Theatre
Szökött katona
Not translated into English
Ede Szigligeti · 1843
Synopsis
Recruiters arrive in the village of Szentmiklós. The notary Gémesi, who covets Julcsa, an orphan, threatens the widow Korpádiné with having her son Gergely conscripted if she does not hand the girl over to him; the mother gives in, and Gergely, an honest son and Julcsa's fiancé, is taken away by force despite his protests. A soldier against his will, he deserts and finds himself among the condemned. In Milan, during a masked ball, a countess hears her name spoken and faints.
Context
In 1843, Endre Bartay, director of the National Theatre of Pest, offered a prize of fifty gold pieces for a spectacular play drawn from the life of the Hungarian people, capable of raising the taste of the public. Szigligeti's play was chosen and premiered on 25 November 1843, with music by József Szerdahelyi, in which folk songs and airs in a popular style are mixed. Receipts from the first performances reached an exceptional level for the theatre. The text appeared the following year with Geibel, under the title of an original play in three parts.
Who it is for
Three parts interspersed with songs, set between a village, Milan and Pest; no French or English translation has been located.
Prizes and reception
A triumph from its first staging, and the play with which the népszínmű, the popular play, was born in Hungary.
Sources for this page 4
The pages consulted to check this page.