about the Performance
The opera La Bohème by Giacomo Puccini is one of his best works. At one time, this creation was not accepted by critics, moreover, it was predicted to have short-lived fame. However, the opera has passed through the centuries and is now successfully staged at the leading theater venues in the world. Anyone who decides to order tickets for the opera “La Bohème” at the Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Theater staged by Alexander Titel can be convinced of the genius of Puccini’s work.
The libretto for La Bohème was written according to novel of the same name Henri Murger, but in the production the story is not told directly, but as a memory of something that is gone forever. In general, at its core storyline lies the story of the inhabitants of one of the poorest areas of Paris - bohemians, as students and poor people without work were then called. Throughout the entire play, two pairs of young people sort out their relationship with each other. The ending of the story is sad - the death of one of the heroines, Mimi, over whose body her beloved Rudolf sobs.
Without exaggeration, we can say that the opera “La Bohème” at the Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Theater, for which our ticket agency offers to buy tickets, is a real pearl and decoration of the theater’s repertoire. It has everything that delights the modern viewer - perfect music, a touching plot and excellent acting. You can order tickets for this opera from us online or by phone.
The duration of the performance is 2 hours 20 minutes (with one intermission).
Composer Giacomo Puccini
Libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa
Musical director and stage conductor Wolf Gorelick
Conductor Felix Korobov
Stage director Alexander Titel
Production designer Yuri Ustinov
Costume designer Irina Akimova
Lighting designer Ildar Bederdinov
Genre Opera
Number of acts 4
Language of execution: Italian
Original title La Boheme
Duration 2 hours 20 minutes (one intermission)
Premiere date 01/07/1996
Age limit 12+
The performance is a laureate of the Russian National Theater Prize "Golden Mask"1997 in 2 nominations (" best job director"; "best female role" - Olga Guryakova).
Ticket price: from 1500 to 4000 rubles.
Conductor - Felix Korobov
Rudolf - Chingis Ayusheev, Nazhmiddin Mavlyanov, Artem Safronov
Mimi - Khibla Gerzmava, Elena Guseva, Natalya Petrozhitskaya
Marseille - Dmitry Zuev, Ilya Pavlov, Alexey Shishlyaev
Musetta - Irina Vashchenko, Maria Pakhar
Schaunard - Andrey Baturkin, Dmitry Stepanovich
Collen - Denis Makarov, Roman Ulybin, Dmitry Ulyanov
Benoit / Alcindor - Vladimir Sistov, Dmitry Stepanovich
Parpignol - Thomas Baum, Vyacheslav Voinarovsky
The action takes place in the cold attic of the poor artist Marcel. Because of his frozen hands, the creator cannot finish his painting “Crossing the Red Sea.” His friend, the writer Rudolf, looks with envy at the smoking chimneys of the roofs of Parisian houses. In order to escape the cold, the guys decide to light the fireplace with at least something. The choice is between Marcel's painting and the first act of Rudolf's work, which he sacrifices for the sake of salvation. The desired warmth enters the room.
The appearance of the third friend is accompanied by comic attacks about the fragility of Rudolf's drama, because the fire consumed the work too quickly. The musician puts it on the table gourmet treats: cheese, wine, cigars and firewood. The comrades are at a loss where poor Schaunard got such wealth. The guy says that he fulfilled the instructions of one Englishman - to play the violin until the death of an annoying parrot, which he did with ease.
The fun is spoiled by the arrival of the owner of the house - Benoit, who decided to once again remind you about the debt for renting an apartment. The company invites the owner to taste the food, thus appeasing him. Talk about love affairs soon forces the owner to loosen up and, in embarrassment, leave the apartment laughing. The guys divide the available money equally and go to their favorite cafe.
There they meet charming Mimi, who asks them to help light her candle. The lights go out and Rudolph and Mimi are left alone in dark room. Frank conversations about love generate fiery feelings in their hearts. They leave the room arm in arm.
Arriving at the Christmas fair, everyone buys gifts for themselves and their loved ones: Schaunard - a horn, Colin - a stack of books, Rudolf - a cap for Mimi. Only Marcel does not spend money, yearning for his ex-lover Musette. The company goes to a cafe, where they meet Musetta, accompanied by a rich suitor Alcindor. Between former lovers the fire of passion flares up again, and after the annoying Alcindor leaves, Musetta and Marcel and the whole company run away from the cafe, leaving unpaid bills to the abandoned guy.
