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Order Number 9320001
Verdi's "Macbeth" libretto and its literary context
Ruggiero, Matthew John, Ph.D.
Boston University, 1993
UMI
300 N. Zeeb Rd.
Ann Arbor, MI 48106
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BOSTON UNIVERSITY
THE UNIVERSITY PROFESSORS
Dissertation
V E R D I 's MACBETH LIBRETTO
AND ITS LITERARY CONTEXT
by
MATTHEW JOHN RUGGIERO
B.A.,
Harvard University,
A.L.M., Harvard University,
M.A.,
Harvard University,
1984
1987
1988
Submitted in partial fulfillment of the
requirements for the degree of
Doctor of Philosophy
1993
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©
Copyright by
MATTHEW JOHN RUGGIERO
1993
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Approved by
Faculty Advisor
Rosanna Warren, BA., MA.
Assistant University Professor;
Assistant Professor of English and
Modern Foreign Languages and Literatures
First Reader
Donald S. Carne-Ross, B.A., M.A.
University Professor;
William Goodwin Aurelio Professor of
Greek Language and Literature;
Professor of Classics and Modern Languages
Second Reader
Dennis J. _____ .
Associate Professor of Modern Foreign
Languages and Literatures
Third Reader
John Daverdjo, MusB., M.A., PhD.
Associate Professor of Music
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For my wife,
Nancy Cirillo
tecum vivere amem, tecum obesun libena!
iv
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Acknowledgments
I wish to thank Professors Donald S. Carne-Ross,
Rosanna Warren, Dennis Costa, John Daverio, and my wife,
Nancy Cirillo. Without their generous advice and continuous
encouragement, I could not have completed this project, but
most of all, I thank them for believing I could do it in the
first place.
v
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V E R D I 'S MACBETH LIBRETTO
AND ITS LITERARY CONTEXT
(Order No.
)
MATTHEW JOHN RUGGIERO
Boston University, University Professors,
1993
Major Professor: Rosanna Warren
Professor o f : English and M o d e m Foreign Languages
ABSTRACT
This is an interdisciplinary study that examines the
relationship between Verdi's Shakespeare libretto and the
events in Italian literary history that helped to produce
the translations Verdi used to write his first Shakespeare
opera, Macbeth. I begin by examining the work of three Ital­
ian men of letters, Antonio Conti, Paolo Rolli, and Giuseppe
Baretti, each of whom was responsible for a "first event"
associated with Shakespeare in Italy. Conti was the first to
mention Shakespeare; Rolli was the first to translate Shake­
speare; and Baretti was the first to argue for his accept­
ance in ways that broke new ground in Italian literary crit­
icism.
Because Verdi acquired his knowledge and experience of
Shakespeare entirely through translations, he owed a pro­
found debt to literary figures who had translated Shake­
speare in Italy. I therefore include, as an important part
of the literary context of Verdi's libretto, an examination
of the Italian translations of Shakespeare that were done
vi
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before 1847, the year Verdi brought Macbeth to the Italian
opera house.
In the second part of my study, I offer examples of
various stages of the libretto and draw conclusions about
how Verdi, through his first encounter with Shakespeare,
brought changes to Italian operatic forms. Finally, I ex­
amine the basis of the harsh criticism that greeted the M a c ­
beth libretto to show that even as late as 1847 the recep­
tion of Shakespeare in Italy was attended by heated contro­
versy between so-called classicists and romanticists.
In charting the route by which Shakespeare's Macbeth
reached Verdi, how the composer adapted the play for his
opera, and how the critics responded to it, my purpose has
been to set Verdi's Macbeth libretto within an historical
context of enduring literary debate, and to view the musi­
cian as dramatist by exploring, as it were, the composer's
literary imagination through his role as librettist.
vii
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Preface
The idea for this study came to me after reading the
critical commentary that followed the first performance of
Macbeth at Florence's Teatro della Pergola in 1847. Critics
generally praised Verdi for his music, but they heaped abun­
dant scorn on his librettist,
Piave, for having written what
one critic called a "profanation in four a c t s . " 1 By speak­
ing favorably of the music of Verdi's opera and scathingly
of its textual component, the Florentine critics brought
into prominence the frangible relationship between litera­
ture and opera.
