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Fairies in Opera, Part 4 - Worlds Apart - Page 3

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In Act II, Ada flouts her heritage by desiring to remain with the mortals. She returns to Arindal, against the fairy king's wishes, with a new agenda now imposed upon her by her ruler: Whatever she does, Arindal must not curse her, or she will be turned to stone. Temporarily stripped of her fairy powers, she is at the mercy of the worst the fairy king can do to manipulate her into seeming hateful. First, she is made to throw Arindal's two children into a fire before her husband's very eyes, and then one of the Tramondian soldiers, Harald, rushes in to say that she is the wicked woman who had just led the opposing forces to slaughter his men. Arindal shouts, "Verruchtes Weib, sei denn verflucht!" - "Heinous woman, I curse you!" and Frazana and Zemina gloatingly appear to tell Ada that she must now remain a fairy. Only now is she permitted to explain who she is and why Arindal has had to endure such torments: for in fact, the children are safe, and the war has been won by his own forces. Though his people in Tramond are joyous at their victory and the restoration of their king, Arindal goes mad from having lost Ada again, and to such horrendous trickery. Ada is indeed turned to stone.

Act III finds a magician, Groma, intervening (where he was all this time, ah, we mustn't ask...). He serves the purpose of a good fairy, equipping Arindal with a shield, a sword, and a lyre, each of which has magical powers for, coincidentally, exactly what the mad king is then confronted with; Frazana and Zemina's worst is undone, one by one, by these instruments. The lyre, to which Orpheus-like accompaniment Arindal serenades the statue- of his wife ("O ihr, des Busens Hochgefühle" - "O you, deep rapture of my heart") melts the stone back into being Ada. The scene is instantly transformed into a vision of fairyland: Because his love -- despite his being a "mere" human -- has shined through these many trials, Arindal has been granted immortality by the flommoxed fairy king, and he is invited to dwell forever in Ada's supernatural home. Sanity restored, Arindal doesn't have to think twice about abdicating his earthly throne to live in fairyland, leaving Tramond to the trusted care of his sister Lora and her husband, Morald (again, not to be confused with the bad guy, Murold). Now that good-fairy qualities have been bestowed upon him, Arindal ends the opera with the promise that the people of Tramond will be happy and prosperous, "denn ich beschütze euche!" - "for I shall be watching over you!"

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