Salzburg Festival is ‘a fruit of the First World War’

The 2014 festival, just announced, will aim to reflect the event’s idealistic origins in the aftermath of war. ‘The Last Days of Mankind’ by Karl Kraus will take centre stage. The Australian Cambridge historian Christopher Clark will give the keynote address on his book, The Sleepwalkers, an account of the bumbling diplomacy that bred the global catastrophe. And a new opera by Marc-André Dalbavie will relate the life of Charlotte Salomon, a young Berlin-Jewish artist who was murdered in Auschwitz in 1943. ‘The festival is a fruit of war,’ said its president, Helga Rabl-Stadler.

Much of the rest of the festival will focus on Richard Strauss, one of the festival co-founders, whose 150th anniversary falls next year.

Details here (auf Deutsch).