Art of war: Austrian composer Alban Berg drew inspiration for his apocalyptic opera Wozzeck (Met Live in HD broadcast), when he attended a production of the drama Woyzeck, a German play left incomplete by Georg Büchner at his death. Berg constructed his libretto for the production while on leave from his regiment in World War I, and became obsessed with completing the three-act work as a way of processing his experience. In a letter home, he wrote: “There is a little bit of me in his character, since I have been spending these war years just as dependent on people I hate, have been in chains, sick, captive, resigned, in fact, humiliated.”
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ARTS Pick: Wozzeck
