Nyctivoe

Developed over the course of 15 years, Dimitris Lyacos' epic trilogy Poena Damni is a sombre allegory exploring the utmost limits of the human condition Nyctivoe forms the central panel; it concerns the staging of a verse play in a grim inner-city setting, unfolding as a pattern of intermittent monologues - solitary visions of characters apparently in a state of trance. And while the setting suggests elements of realism (a crashed car, distant trains, a fire, the beat of the sea) the text hovers on the brink of the metaphysical; dense and allusive dreamlike and fragmented, yet also concerned with linear narrative. Cast in a structure reminiscent of Greek tragedy and No play, and interspersed with biblical references, Nyctivoe is at the same time a contemporary view of the underworld, to be feared, but perhaps desired as well; a quest for hope that becomes more distinct even as its characters recede from the world of the living.  The recorded performance accompanying this edition is one of many possible avenues through which this complex and ambiguous text might be approached.

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