Neimënster has announced that Guillaume Clayssen’s play “Les Lettres persanes” will be performed in the Abbaye de Neumunster’s Salle Robert Krieps on Saturday 12 November 2016 at 20:00.
Guillaume Clayssen’s play was praised by critics and the public alike during its opening performance at the Comédie de l’Est in Colmar last month. The work, which is an adaptation of Montesquieu’s famous epistolary novel, evokes discomfort between civilisations and the paradoxical need to be watched by others.
Guillaume Clayssen chose to create a space of dialogue between the contemporary world and this great work from the 18th Century by combining the literary form with a collection of words. Four actors, two of which are also singers and one a musician, give the text a human touch, fuelled by differences and universality.
The play deals with the owner of a seraglio (for concubines), Usbek, who is under threat from his country and so decides to leave his homeland and abandon his Muslim culture. Joined by his compatriot Rica, he obtains authorisation from the King to go west to study science, and ends up in Paris. Both in its own time and today, this Enlightenment text treats many big issues, from feminism to democracy. Usbek and Rica offer a critical and humorous perspective of Europe as well as of themselves.
The play is in French and is recommended for people over the age of 15.
Tickets cost €20, €8 for under 26s, or €1.50 with the Kulturpass, and can be reserved at www.neimenster.lu or on +352 262 052 444.
There will be a special screening for schools on Friday 11 November 2016 at 11:00.
