| Having seen the performance, I must agree that "Der Zwerg" represents the best of "message" opera (which was due in no small part to the acting talents of the African-american tenor, Rodrick Dixon, who sang the title role.) It is a production that well deserves to be repeated throughout the world. Although based on a play by Oscar Wilde in which the symbolism of the forced self-hatred of the dwarf represents the dilemma of the homosexual of his era, it takes on entirely new meaning in Zemlinsky`s opera, where the destructiveness of self-hatred is more universal. |
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