Opera in two acts
Libretto by Hans-Ulrich Treichel, based on
Theodor Fontane's „Oceane von Parceval“
First performed on 28th April, 2019 at the Deutsche Oper Berlin

 

Oceane's otherness breaks into the well-ordered world of a Baltic seaside resort and provokes both almost aggressive rejection and deepest fascination. She longs for closeness and love, but at the same time feels a deep connection to a world that lies beyond the human. And in the end, nothing is as alien to her as those who want to be close to her ... 

The “mysterious woman from the sea”, vainly attempting to fit into human society, was a source of inspiration for writers, composers and artists alike throughout the 19th century. Theodor Fontane, too, tried his hand at the subject matter: Oceane von Parceval, a fragment of an unfinished novella, was just one of his attempts to encapsulate in the form of Melusine the sense of menace and fascination felt by a bourgeois, male-dominated society faced with femininity coupled with an archaic, erotically permissive artlessness. With Fontane, Oceane’s inability to sympathise with human destinies serves to amplify her alienness. She is indifferent to death and love alike, and as such her attempt to have a relationship with a young landowner, Martin von Diercksen, is doomed to failure.

One of the most successful opera directors working today returned to the Deutsche Oper Berlin for the premiere of OCEANE in 2019. Canadian Robert Carsen has worked at the world’s major opera houses for the last thirty years. At the Deutsche Oper Berlin he has staged Verdi’s MACBETH, Strauss’s ARIADNE ON NAXOS and most recently Prokofiev’s THE LOVE FOR THREE ORANGES.