The Existentialist Divide

One of the reasons that people see opera is that they see characters that represent the "grand existentialist divide" — people that recognize fully that they are out of tune with their time and society but are willing to go their doom with zero fucks and zero qualms.

The prototypes are Lulu, Carmen, Violetta, and of course, the ur-prototype, Don Giovanni.

Repent - NO, Repent - NO, Repent - NO.

So he stands existentially. He is who he is.

That's Carmen. Better to be dead than subservient. Never ever is the only game in town!

Puccini made a career out of this, of course. However there must be something that draws us back to these characters again and again. The psychology should be completely straightforward. They are enacting on stage something that we continuously fail to do in our own lives.

Hence Brunnhilde. Her epic transgression against the gods - that costs her everything (and the gods!) is but a correlative for the inner lives of people that desire it but fail to enact it?

Aah, opera!