ParsifalNew production

Three months before the end of his tumultuous life, Richard Wagner wrote words of bitter resignation, as well as profound recognition: “Who could look all his life long with an open mind and a free heart at this world of murder and theft, organised and legalised through lying, deception and hypocrisy, without having to turn away, shuddering in disgust? Whence then would one avert one’s gaze?” The first sentence refers to the content and meaning of his monumental tetralogy Der Ring des Nibelungen, a parable about a world in which the gods and mortals alike pursue devastating conflicts, striving to attain their selfish interests. In the second sentence, Wagner alludes to his final music drama, Parsifal, dating from 1882, in which, again in the form of parable, he exposes humanity’s age-long demise and suggests human regeneration through forgoing egoistic endeavours, giving way to compassion, understanding and reducing the suffering of all living beings. Wagner based his work, which he did not describe as an opera but “a stage-consecration festival play”, on Wolfram von Eschenbach’s medieval epic poem Parzival, about the knights of the Holy Grail, which he, however, profoundly transformed in the spirit of his singular, immensely mystical and metaphorical conception, influenced by Arthur Schopenhauer’s philosophy and Buddhist thoughts. The bleeding wound of King Amfortas symbolises human life driven by insatiable desire, which is personified by the mysterious woman Kundry, while Parsifal himself represents the “pure fool”, a compassionate and selfless simpleton who is the only one able to heal Amfortas’s wound…

The internationally renowned German stage director Andreas Homoki has decided to create his very first production of Wagner’s Parsifal in Prague, thus it comes as no surprise that he also drew inspiration from the illustrious local Kafka tradition.