Act II
Morning comes and Mimi comes to Marcel for advice. She confesses her love for Rudolf and shares her fears about their imminent separation. Marcel convinces that it would be best for them to separate, since they are both not ready for serious relationship. Rudolph enters, Mimi hides. Rudolph talks the real reason parting with Mimi - her incurable disease. Mimi, unable to hold back her cough, gives herself away. But the memories of life together do not leave the couple and they decide to postpone separation until spring.
Act III
Several months pass. Marcel and his friend Rudolf are alone in the attic again. Both yearn for their former happiness. Marcel is looking at the portrait of Musetta, and Rudolf is looking at Mimi’s cap. Colin and Schaunard arrive, laying stale bread and herring on the table.
In the midst of the fun, Musetta appears and delivers the sad news: Mimi is dying. Wishing in last time Mimi barely reaches the attic to see her lover. Each of those present is trying to do at least something to alleviate Mimi’s plight. Marcel sells earrings intended for Musetta, and Musetta herself runs for her muff, passing it off as a gift from Rudolf. Mimi falls asleep with a smile on her face. Marcel says that the doctor is about to arrive, but the girl is dying...
– debut performance Vladislav Shuvalov, who found Puccini's production hopelessly festive.
At the end of the 242nd season, the Bolshoi Theater presented Puccini’s opera “ Bohemia” in reading the international composition of directors and artists. The Bolshoi's previous production, dated 1996, directed by Austrian Federik Mirditta and conducted by Slovak Peter Feranec, ran for more than 110 performances (the last one took place a year before the new premiere). The presence of opera in the Bolshoi repertoire has been a routine story since the first production of La Bohème in 1911. But even successfully working stories should be updated sometimes. In fact, it turned out that the previous production differs essentially little from the current one, with the exception of a more aesthetic scenography and historical fact that the director, conductor and singers in the new edition of La Bohème are young people. Due to their age, they should have been expected to be more alert to the material.
The directors of La Bohème often interpret the tone of the bohemian audience as an atmosphere of demonstrative sentimentalism and silly fun, as if afraid to deviate from the stereotype. Meanwhile, modern theater offers different readings. Klaus Guth last year in Paris national opera radically overturned the figurative gallery of “La Bohemes”: a poor artistic company, driven by the disorder of life early XIX century in a cold attic, was locked by Gut literally in a capsule spaceship, plowing the cold expanses of the universe. Lonely cosmonauts, either from a heightened sense of the approaching end, or from lack of oxygen, were visited artistic visions a past or never existing life.
photo: Press service of the Bolshoi Theater
The past and the future are equally distant from their contemporaries, so the traditionalists’ ideas about the bohemians of the century before last turn out to be no less utopian than Guth’s. Including due to overly sentimentalized illusions about the holiday of carefree youth. At the same time, initially, in the sketches of images of bohemia, Balzac and Hugo, as is known, had more of the realistic. Henri Murget, the author of “Scenes from the Life of Bohemia,” with an emphasis on his own biography, described a plot about a previously unheard of and not found anywhere else new stratum of society, whose freedom of creativity and relationships was feared in decent circles, while at the same time admiring them. Neighbor Mimi, who fell in love with the poet Rudolf, was based on Murger's mistress, according to legend, who was very ignoblely abandoned by him to die alone. Librettist Luigi Illica was known as a frondeur, participated in the organization of radical magazines and fought duels, second librettist Giuseppe Giacosa served as a buffer in the clashes between the hot-tempered natures of Puccini and Illica.
Rebellious spirit creative personalities was reduced to the rules of the game of the genre, and few subsequently dared to modernize the immensely romantic opera for all times. Not daring to bring the characters' characters closer to something more lively and imperfect, the directors invariably directed their efforts to touch the audience: with undemanding comedy and sketchy romance in the first act, a boundless carnival in the second, lyrical molasses with a sad ending in the last. Jean-Roman Vesperini, the director-producer of the new La Bohème, who has some experience in dramatic and opera productions in France, is not working in Russia for the first time. He was an assistant to Peter Stein in “Aida,” which had a brilliant run at , and Berlioz’s dramatic legend “The Damnation of Faust,” staged by Stein at the Bolshoi Theater two years ago. Probably during this time Vesperini formed an opinion about the Russian public and the customer’s expectations. He repeatedly voiced the task of aestheticizing Puccini’s opera in the style of the film musical “,” which in itself sounds somewhat strange coming from his mouth opera director, albeit honestly.