What I found astonishing was that Verdi's music had
furthered Shakespeare's cause in the Italian opera house at
the same time that his libretto had sparked a debate in li t ­
erary circles. Furthermore,
I thought it especially curious
that many critics disparaged Verdi's first Shakespeare l i ­
bretto for the same reasons that critics had denigrated
Shakespeare in the previous century. I was surprised that as
late as 1847 vestiges of earlier attitudes toward Shake­
speare still floated through the literary atmosphere of R o ­
mantic Italy.
The nineteenth-century Florentine critics made me r e a l ­
ize, therefore,
that Verdi's first Shakespeare libretto b e ­
longed to a particular literary context that stretched far
1 MOntazio. "Macbeth: Profanation in Four Acts b y F. M. Piave." Rpt.
Verdi's ’Macbeth': A Sourcebook. Eds. David Rosen and Andrew Porter (New
York: Norton, 1984) 381.
viii
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back into the preceding century. The foundations of this
literary context were laid by Italian philosophers,
scien­
tists, musicians, and men of letters who traveled to England
in the eighteenth century and brought back English litera­
ture to their compatriots. Before long, translators rendered
Shakespeare into Italian, and polemicists had to argue vehe­
mently for his acceptance, against the intimidating opposi­
tion of Voltaire and his followers. When viewed from the
perspective of this enduring polemical context, the harsh
critical reaction to Verdi's libretto can be seen as one
more example of the literary controversy that often accom­
panied the introduction of Shakespeare's work in Italy. From
such a perspective, Verdi can perhaps be viewed as an unwit­
ting literary polemicist.
Verdi himself often revealed the extent to which his
art depended upon an appropriate literary text, the sine qua
non of any opera. He once told a friend, for example,
that
he wished for " n o t h i n g more than to find a good libretto
and along with it a good poet...." Verdi explained that he
always searched for subjects that were "new, great, beauti­
ful, different, b o l d . ..yet at the same time suitable for m u ­
s i c . " 2 With typical hyperbolic flourish, he told Leon Escudier, his French agent and publisher,
all depends upon a suitable
that " i n theend
libretto. A libretto —
it
a li-
2 Rome, January 1853; autograph at the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei,
Rome. Carteggio, I, 16. Cited by
Hans Busch, Verdi's 'Otello' and 'Simon
Boccanegra' {revised version) in
Letters and Documents. {Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1988) xxxi.
ix
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bretto and the opera is m a d e ! " 3 And in October of 1876,
when he wrote about Shakespeare to his friend, Countess Clarina Maffei, Verdi showed keen insights into the poet's
characters and also revealed the dominant concept he always
kept in mind whenever he adapted literary texts to his own
artistic purposes.
"Cop y i n g the truth can be a good
thing," he told her,
" b u t inventing the truth is better,
much better." Aware of the paradox, he hastened to explain
that while it was possible for Shakespeare to have known
someone like Falstaff,
it was inconceivable that the poet
could ever have known anyone as wicked as lago, or as
saintly as Cordelia,
said,
Imogene, and Desdemona.
"Yet,"
he
" t h e y are so r e a l ! " 4 Surely, when Verdi shaped his
librettos, he felt he was creating his own world of dramatic
truth.
As Patrick J. Smith remarked in his history of the o p ­
era libretto, Verdi " h a d such definite ideas about the dra­
matic shape of his works and insisted so strongly upon o b ­
taining what he desired that his influence upon the libretto
was almost as direct as his poets', and in most cases was
more important."5 Formulating his critical judgments and
interpretive decisions at the initial stages of each opera,
3 F. Abbiati, Giuseppe Verdi, 4 vols. (Milan, 1959) III, 42. Also,
Martin Chusid, "Verdi's Own Words: His Thoughts on Performance, with
Special Reference to 'Don Carlos,' 'Otello,' and 'Falstaff.'" The Verdi
Conpanion (New York: Norton, 1979) 144-92.
4 Verdi, I copialettere. Eds. Gaetano Cesari and Alessandro Luzio.
(Milan, 1913) 624.
5 Patrick J. Smith, The Tenth Muee (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1970)
237.
x
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Verdi participated actively in planning, designing, and
implementing texts, frequently working on details of meter
and versification himself before composing the musical ambi­
ence through which his dramatic characters were to move. For
these reasons, he can readily be considered a librettist.
