The World's Most Famous Operas: Pelléas and Mélisande

Music by: Claude Debussy (1862–1918)
Rendered into Arabic by: Samir Shikhani

An opera in five acts, adapted from a play by Maurice Maeterlinck
First produced in Paris in 1902

The Characters:
• Mélisande
• Golaud, grandson of King Arkel
• Pelléas, Golaud's brother
• Geneviève, mother of Golaud and Pelléas
• Arkel, King of Allemonde
• Yniold, Golaud's son
• A physician
• Servants, sailors...

Time: the Middle Ages
Place: the kingdom of Allemonde

Act One

Scene One: A forest.

The setting is an old, gloomy castle standing on the seacoast, in an imaginary land. In a legendary forest Golaud, grandson of the aged King Arkel, has strayed far from his home while hunting. In the midst of this forest he comes, near a spring, upon a girl with long blond hair and childlike features. She answers his questions curtly, hesitantly, and in vague phrases; she does not reveal to him her true self, nor tell him where she has come from, but she does mention that her name is Mélisande. Golaud is bewitched by this fairy creature who has appeared to him out of the unknown; he murmurs that he too is lost, and leads her away as the curtain falls.

Scene Two: A hall in the castle.

Six months have passed, and here is Geneviève, Golaud's mother, reading to his grandfather, the aged King Arkel, a letter from him addressed to his brother Pelléas, in which he describes how he met Mélisande in the forest and, though knowing nothing of her past, married her. He believes his family will not welcome him and his strange bride if the two of them come home; but if they forgive him this deed, he asks his younger brother to set a lamp in the castle tower where he can see it from the deck of his ship. If he sees no lamp in the tower, he will sail far away and never return. The old king cannot help saying that it is not for human beings to meddle in one another's destinies, and he permits Golaud's return home.

Scene Three: The castle garden.

On a terrace outside the castle, overlooking the sea, Mélisande complains to Geneviève of the darkness of the forests surrounding the castle. Every spot in that land is dark in her eyes — she, a daughter of light. Pelléas comes and joins them, and the talk among them turns to a storm that nature is brewing. The wings of night begin to descend, and Geneviève goes out, leaving Pelléas and Mélisande alone. Pelléas tells her that he is leaving tomorrow; Mélisande is astonished and asks him why he is going.

Act Two

Scene One: A fountain in the garden surrounding the castle.

It is noon, and Pelléas and Mélisande sit on the marble rim of the fountain, resting after her wanderings through the garden. Like a child, Mélisande tosses her wedding ring into the air and catches it, time after time, until she misses it and it falls into the fountain. She cries: “Oh, we shall never be able to find it. What shall we say to Golaud?” Pelléas answers her: “The truth, the truth!” But Golaud never learned the truth, so greatly did Mélisande fear him.

Scene Two: A room in the castle.

Golaud lies in bed, his horse having stumbled under him at the very moment Mélisande's ring fell into the fountain. Mélisande stands beside his bed, and he asks her gently why she weeps continually — has anyone treated her harshly? Or does she wish to leave him? She answers no, saying that what troubles her is the darkness and gloom that hang over the castle, where she sees the sun only rarely. As Golaud takes her hands in his, he discovers that the ring is gone. This distresses him greatly, and Mélisande tells him she lost it in the grotto by the shore. He bids her go at once to search for it before night unfurls its banners.

Scene Three: A grotto on the shore.

Pelléas and Mélisande grope slowly through the darkness along the path leading to the entrance of the strange cave. Suddenly the moon breaks from behind the clouds, revealing three old men asleep at the mouth of the cave. Pelléas tells her this is because of the famine in the land. But Mélisande trembles with fear and wishes to go back the way she came, saying: “Let us go — we can come back another day!”

Act Three

Scene One: One of the castle towers.

