Werther

Werther Jules Massenet Opéra Bastille Duration: 2h50 with 1 interval Language: French Surtitles: French / English “Werther caused more suicides than the most beautiful woman in the world,” wrote Madame de Staël.

Indeed, Goethe’s first novel, The Sorrows of Young Werther, published in 1774, was a literary and aesthetic shock for an entire generation, foreshadowing Romanticism.

Composed a century later, at the end of the 19th century, Jules Massenet’s opera draws on the novel and dissects the experience of romantic love. ” A pinnacle of French opera, the work returns to the Opéra national de Paris in a new production.

Wishing to restore the epistolary form of Goethe’s novel to its full place, Robert Carsen puts literature at the centre of his staging, setting the action in an immense library. ) Laurent Naouri The Bailiff Christophe Mortagne Schmidt