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will be dead by the end of the play.26 In Strauss's opera it is also used ironically, as part of a love duet between brother and sister, when the two prepare for murder. Their symbolic marriage will be achieved through the ritual of vengeance and Elektra sings this makarismos, which besides expressing her love, serves as a paean for victory: |
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Der ist selig, der seine Tat zu tun kommt,
selig der, der ihn ersehnt,
selig, der ihn erschaut.
Selig, wer ihn erkennt,
selig, wer ihn berührt.
Selig, wer ihm das Beil aus der Erde grabt,
selig, wer ihm die Fackel hält,
selig, selig, wer ihm öffnet die Tür.27 |
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Blessed is he who comes to perform his deed,
blessed is the one who longs for him,
blessed who sees him,
blessed who recognizes him,
blessed who touches him.
Blessed who digs up the axe for him,
blessed the one who holds the torch for him,
blessed who opens the door for him. |
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This blasphemous yet evocative litany is well greeted by the Paidagogos, who asks if the two are mad, since a sound might set off the alarm. This is also in Sophokles, and gives us a moment of opera buffa in a long opera seria. The incantation is equivalent to the prayers uttered in Aischylos' Choephoroi (246ff. and passim), besides being reminiscent of prayers used in the Catholic mass. Here in Hofmannsthal's ritualistic text, Apollo is joined by Christ, and religion endorses the revolutionary coup. |
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The entire opera can be read along the lines of the mass with Introit, Offertory, Communion and Alleluia. Victims are offered to quell Klytemnestra's dreams. It is said another victim will bring her nightmares to an end. She will be the victim, the agnus offered to the deus. The blood of the victims is turned into the wine of vengeance. After the sacrifice Elektra dances her alleluia, and the ritual ends: ite missa est. Elektra goes through her own death and transfiguration. |
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The ritual continues in the opera following Klytemnestra's death as Aigisthos is lured to his death by Elektra dancing. She accompanies him into the house as a bacchant would, with a blazing torch and dance. Aigisthos |
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26 For the general use of the makarismos, and also its ironic use in the plays of Euripides, see McDonald (1978) 17174. |
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27 Hofmannsthal (1990) 105. This litany is reminiscent of the Catholic mass, which Thomas Murphy in his Sanctuary Lamp used along with the Oresteia to color his own theme of vengeance and resolution, see McDonald (1991) 17185. |
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