In a brief text he prepared for the premiere of Kopernikus, Vivier first defended his desire to compose an opera at all, then spoke of the work itself: “Why an opera in 1980? Since its beginnings, opera has always ‘represented’ archetypes of history, the deep desires of human beings. To ‘represent’ means to tell a story, characters in their pure state and behavior, therefore a bit excessive. Opera, as a form of expression of the soul and of human history, cannot die. The human being will always need to represent his/her fantasies, dreams, fears and hopes.” This last sentence is perhaps as accurate a description of the motivations of this complex work as Vivier would ever give. In the earliest surviving source, a six-page typescript titled “Project for a chamber opera,” dated March 13, 1978, we learn that the work was originally to have been another of Vivier’s explorations of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, with Alice as the principal character, but “80 years after her experience through the looking glass”: the working title was The Old Alice. As the work progressed this connection was lessened: the final title is a whimsical spelling of the surname of the Renaissance astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus, and the principal character became Agni, Hindu deity and god of fire, a male god, but represented—as Alice was to have been—by an alto. However, the Alice theme is still present: the work opens with a passage from a letter by Lewis Carroll (the Reverend Charles Dodgson) titled “An Easter Greeting to Every Child Who Loves ‘Alice,’” originally appended to a new edition, published in 1890, of his famous book.

Vivier made it quite clear that he identified strongly with the central character of the opera, so much so that we may regard Agni as one of the long list of “Vivier characters” in his work. In a press release, he noted: “Agni is the Hindu god of fire. … Fire is my astrological sign. I was born on April 14. I am Aries, the ram. Agni, c’est moi. . . . For musical reasons, I represent him by a woman.