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Pyotr Tchaikovsky's opera Mazeppa at the Mariinsky Theatre. The libretto by Viktor Burenin is drawn from Alexander Pushkin's narrative poem Poltava. Set in early-18th-century Ukraine, the opera explores the personal cost of political conflict — love, family and betrayal — around the historical figure of Ivan Mazeppa, the Cossack hetman who broke with Peter I of Russia and sided with Charles XII of Sweden at the Battle of Poltava (1709). At the centre of the story is Maria, daughter of Vasily Kochubey, caught between her elderly godfather Mazeppa — who she comes to love — and her father, who opposes the alliance and pays for it with his life. One of Tchaikovsky's more direct historical operas; the score is dark and dramatic. Sung in Russian; check for surtitle availability.