It can start to feel like Woolcock is on the the verge of making Les Pêcheurs de Perles feel contemporary, and profound. But in the end, she doesn’t have a trick up her sleeve that can fix the jagged, plot-twisty ending (long judged implausible, even by operatic standards).

Youse two birds will be after pullin' th' tail feathern out av each other and litterin' up th' landscape with loud squawks.

The magnificent bronze corona, or luminaria, which still hangs in the central octagon, shews the skill of the workmen in bronze of that period.

Turning and turning in the widening gyre / The falcon cannot hear the falconer; / Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; / Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, […]