The aesthetic bet is as opportunistic as it is little erroneous: in Russia they still love everything sparklingly bright with a pretense of glamor, despite the fact that since the release best film Luhrmann's "" Australian handwriting is, if not hopelessly, then certainly outdated. In addition, the glamorous design contradicts the essence of the image of bohemia - circles of penniless artists and generally marginal workers of art for art's sake, close to glamorous characters only high degree arrogance in the representation of artistic ability. It is much more important that the dizzying style of the Australian postmodernist requires from followers, first of all, an impeccable sense of editing rhythm and perfectionism in creating details, which on the chosen path of bridled aestheticization can turn out to be not a blessing for the director, but a setback.
According to tradition, La Bohème unfolds in three settings: an attic with a wide window - a street in the Latin Quarter - the D'Enfer outpost. Scenography Bruno de Lavenera- the most attractive component of the production. The attic is represented by a three-story structure, occupying only a third of the stage, and fulfills the task of a limited space in which the Bohemians - a poet, painter, philosopher and musician - huddle difficultly but cheerfully. The rest of the stage, to the right and left of the “attic section,” is covered with a curtain. An image of roofs with chimneys and chimneys is projected onto the curtain. The singers entered the first act, being on the second level of the bookcase, where there was a table and the famous stove, to which the first libations of the frozen artists on Christmas Eve were turned. The singers' performances at height provided better visibility of what was happening from the gallery and tiers, but complicated the contact between the artists and the orchestra. The hands of American conductor Evan Rogers kept flying over the orchestra pit. By the way, the singers reached the third floor of their own attic only once.
photo: Press service of the Bolshoi Theater
The transition from the first to the second act did not require the usual pause for a change of scenery. The attic structure effectively moved in different directions, revealing the coveted breadth of stage space, which the viewer had already become bored with. The joy of Christmas Eve in the play was simply replaced by the solemn bustle of the Latin Quarter: fifty extras - idle revelers - poured onto the Bolshoi stage. The backdrop was decorated with randomly crossed LED strips, giving rise to a whimsical geometric figure, as if accidentally flown in from the future times of “non-figurative art.” The integral blades of the Moulin Rouge mill could be seen in the distance.
The costumes of the extras and choristers, made according to the patterns of clothing from unknown eras, and in blatant colors - lilac, light green, lilac, cherry, turquoise, lemon - evoked a persistent feeling of either an overzealous masquerade, or a children's matinee. The appearance of toy seller Parpignol in a searing scarlet suit (tenor Marat Gali on a bicycle), anointed by a chorus of children's voices, as well as a performance by a “lady with a dog”. Musetta ( Damiana Mizzi) appeared accompanied white poodle, perfectly trained, and undoubtedly gave the artist a share of audience affection. Among the daring images that one might expect from a young production (but which are stingily few), I remember a guardsman taking off his army trousers, revealing a ballet tutu underneath.
If the second act was presented in the style of a variety show, in which the Momus cafe was elegantly decorated with an arch of light bulbs, obviously reminiscent of the illumination of a cabaret stage, then the third act, according to the principle of dramatic contrast professed by Vesperini, was decided in the opposite way. The scenery of the D'Enfer outpost on the outskirts of Paris consisted of located under acute angle three sections - a flight of stairs, a fence made of rods and a brick wall. An old-fashioned lantern stood in the opening of the wall, and from above, streams of scattering, foggy light poured over the entire set, like a melancholy sketch in the spirit of the Impressionists.
The stylistic diversity of the design was supported by constantly bright male voices second cast of the opera. Tenor Davide Giusti(by the way, he has already performed the role of Rudolf for Himmelman-Currentzis) and baritone Aluda Todua mercilessly exploited the lyrical side of their characters so that the drama of the finale was difficult to believe. The solution again came from the field of scenography. In the final episode of Mimi’s death, the attic structure was disconnected, which strengthened the sad meaning of the moment: all the living characters remained on one side of the open structure, and on the other, the bed with Mimi, who died alone, floated into eternity.
photo: Press service of the Bolshoi Theater
On the sidelines there were reproaches for the orchestra, which could not keep up with the clearly emotional interpretation Evan Rogerster– a young, smiling conductor in black, who also worked with Peter Stein and had already staged two “La Bohèmes.” Rogerster himself admitted that he was looking for a sound analogy to the violent emotionality of the characters, although it would be more reasonable to assume that the orchestra confidently limited and directed the singers, including Maria Mudryak, who put all her temperament into the part of Mimi and juicily savored the obvious and imaginary misfortunes of her heroine.