Mélisande, at a window of one of the castle towers, is combing her beautiful long blond hair. Pelléas passes beneath the balcony, and the moonlit night works its effect upon their feelings. He begs Mélisande to give him her hand, for he must depart on the morrow. She stretches out her hand to him, leaning out of the window, and the end of her hair brushes Pelléas's head. He winds it about his neck, and they exchange murmurs in a tender, stirring, quiet song of love. Golaud arrives and finds them thus, and says: “Do you not know how late it is? It is nearly midnight.” And he laughs nervously, repeating: “What children you are!”

Scene Two: The vaults of the castle.

Golaud has led his brother Pelléas down into the damp, dark, dismal vaults beneath the castle. Pelléas's hands tremble in this fearful, suffocating place as Golaud points out how easily one might fall into the abyss — but he does not say that such a fate awaits the man who loves his wife, even if that man is his own brother. True, he never says it at all; but everything hints at it.

Scene Three: A terrace before the castle.

Golaud and Pelléas emerge from the dark vaults, and Pelléas expresses his relief at breathing the fresh air once more, pointing out that the children are running down to the shore to swim, while he can see Mélisande and his mother together inside the castle tower. Golaud warns him against long meetings with Mélisande.

Scene Four: A terrace before Mélisande's tower in the castle.

Golaud is on the terrace with his small son Yniold, the fruit of an earlier marriage. He questions him about Pelléas and Mélisande; but all he can learn is that they meet often, that they speak of him, that they weep, and that they seem afraid. Golaud lifts the boy high so that he can look into the room. The innocent child soon reports to his wretched, tormented father that Pelléas and Mélisande are together, silent, gazing at the light. The child grows frightened and begs his father to put him down. And so Golaud goes off, deeply shaken, having learned nothing.

Act Four

Scene One: A room in the castle.

Pelléas and Mélisande meet briefly in one of the castle rooms, and he announces to her his resolve to depart the following day, saying she will never see him again after that. They agree to meet one last time that night in the garden. They part, and only moments later the aged King Arkel enters in Mélisande's company, speaking to her of a smiling future in words that breathe reassurance. Presently Golaud arrives in the strangest state of rage and fury; he pushes his wife aside and orders her to bring him his sword, then lays it aside and begins to interrogate her.

He speaks of her apparent innocence — an innocence that seems to hide secrets. He grows agitated and troubled, his anger shows, and he forces Mélisande to her knees, then seizes her hair cruelly, wrenching her head right and left with a violence and roughness that drive King Arkel to intervene, crying: “Golaud!” Golaud draws back, feigning a magnanimity he does not feel. But he departs, saying: “Do as you please — I am old, and I shall wait.” As for poor Mélisande, she speaks for the first time, repeating: “He does not love me... I am wretched!”

Scene Two: The fountain in the garden.

That night Pelléas and Mélisande meet for the last time in the garden, by the fountain. Pelléas tells her that he is compelled to leave her because he loves her, and she murmurs: “I love you too.” That was her first and only confession of love, uttered in a whisper. And the happiness they knew was a brief happiness, for the hour is late and danger presses close; the castle gates are shut, and they sense that Golaud too is in the garden, watching them. He is there, wrapped in darkness, his sword drawn. They embrace without turning toward him. Golaud falls upon his brother Pelléas and deals him a mortal blow. Terror runs through Mélisande's limbs and she turns to flee, and Golaud pursues her in his fury without uttering a word.

Act Five

The Scene: A room in the castle.

Mélisande is on her deathbed, and the physician tells Golaud that the slight wound he inflicted on her is not the cause of her dying. But Golaud refuses all consolation, and drags himself in bitter remorse to her bed, asking to be left alone with her. He asks her whether she loved Pelléas; she answers yes, and asks where he is. Golaud asks her whether her love was an impure love, and she answers no. But Golaud does not believe her, and torments himself with doubts and suspicions. Mélisande feels cold; she thinks winter is coming, and says how she hates it. King Arkel enters and places her infant child in her arms, but Mélisande is too weak to embrace it. Six women come quietly into the room and kneel beside the bed. Soon the physician perceives that Mélisande has passed to the other world. Golaud bursts into anguished weeping, and the king takes up the child and carries it out of the room, saying sorrowfully to Golaud: “Now let this child live!”