Manfred (Byron)

This most theatrical of the four ‘unstageable’ Romantic verse-dramas in this collection repertoire touched a nerve all over Europe, inspiring great music from Schumann and Tchaikovsky. Byron’s description was typically detached: “It is of a very wild, metaphysical and inexplicable kind. Almost all of the persons are spirits, the scene is in the Alps, and the hero is a kind of magician, dominated by a species of remorse…”

Tip: we divided Manfred’s long part between three readers of different ages, wearing identical shirts.

Zip file of everything

Programme

Script

Slides

Music

  • CD track listing: PDF
  • Script annotated with musical items: PDF

Further reading

  • The plot and supernatural machinery: Word file