Evoking a festive mood and unapproachably monotonous charm, the production evoked the expectedly favorable impression of the public. The classic character of the opera about picturesque vagabonds and consumptive beauties, in which slightly caricatured tragedy coexists with frontal sublimity, once again stood firm. The repertoire hit has taken place and will probably remain within the traditional ideas about “La Bohème” for another 20 years.
photo: Press service of the Bolshoi Theater
Bolshoi Theater of Russia this year I decided to close my season with an opera premiere.
And this premiere turned out to be bigger than itself. It would seem like an isolated failure of an individual performance, but it most clearly accumulated all the problematic points of the policy of the current theater management. And far from the most rosy prospects were clearly outlined.
So, "La Boheme".
They barely had time to remove the previous production from the poster (by the way, although it literally follows the libretto, it is quite aesthetically pleasing), when the new one was immediately presented. After all, one of the most recognizable and, importantly, box office operas in the world.
The production was directed by Jean-Roman Vesperini. A young director, yesterday's assistant to Peter Stein. He worked with him on several projects in Russia, including “Aida” at the Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Theater. And apparently he assimilated too deeply into the Russian cultural landscape.
As an independent director, Vesperini was completely helpless.
While watching it, it seemed that the only thing that motivated him in the production was to avoid any comparisons with Stein. And to be sure, he decided to borrow everything from others. Stamp on stamp, cliche on cliche — everything has been seen a thousand times, has long since grown old and died a natural death.
The end result was just a huge, tasteless wedding cake made of banalities and the absence of any expressed individuality.
The direction here is statuesque.
Straight from the century before last. All the stereotypes for which the opera genre is often ridiculed are brought together and brought to the point of absurdity. To convey the simplest emotions (a coughing fit or surprise), the soloists suddenly freeze, as if before a stroke, bulge their eyes with all their might, coyly bat their eyelashes and dramatically, with a broad gesture, clutch their chests with their hands. Otherwise — everyone just goes on stage, turns to face the audience and sings. All. And so 2 and a half hours with one intermission.
At some point, there is a feeling that the only acting task that the director set for the performers was to go on stage, glance briefly at the partners, turn to face the audience and sing as hard as you can, the louder the better, preferably completely forgetting about nuances. And in order to create at least some semblance of action, the director ordered the soloists to intensively walk around the stage — from right to left, from top to bottom, here and there — and invariably justify this walking by saying that, with a thoughtful look, they felt absolutely all the objects they encountered along the way. Only occasionally are artists given the opportunity to remember each other’s existence.
It sounds funny, but I’ve never seen a production before where the characters grabbed, touched and rubbed the props and decorations around them so intensely and enthusiastically. Seriously, if you decide to see this production, don’t put it off for long, there is a serious risk that the premiere gloss that set designer Bruno de Lavener brought to this performance will very quickly be erased.
The result is a textbook, literal, direct and, as a result, gaping with its emptiness “Bohemia” - attics, restaurants, fireplaces, unhappy poor young people creative professions and caricaturedly stupid fat wealthy bourgeois.
It doesn’t seem to say that something very terrible happened.
Many world opera houses (among which the famous Metropolitan Opera is especially noticeable) annually sometimes present more than one premiere with such “empty” direction... But here the question of expediency and artistic planning arises.
Firstly, “La Boheme” is one of the most frequently operas performed in the world over the past decades. If anyone has been to the opera at least once, they have probably been to La Bohème. And literalness is simply contraindicated for her. The audience is simply bored when you can accurately predict in advance not only what will happen next, but also what it will look like.
