The Berlin Premiere of Gluck’s Iphigénie en Aulide in 1809: An Opera to Restore the Monarchy and the Nation

Abstract

After devastatingly defeating Prussian forces in 1806, Emperor Napoleon’s forces occupied Berlin, reduced Prussia’s territories, and forced King Friedrich Wilhelm III into exile. When the king returned to Berlin in 1809, the Nationaltheater staged Christoph Willibald von Gluck’s Iphigénie en Aulide (1774) in German translation as part of a larger dynastic celebration. On the one hand, these festivities attempted to restore a monarchical power structure. On the other hand, the staging of Gluck’s French opera represented a desire to appropriate Gluck’s works within a changing Prussian-German nationalist discourse. In particular, the writings of E. T. A. Hoffmann, J. D. Sander, and others sought to capture the Teutonic nature of Gluck’s ‘reform operas’. Drawing upon primary sources and recent research, this article demonstrates the manner in which this performance of Iphigénie en Aulide represents a confluence of political, cultural, and nationalist ideologies in the midst of a German national identity crisis.