The title of Janáček’s penultimate opera, Věc Makropulos, actually means The Makropulos Thing; the word ‘case’ in the usual English translation is slightly misleading. It’s true the opera involves a certain amount of legal wrangling, but the ‘thing’ of the Czech title refers to the longevity draught consumed by the heroine, and not to the events in Act One, which takes place in a barrister’s(?) chambers.
Based on a play by Karel Čapek, which Čapek styled a comedy, Janáček’s libretto veers away, for the greater part, from the ‘comic’ and makes the central figure – the diva Emilia Marty – a more sympathetic figure than did the playwright.
The work has a certain poignancy since, given the composer’s one-sided fixation with the much younger Kamila Stösslová, it concerns a femme fatale who has the secret of eternal youth and has lived for over three hundred years, but in the process has lost the capacity to reciprocate or even possess any human emotions.
0:00 Act 1
35:00 Act 2
1:04:35 Act 3
← Back to page 8
← Back to page 7
← Back to page 6
← Back to page 5
← Back to page 4
← Back to page 3
← Back to page 2
← Back to page 1
Any copyrighted material on these pages is included as “fair use”, for the purpose of study, and critical analysis only, and will be removed at the request of the copyright owner(s).
The Art of Listening 