Secondly, world theaters present such productions with one transparent and calculated goal - world-famous stars are invited to play solo roles. Often very different. And dotted, minimalistic direction is required so that a visiting performer can quickly get into the role without unnecessary headaches, bringing his personal achievements to the stage. And often this works out well, since, as a rule, all major world names have a well-developed artistic talent. They not only sing, but are also able to convey their singing dramatically to the viewer. Otherwise they wouldn’t be such stars. All the soloists here are young. Some have more prospects, some have less, some have already established themselves, some are just starting, but in general there are no developments yet. And they obediently carry out all the director’s tasks. Diligently and unquestioningly.
And this is the main disappointment and insult from this “premiere”.
The fact is that the opera itself has a very lively and extremely witty libretto. Puccini tried his best to mold this story into his favorite melodrama, almost forcefully squeezing out a tear, but, fortunately, the source material did not completely succumb to him. And perhaps in this circumstance lies the secret of such mass popularity, ease and accessibility for the viewer of “La Boheme”.
In fact, all the dialogues and plot twists in this opera are arranged in the spirit of a good serial sitcom. A sitcom about the life of young people. About the first encounter with love, jealousy and death. But first of all — about strong friendship, no matter what. About how to be friends not only with the fair one, but also with dark side person. About the ability to forgive the weaknesses of a close friend and be there in difficult times. Even in final scene Mimi's death in the foreground is not her famous dying aria, but how Rudolf's friends cannot find the strength to tell their friend the tragic news. While he confusedly examines each of them in turn and asks the question: “Why are you looking at me like that?”, internally already understanding “why.”
Youth, the first test of strong feelings and strong shocks, is precisely what makes this opera lively and interesting. And often, even when superstars with outstanding voices sing in the main roles, and it is staged by an eminent director, everything fails due to the lack of youthful enthusiasm — that very sacred fire that burns a good drama.
But here is the entire team of the play — the director, soloists, conductor — very young guys. And they are simply supposed to light it, strike a spark from which a flame will flare up. And they take and install such a dinosaur in 2018. Also with poorly hidden effort. And instead of seeing how young talents boldly and daringly create the future, you see how they try to inhabit the past and themselves suffocate in the clouds of raised dust.
Of course, some performers try not to lose their youthful lightness. This is especially successful in the male ensemble (in different compositions, Zilikhovsky and Todua appear in the role of Marcel. I really believe in the first - I’ve heard him many times, he always tried to avoid banalities. The second today turned the supporting role into the main one character). In women's, everything is much more modest. I was in the second cast, and for the first time I caught myself thinking that I had never in my life waited so much for Mimi to finally die. Rumor has it that in the first one everything is no better. I'm afraid to imagine and definitely don't want to check.
But the main hostage of this “premiere” was conductor Evan Roger.
That's who I'm truly sorry for. Despite some roughness and also a solid use of banalities (apparently this is a very contagious bacteria), he managed to stir up the Bolshoi Theater orchestra, which, unfortunately, lately is notorious for the snobbery and inflated sense of self-importance of many of its musicians, which is why, regardless of the conductor and the material performed, the theater orchestra consistently plays itself to a given theme. I suspect that the secret of such success is Roger’s natural charm and infectious, good-natured smile. As a result, he is the only one in this performance who retains his young age and brings at least some freshness, due to which even the most hackneyed techniques are perceived rather as youthful naivety, which suits this opera very well.
However, let us assume that all this is not significant and is not worth such detailed dissatisfaction. In the end, failures happen in every theater. Everyone has the right to fail and miss.
But here the story is no longer about a single performance, but about the climate in the entire theater.
Not so long ago, the Bolshoi was one of the leading and promising opera houses in the world. People flocked from all over the world to see Chernyakov’s Ruslan and Lyudmila. Specialized agencies arose to provide cultural tourism to the opera public for the sole purpose of attending the theater's opera premiere.
Now the theater is demonstrating that it is aiming at a casual audience that is far from the operatic genre and continues its pilgrimage behind the chandelier. And if there are foreign guests, they have also changed a lot. Now buses of Chinese tourists are arriving at the Bolshoi.
And now, concluding yet another lifeless season for opera with such a premiere, the theater seems to be signing its voluntary renunciation of the title of world theater, accepting the status of a provincial one. Openly admitting that even in this status the Bolshoi is no longer an opera and ballet theater. Now only ballet. And even that, with very rare pleasant exceptions, mostly classical. And ideally, resurrecting the classics of the Soviet period, so that officials have a place to walk the nomenklatura foreign delegations.
