About the work
Bedřich Smetana's „The Devil's Wall" („Čertova stěna") was premiered in Prague in 1882 and is the last completed opera of the by then deaf composer. The romantic-comic opera combines a love story with a Bohemian legend about a rock formation on the Vltava said to have been built by the devil.
Plot
In medieval southern Bohemia the nobleman Vok Vítkovec lives in melancholy and solitude; after a disappointed love he has forsworn marriage. His diabolical adversary Rarach — who appears in the guise of a servant and resembles his master deceptively — seeks to thwart everyone's happiness. The young knight Jarek too suffers, for he may not marry his beloved Katuška as long as his lord Vok remains unwed. Only when the young Hedwig appears, resembling Vok's lost love, does new hope stir. In his fury the devil seeks to destroy the lovers and dams the Vltava with a mighty wall of rock to drown them. But the piety of the hermit Beneš thwarts the plan: the Devil's Wall collapses, the water drains away, and nothing more stands in the way of a double wedding.
Cultural significance
„The Devil's Wall" was written under the tragic circumstances of Smetana's advancing deafness and remained his last completed opera. Long underrated as a difficult late work, the combination of legendary material, comedy and Smetana's mature idiom is today newly appreciated. In the Czech repertoire the work is firmly established.