[1] The premiere production at Covent Garden was directed by Trevor Nunn and conducted by Simon Rattle; Styron was in the audience.
There had been concerns about the recalcitrant behaviour of some of the stage machinery as late as the dress rehearsal, but in the event the premiere went perfectly from a technical point of view.
The critic of The Guardian, quoting the programme notes that "Life is messy, like masturbation", felt that the opera itself was "long" and "messy", and, whilst praising the individual performances, was deeply unimpressed with the production's attempts to evoke the atmosphere of Auschwitz concentration camp, and lukewarm as to Maw's musical idiom.
[3] The critic Alex Ross felt that the production's treatment of the horrors of the Holocaust was "at the edge of the tolerable", and opined the libretto to be too wordy, especially in the opera's first half.
"[5] Reviewing the BBC's live recording of the production, Christopher Ballantyne believed the opera to be "a work not just of serious purpose and great integrity, but one that makes a valiant effort to speak back to the unspeakable.