It is very painful to feel this rebirth. The walls are the same as in the very recent “Rodelinda”, “Billy Budd”, “Eugene Onegin”, “Carmen” by Pountney... But there’s nothing left except the walls. Now there is such a balsamic chamber.
But even in isolation from a specific theater, the “new” La Bohème showed a much larger and more interesting feature.
IN last decades There were fierce debates among opera fans about productions with a pronounced director's vision and interpretation of opera plots. And, as a rule, the degree of indignation of opponents of the so-called “director” was always marked by the disparaging phrase “I’ll go and listen with my eyes closed.”
And so a separate production was born for such conservatives — almost the quintessence of their ideals. A diligently and scrupulously collected textbook on directing the “broad gesture”.
It’s just that the vast majority of spectators in the hall now close their eyes on their own. Out of boredom.
Even casual viewers, miraculously unfamiliar with the plot of La Bohème, began quietly whispering about how things were going at work and with friends. Or they all giggled at the same stereotypes about opera, where the hero sings for 10 minutes at a time foreign language as he dies.
At the same time, applause was heard not after the successful performance of the arias, but precisely after a loud one. Many who came to the opera for the first time were sure that this was how it should be. And satisfied with such recognition, the coincidence of their ideas with reality, they at least somehow got rid of boredom by physical activity — clapping.
Even at the final applause (and this is the last show of the season!) the loudest ovation went not to the main performers, but to the circus dog (don’t ask, accept it - there is a circus dog in the play). Only the conductor managed to come close to this success.
After the performance, I lingered on the way out of the hall. I specifically looked out, but did not see anyone with a tear-stained face or at least slightly moist, thoughtful eyes. And this is on “Bohemia”! Perhaps, of course, I was looking in the wrong place, but usually you find such people in Puccini without much difficulty. It’s just that everything in this performance is not real. At all. As in any historical reconstruction, everything that is happening is false and antics, having long ago lost its meaning and forgotten its very essence. And such feelings do not evoke in anyone. Even those who “cut onions” for the first time with Puccini.
And there is an interesting moral in this phenomenon: not everything that you personally think is right and pleasant is the future.
Today, the opera genre has moved far beyond the bitter debate about “director” and “conductor”. The first one will soon be 100 years old. The second one is a natural resource in general. And the more actively we run against the movement of the escalator, the faster we will find ourselves at the very bottom.
With all my heart, sincerely, I wish the Bolshoi Theater to understand this, stop trying to please everyone and radically correct its course. Do not flirt with the local audience, luring them with affordable tickets based on coupons and passport inspections at the entrance, but develop the landscape and musical level in the country. Someone, but the Bolshoi Theater has all the resources for this.
Soon, for example, I will tell a beautiful and instructive story about how the theater of our country, which is much more modest in resources, thanks to good taste and reasonable management planning, is already quietly carrying out an important project that will determine our cultural future for years to come.
In the meantime, the next opera premiere at the Bolshoi, which it’s not particularly possible to dissect, because there is simply nothing to cling to, demonstrates an already established system. A system of what happens when theater management makes compromises too easily. These compromises move down the hierarchy. And as a result, the whole atmosphere is poisoned.
In this regard, as a better warning about the destructiveness of flirting with compromises for art, I would like to wish the artists and management of our other theaters to see the “new” “La Bohème” of the Bolshoi. And first of all, of course, to Sergei Vasilyevich Zhenovach. Many mistakes can be avoided. A lot becomes obvious. Instead of a thousand words.
p.s.
Having returned in completely upset feelings, I turned on the recording of “La Bohème,” which I had been highly recommended for a long time. good people. Just recently he admitted that he had never encountered a non-terrible “La Boheme”. Not a single production hit me. It’s not that he didn’t roar, but simply didn’t experience emotions other than irritation. And I already thought that in the premiere of “Big” the problem was more with me and my protest against squeezing tears out of the audience using cheap methods.
But I turned on the recording. And I have never blinked so rarely at La Bohème. An absolute masterpiece. Best Production, which is known today. Music heard more than 100 times sounds completely different. And the sung performance is absolutely brilliant. Yes, such “Bohemia” exists! We waited for her for a long time, and she was found!
Patience... I’ll gain strength and be sure to share my find. In the meantime...
Love, love, alas, will not replace firewood for us...