Émilie (opera)
opera by Kaija Saariaho
Émilie is an opera – specifically a 9-scene, 75-minute monodrama for soprano – by Finnish composer Kaija Saariaho to a libretto by Amin Maalouf. It was written in 2008. Based on the life and writings of Marquise Émilie du Châtelet (1706–1749), the work premiered at the Opéra de Lyon, France, on 1 March 2010, with Finnish soprano Karita Mattila, its dedicatee, in the title role. It recounts the achievements of this mathematician, physicist, and mistress of Voltaire: the first woman to establish an international scientific reputation, with pioneering work in the study of fire.
Billed as the third opera by Saariaho, Émilie is more accurately a sister-piece to the oratorio La Passion de Simone (2006).
In 2020, the opera was performed at the Peabody Conservatory with Australian conductor Leonard Weiss, led by soprano Elizabeth Futral, who premiered the role at Spoleto in 2011.
Subject
The opera Émilíe is based on the actual biography of Émilie du Châtelet, an 18th-century French intellectual in her own right and the mistress of the French philosopher Voltaire. She had a child by a later lover, and the childbirth led to her death. In the plot of the opera, her character's arias are linked to the birth of the child and of her significant scholarship. The soprano soloist is seen in character pregnant and penning new ideas as the opera begins.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Émilie (opera)” is opera by Kaija Saariaho. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Émilie, opera and Kaija, not as a finished interpretation.
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Attribution, date and provenance are strongest when supported by the original work, a catalogue record and documented transmission. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 1, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3588826. VIAF identifies the subject as 292843399. The Library of Congress control number is no2013085601. None of the 3 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 2008, 1706, 1749 and 2010.
Rights, attribution and provenance may remain disputed even when a general reference summary presents a stable account. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “Émilie (opera)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.