Search - Jean Teitgen, Marie-Adeline Henry, Veronique Gens :: Camille Saint-Saens: Proserpine

The protagonist of Saint-Saëns' Proserpine, premiered at the Opéra-Comique on March 14, 1887, is no reincarnation of the ancient goddess, but a Renaissance courtesan well versed in culpable amours. According to the composer, she is a ""damned soul for whom true love is a forbidden fruit; as soon as she approaches it, she experiences torture"". Yet for all the innocence of her rival Angiola, the unexpected happens: ""It is the bloodthirsty beast that is admirable; the sweet creature is no more than pretty and likeable."" Visibly enraptured by this delight in horror, Saint-Saëns indulges in unprecedented orchestral modernity, piling on the dissonances beneath his characters' cries of rage or despair. He concluded thus: ""Proserpine is, of all my stage works, the most advanced in the Wagnerian system."" The least-known, too, and one which it was high time to reveal to the public, in its second version, revised in 1899.