‘Divadlo nesmí býti lidu komedií’: Leoš Janácek a Národní divadlo v Brne / ‘Theatre music not be comedy for the people’: Leoš Janácek and the National Theatre in Brno by Jiri Zahrádka (review)

This is a most welcome book—and a beautifully produced one too. Jiří Zahrádka has already published several important new editions of major works by Janáček, including The Excursions of Mr Brouček and The Cunning Little Vixen (for Universal Edition) and the Glagolitic Mass (for Bärenreiter). His excellent new book is a bi-lingual production, with the text in Czech and English, and the design is such that this is always simple to navigate. (It also has the advantage of providing Anglo-phone readers with access to the original sources in Czech.) Zahrádka provides an impressive general account of Janáček’s relations with the Brno National Theatre, but it’s one that also includes important material that has not been published before. The book includes sections on Janáček as a critic at the theatre, Janáček as a member of its Družstvo (management committee), Janáček as a visitor to performances, Janáček’s operas on the stage of the Brno National Theatre, and his works in concerts given by the theatre’s orchestra. The final chapter on ‘The Brno National Theatre’s Farewell to Janáček’ is a touching and extremely well-documented account of the composer’s funeral.

The most original aspect of the book concerns Zahrádka’s research on the Družstvo—the administration—of the theatre. What he reveals about Janáček’s relationship to and connection with the Brno National Theatre Družstvo is a topic of fundamental significance to the early performance history of his operas, and the wealth of unpublished sources (especially minutes of meetings) and little-known newspaper articles adds greatly to our knowledge of the subject.

The substantial chapter on Janáček’s operas produced at the theatre covers a story that is far better known, but Zahrádka’s treatment is a valuable addition to the Janáček literature, above all thanks to his inclusion of carefully chosen newspaper reports and reviews, presenting a rich array of writings from the time that allow for a fuller understanding of the early reception history of Janáček’s operatic masterpieces. The chapters on Janáček’s work as a critic and performances of his orchestral works by the orchestra of the National Theatre are both similarly impressive in terms of detail and insight. Incidentally, the music presented for the first time anywhere by this orchestra includes several of Janáček’s most important works for the concert hall, notably Taras Bulba and the Glagolitic Mass; the chapter on its concerts makes for absorbing reading, enhanced by numerous illustrations. The final chapter on Janáček’s operatic funeral (the final scene of The Cunning Little Vixen)is not only informative but given a moving description.

The numerous photographs, facsimiles, and other illustrations add considerably to the value of this book. They are beautifully reproduced in colour, and have been chosen with great care to animate and elaborate Zahrádka’s text. While many of the people illustrated may be familiar names in the Janáček story, it is delightful to discover what they look like, and to put faces to names. The illustrations of sets, programmes, and posters are superb—of a very high quality (though in an ideal world some of them would be larger; but that is to nitpick).

With its detailed presentation of both written and pictorial sources—many of them unfamiliar—this is a book that should be of interest to at least two groups of readers: enthusiasts and admirers of Janáček’s music are likely to find much here that will fascinate and inform; and scholars—both of Jan...