Blanche Neige
by Robert Walser, directed by Sylvie Reteuna
« Feelings are darts which wound me. What can one do with feelings, apart from letting them wriggle and die like fish in the sands of language? I’ll be finished too as soon as I stop writing, and I’m glad about that. Good night »… Robert Walser
« Walser’s Snow White starts where the Grimm brothers fairy tale ends, just before “they lived happily ever after”… to endlessly question the story of love and hate which is the story of humanity. It is an early work, but in it we find the themes which were at the heart of the writings and life of Robert Walser… Robert Walser was a German speaking Swiss writer, who died on Christmas day in 1956 while on a solitary walk in the snow, at the age of 78 and after 23 years confinement in the Herisau asylum. Fifty years earlier, Walser had described the death of a poet in the snow in his novel the Tanner children, that is to say, apart from a few details, his own death. » Sylvie Reteuna
Text : Robert Walser / Directed by : Sylvie Reteuna / Translation and adaptation : Nicolas Luçon / Designer : Pierre-André Weitz / Light designer : Jean-Claude Fonkenel / Music : Eric Sterenfeld / Video : Kate France / Stage manager : Pierre-yves Aplincourt / Assistant : Elise Lahouassa / Lighting assistant : Pierre Godard / Set construction : Bertrand Killy / Costumes : Sophie Hampe / Administration : Christine Tournecuillert – Conduite accompagné / performed by: Aurélia Arto, Olav Benevsedt, Claude Degliame, Eram Sobhani and with the participation of Marc Mérigot
Coproduction : La Sibylle / le Vivat, scène conventionnée danse et théâtre d’Armentières / Le Bateau Feu, scène nationale de Dunkerque / l’Hippodrome, scène nationale de Douai / a la Rose des Vents, scène nationale Lille Métropole / with financial support from la Région Nord Pas-de-Calais , l’ADAMI, la DRAC Nord Pas-de-Calais / Ministère de la culture et de la communication / The company’s residence at le Vivat was funded by the “dispositif d’aide à la résidence de la région Nord Pas-de-Calais”.
First performed from 2nd to 4th April 2009 at le Vivat, Armentières / toured to: Théâtre de la Bastille in the festival TRANS 09, organised by Jean-Michel Rabeux and Clara Rousseau, Théâtre de l’Etoile du Nord à Paris in the festival « On n’arrête pas le théâtre “, l’Hippodrome, scène nationale de Douai, Bateau Feu, scène nationale de Dunkerque, la Rose des Vents, scène nationale Lille Métropole, l’Espace Jules Verne de Brétigny, scène conventionnée du Val d’Orge.
