What does it tell us about the Kostelnička’s back story?ĬG: As a young woman, the Kostelnička had great hopes for the future. YG: Gabriela Preissová’s novel Její pastorkyňa ( Her Stepdaughter) inspired Janáček’s Jenůfa. While appreciating the mood and music of the opera, we also want audiences to realize the universality of the story. YG: So you could say that, while telling a very clear and realistic story, the opera also functions as a parable, looking outside and beyond itself.ĬG: That is the core of our interpretation. Because a lot went wrong for her in her earlier life, she tries to overfulfil the rules, even committing murder in the process. The figure of the Kostelnička is a case in point. Jenůfa illustrates how huge social pressure to conform can bring about the complete downfall of an outsider, someone who stands outside the norm. It’s an interesting notion, and one that’s deeply rooted in this opera.įor all our metropolitan, liberal and enlightened views, we are continually forced up against the fact that – irrespective of the direction we later take – we are shaped by a pre-existing moral code which tells us what is right and wrong and how we should live our lives. It’s as though all the force and frenzy we apply to blocking it actually summon it into being. Once a problem or a failing has manifested itself, it seems inescapable that the same problem will be passed on from generation to generation, like a family curse. YG: How are we to understand Jenůfa? Is it a Milieustück – a drama about a specific community?ĬG: During the rehearsal process, again and again we noticed that singers as well as members of the production team came up against themes they recognized from their own lives, a particularly striking example being the kind of repetitive impulse that’s seen in certain family histories.
That completely subverts the cliché that his works are purely naturalistic representations of reality. I am also hugely interested in Janáček’s extensive use – in his setting of the text as well as in the music itself – of insistence and repetition, forever ratcheting up the tension. This strikes me as very modern, very contemporary. What interests you about his music?Ĭlaus Guth: Janáček’s style is minimalistic in that it articulates only what is necessary to produce the maximum emotion.
Yvonne Gebauer: You’ve directed just over a hundred operas, but none by Janáček before. (Abridged from a fuller discussion, featured in the Royal Opera House production programme) Jenůfa Director Claus Guth in conversation with Dramaturg Yvonne Gebauer
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