The title of [Trilogie des Wiedersehens (Three Acts of Recognition)] causes a confusion that informs the entire work. It's not so much a trilogy as one three-part play with a single set, a unity of time and the same cast. The Wiedersehen in the title, I suppose, refers to the fact that this group of acquainted and related artists and art patrons has gathered for an opening at the art museum. In fact, however, what takes place can only be called Wiedersehen in the strict, literal sense of seeing one another again. As in Theatre of the Absurd, a tradition to which Strauss consciously attaches himself, these characters have never "seen" one another. They talk nonsense which slides by any possible listener; their moods change erratically, but the changes have no effect on anyone. There is, as the saying goes, a failure of communication.

But how tiresome and...