The Cunning
Little Vixen is a three-act opera by Leos Janacek (1854-1928) who wrote both
the libretto and the score. It is very much a fantasy opera, in that it
combines human and animal characters, and it is a strange mix of comedy and
tragedy.
The Cunning
Little Vixen
The opera
received its premiere at Brno (now in the Czech Republic) on 6th
November 1924. Written in the regional Czech dialect, it was not easily
understood even by Czechs from Prague
Janacek was
impressed by a series of the newspaper articles written by Rudolf Tesnolidek
and, with the latter’s permission, wrote his libretto about the circle of life
as it affects both the human and animal world.
Act 1
The opening
scene is a shady spot in the woods where insects and animals dance in the heat.
A forester enters and lies down for a nap. A frog jumps on him and wakes him,
but instead of the frog he catches the young vixen (female fox) that had been
chasing the frog, and takes her away.
The second
scene is outside the forester’s cottage, where the vixen is miserable and
refuses to be comforted by the forester’s pet dachshund dog. When the forester’s
son teases the vixen she bites him, and is tied up and left alone all night as
a punishment. During the night the vixen appears to change into a human girl,
but is a vixen again by the morning.
In the
morning, the chickens are fed and strut around where the vixen is tied. She
harangues them and exhorts them to rise up and not be dominated by either men
or cockerels. However, they do not respond and the vixen starts to bite off
their heads. When the forester and his wife rush out, the vixen snaps her chain
and runs off.
Act 2
In Scene 1,
set in the forest, the vixen taunts a badger who goes off in a huff, leaving
the vixen to take over his earth.
Scene 2 is
set in the village inn. The forester, the schoolmaster, the innkeeper and the parson
engage in banter that is mainly concerned with the characters’ luck with the
opposite sex, but when it turns to mockery of the forester for losing the
vixen, he gets cross and storms out.
Scene 3 is
the wood at night, not far from the inn. The vixen is hiding behind a sunflower
when the schoolmaster comes along, clearly the worse for drink. He sees the
vixen and mistakes her for Terinka, his long-lost gypsy love. However, as he
moves forward he trips over a small fence and lies prone.
Next, the parson
comes along, also having drunk a bit too much. He also sees the vixen and he
also confuses her with Terinka, with whom he had had an affair in his youth.
The schoolmaster gets up and he and the parson grab each other when the forester
comes along with his gun because they don’t trust his aim, even though he says
he is trying to shoot the vixen.
Scene 4 is
set at the entrance to the vixen’s earth, where she meets a dog fox and they
fall in love, overheard by an owl and a dragonfly. They go off into her earth
and when they return they announce that they must get married straight away,
the ceremony being conducted by a woodpecker in the company of all the woodland
animals.
Act 3
Scene 1 is in
the forest, as Harasta the poacher comes along and finds a freshly killed hare
on the ground. He is about to pick it up when the forester appears and taunts
Harasta about still being unmarried. Harasta replies by saying that he is about
to marry Terinka, whom everybody, including the married forester, seems to have
an eye for. Harasta goes off laughing while the forester sets a trap for the
foxes.
When he
leaves, the foxes and all their cubs arrive. The cubs dance and their parents
speculate on how many more cubs they will have. When they hear Harasta
approaching they all hide apart from the vixen, who pretends to be injured so
that she can lead the poacher away from the cubs. Harasta trips and falls, and
when he gets up he sees the cubs pulling his booty of poultry from his bag. He
fires his gun and the vixen is killed.
Scene 2 is in
the garden of the inn, where the forester tells the schoolmaster that the
foxes’ earth seems to be deserted, so he can never get his wife the fox-fur
muff he had promised her. The schoolmaster tells him that Terinka is getting
married today, and, says the Innkeeper’s wife, will be getting a muff. The forester
and schoolmaster console each other that Terinka was right for neither of them.
They hear that the parson has left the district but is homesick.
Scene 3 is in
the clearing where the opera opened. The forester muses on how there are never
endings but only constant beginnings, and how this lesson is best learned in
the forest with its ever-changing cycles of birth, death and renewal. He sees a
fox cub and says that he will catch the cub and make a better job of looking
after it than he did its mother. He moves to catch the cub, but finds a frog in
his hand instead. Thus the wheel has come full cycle.
To summarise
The Cunning
Little Vixen tells a charming bitter-sweet story, made sad by the death of the
title character but with an uplifting motif in the reformation of the human
characters who are able to learn to be better people because of the actions of
the animals. Although it may appear on the surface that the two worlds go their
own way, the audience is left with the impression that they are connected at an
almost mystical level, with the vixen and the unseen gypsy, Terinka, being
incarnations of the same unattainable being.
It has the
general air of a fairy tale, so the suspension of disbelief that is required to
accept humans and animals singing to each other is not difficult to achieve.
Janacek’s music is delightful and tuneful, and there are many opportunities for
imaginative staging and costumes. This is therefore an excellent choice of
opera for children to view as well as adults.
© John
Welford
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