LIBRETTO OF THE OPERA THE MAGIC FLUTE BY W. A. MOZART IN THE GENRE OF FAIRY-TALE

Abstract

The Magic Flute by W. A. Mozart occupies a special place in the treasury of the world musical art. The article for the first time explores the specifics of the embodiment of the genre model of the fairy-tale underlying the libretto. The reconstruction of its basic, static and dynamic elements is based on methodological approaches developed in the study of folk and literary fairy-tales. The analysis of the verbal text of the opera demonstrates: canonized set of personages that possess the definite semantic functions in the plot-syntagmatic line, invariant fairytale situations, typical parameters of the fairy-tale space-time continuum. In the semantics of the fairy-tale by W. A. Mozart the categories of paths (wanderings), trials, value indicators and the totemic rite of initiation acquire conceptual meaning. The plot line of the libretto, as well as of the fairy-tale, reflects the theme of marriage and family relations but in the cosmic foreshortening. The deep symbolic paradigm witnesses the mythical, cosmogonic gist of the fairy-tale plot. The semiotic model of the artistic world of the fairy-tale singspiel is organized by the binary oppositions of Light and Darkness. Darkness is metaphorically personified in the anthropomorphic image of the fundamental constant of being — Queen of the Night. The world of the sage Zarastro personifies Light. In the verbal artistic text of the opera the composer and the librettist exhibit deep and bright knowledge of the genre canons of the classical folk and literary fairy-tale and reflect the idea of the spiritual search of perfection in the world.