Der Liebhaber

Marco Goecke's Der Liebhaber is based on Marguerite Duras’ 1984 novel L’Amant. In partly autobiographical fragments, Duras recounts the encounter between a fifteen-year-old French girl and a significantly older Chinese lover in colonial Indochina, today’s Vietnam.

While the novel, marked by poetic condensation and suggestive openness, provoked not only literary admiration at the time of its publication but also debates about sexuality, dependency, and colonial hierarchies, Goecke consciously focuses on the interpersonal dimensions of the story. Duras’ elliptical, fragmentary narrative, layered with memories, quiet observations, and subtle nuance, is translated by Goecke into a choreographic language that does not depict a linear plot but condenses longing, guilt, dependence, love, and desire into precisely articulated movement impulses, making the body a medium for memory, passion, and social constraints.

Musically, compositions by Claude Debussy, Maurice Ravel, Frédéric Chopin, Unsuk Chin, and Gabriel Fauré merge into a soundscape as strongly shaped by memory and imagination as the literary source itself.

Goecke, one of the most influential choreographers of the present day, has established his unmistakable signature with over sixty works worldwide. In Der Liebhaber, this is expressed through flickering movements, impulsive bodily reactions, and an expressive radicalism that renders every detail meaningful. His production is not a romantic story but a radical, poetic meditation on corporeality, dependency, and the struggle for self-determination.

Suitable for ages 12 and above