STORY AND APPROACH

Kata Wéber Librettist

Journey of Hope is a tender and passionate story about a man, who – inspired by the economic success of Turks in Switzerland – leaves his home in search of a better future. However, the journey of Haydar is also everyman’s journey that applies to many impoverished people, who seek better growth opportunities in other countries. The portrayal of a family here is genuine. It shows the love, the hurt and the extreme struggle some experience when desperation dominates and all hope is gone. Since leaving people and places behind always comes at a painful price.

My fundamental intention was to reduce the narrative of the feature film in order to leave more space for the musical finish while also emphasising the plot’s main turns. By simplifying the «plot» I wanted to give more territory to the musical aspects, giving the emotions and conflicts a stronger outline, while carrying a sort of entity from the after-life that stands above everyday notions. I was also hoping that the simplification will help highlighting Meryem’s character, so she can rise to be the other main character of the drama alongside Haydar. Thus, instead of a tragic hero who demonstrates courage in the face of danger and who is destined to downfall – within a story somewhat similar to a classic ancient Greek drama, here their all-time unity expresses a broader meaning which reflects on our modern society in a more authentic way.

Regarding the construction, I chose a narrow, purely dramatic composition utilising only a few group scenes. I wanted to make this rigid structure powerfully engaging in which the story is immediately told, therefore becomes emblematic. It is both a big story and a small one – so I wanted to present it as a chamber drama, trying to keep the husband and wife’s fate strongly bound together so we get to understand this story of general human values through their conflicts and quarrels. This way the structure’s narrowness became so dominant that it is only disturbed by the outside world occasionally.

THE STORY IS SEPARATED IN THREE ACTS:

PARADISE Haydar sells his house and leaves to Switzerland with his wife Meryem. They leave their two children behind but take Ali, the smallest to be educated in Europe.

ON THE ROAD The three set off. We see them through the changing landscape. A journey beyond hardship.

THE ALPS The father and son are separated from Meryem. They are abandoned at an Alpine pass in the midst of a blizzard. The boy is too sick to continue the journey.

The three acts are a continuous march through a constantly changing landscape with a striking question: Will anyone ever reach the land of promise?