By María García Esperón
The story of Queen Dido of Carthage has not ceased to move humanity since the Roman poet Virgil described the tragedy of her love and death in the “Aeneid.” Dido, widow of the priest Sichaeus, has escaped from Phenicia with her followers to found a new city. By command of the gods, the Trojan hero Aeneas comes to her shores, and the queen falls madly in love with him. Aeneas accepts her love, but must follow the will of the gods and abandon Dido to found a new city in other lands, which will be Rome.
In despair, Dido raises a huge pyre in which she accumulates the gifts that the Trojan prince gave her and with the same sword of Aeneas, she pierces her chest and dies to the astonishment of the gods themselves, who had not ordered her death.
The Mexican writer María García Esperón was inspired by this story to write the novel “Dido para Eneas,” which in 2015 won the award for the year’s best book, awarded by IBBY (International Board on Books for Young People) for bringing society closer to the classic themes and offer readers a feminine character of varied nuances and passionate strength.
The present dance theater show, directed by Ángela García, arises from those pages and integrates the musical and dance language of flamenco to offer the public of San Miguel de Allende a proposal that, in Mexican lands, gives birth to the original spirit of the Greek tragedy.
The word, music, dance—a ritual context that responds to a certain historical circumstance—are the elements that make up the phenomenon called tragedy that reached its peak in Athens in its golden age, the 5th century B.C. The tragedy puts the human being in communication with the fundamental themes of existence and establishes a connection with the mystery of death. In the 21st century, in times of pandemic and the sacrifice of normality, in a city like San Miguel, a stronghold of artists and human beings from different countries in search of meaning, a montage like “Dido for Aeneas” invites us to commune with the sacred essence of the theater and search in the myth of the Phoenician queen who is consumed with love, the deep meaning of existence. “Dido for Aeneas”—word, dance, music—is ritual theater, tragedy in the original sense, and in short, an opportunity for spiritual transformation for our time. Like the phoenix and the Phoenician queen herself (the linguistic kinship between the phoenix and the Phoenician is not accidental), our time must rise from its ashes to shine brilliantly, like a new sun.
In “Dido for Aeneas” dance theater, the percussionist Víctor Monterrubio, the pianist Papacho Syrdey, and the singer Alberto Solís participate; the dancer and choreographer Ángela García performs dance as Lamia la Hechicera, and the writer and actress María García Esperón personifies Queen Dido of Cartago.
Dance-Theater
“Dido for Aeneas”
Fri, Nov 19, 6pm
Teatro Santa Ana
Reloj 50A, Centro
500 pesos