To limit a daunting task, I have restricted my study to
three eighteenth-century Italian men of letters, Antonio
Conti, Paolo Rolli, and Giuseppe Baretti. I chose them b e ­
cause each is responsible for a " f irst event" relating to
Shakespeare in Italy. Conti was the first to mention Shake­
speare; Rolli was the first to translate Shakespeare; and
Baretti was the first to argue for his acceptance in ways
that broke new ground in Italian literary criticism. Fur­
thermore, all three lived at various times in England; all
translated English works into Italian or wrote essays in
English; and all, in varying degrees, effected changes in
Italian literary attitudes.- in these ways, each helped to
form the literary context that made possible the ninteenthcentury translations of Shakespeare that Verdi used for his
libretto.
Because Verdi acquired his knowledge and experience of
Shakespeare entirely through translations,6 he undoubtedly
6 It has been impossible to determine how much English Verdi knew. In
"Verdi, Shakespeare, Maozoni," Nuova Antologia 16: July 1912, Michele
Scherillo says that Shakespeare knew no English, but in a letter to
Boito, dated May 1886, Verdi said he had consulted "the original"
while working on his Otello libretto. See Carteggio Verdi-Boito. Eds.
Mario Medici and Marcello Conati. 2 vols. (Parma: Istituto di studi
verdiani, 1978) I, 103.
xi
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owed a profound debt to literary figures who had translated
Shakespeare in Italy. I therefore include, as an important
part of the literary context of Verdi's libretto, an examin­
ation of the Italian translations of Shakespeare that were
done before 1847, the year Verdi first brought Macbeth to
the Italian opera house.
In the second part of my study,
I describe how Verdi
and Piave prepared their libretto. By examining their corre­
spondence and related documents,
I reconstruct the chrono­
logical sequence leading to the completion of the libretto,
and the problems Verdi and Piave encountered along the way.
I then offer an analysis of the finished libretto, and draw
conclusions about how Verdi's first professional encounter
with Shakespeare wrought changes in Italian operatic forms.
To demonstrate further the interdependence of Verdi's art
and literature,
I discuss how translations and contemporary
literary attitudes towards Shakespeare might have influenced
V e rdi's libretto.
In charting the route by which Shakespeare's Macbeth
reached Verdi, how the composer adapted the play for his
opera, and how the critics responded to it, my purpose has
been to set Verdi's Macbeth libretto within a historical
context of enduring literary debate, and to view the m u s i ­
cian as dramatist by exploring,
as it were, the composer's
literary imagination through his role as librettist.
xii
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Table of Contents
Acknowledgements ...........................................
v
A b s t r a c t .................................................... vi
P r e f a c e .................................................. viii
Table of C o n t e n t s ....................................... xiii
PART ONE
The Literary Context
Introduction ................................................ l
Chapter I ................................................... 7
Antonio Conti and ''Sasper' • :
" G r a n d ideas and noble sentiments"
Chapter II
................................................ 41
Paolo Rolli and Ham l e t :
" That most original and sublime p o e t " :
Chapter I I I ................................................ 57
Giuseppe Baretti and Voltaire:
" A n enormous dunghill"
Chapter IV
................................................ 89
Translations Available to Verdi
PART TWO
The Macbeth Libretto
Chapter V
............................................... 120
Verdi's genere fantastico and Italian Operatic
Tradition: "n o t h i n g in common with the others"
Chapter VI
............................................... 139
Verdi's Dramaturgy and the Macbeth Libretto:
"Inventing the truth"
xiii
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Table of Contents (con'd)
Chapter v i i ............................................... 163
The Macbeth Libretto: A Continuation
Chapter V I I I ............................................... 201
Critical Reaction to Verdi's Macbeth:
Concluding Remarks
Works C i t e d ............................................... 216
Appendix A
................................................ 222
The First Mention of Shakespeare in Italy
Appendix B
................................................ 223
The First Italian Translation of Shakespeare
Appendix C
................................................ 224
Frontispiece from Baretti's Diecours,
a " n e w code of Shakespearean criticism"
Appendix D
................................................ 225
From the Libretto of Verdi's Macbeth, the First
Authentic Italian Shakespeare Opera
xiv
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Introduction
In January of 1816, a new Milanese journal called
La Biblioteca italiana published an essay written by Madame
de StaSl entitled " O n the Manner and Usefulness of Transla­
tions.' '* Deploring what she considered the moribund state
of Italian literature, Madame de Sta£l urged Italian writers
to turn away from their usual formalistic dramas of Roman
antiquity, and to look beyond their borders for new ideas to
revitalize their literature.
"Translating admirable works
of human imagination from one language to another,"
wrote,
she
" i s the greatest benefit one can render to litera­
ture. Since perfect works are so few, and invention in w h a t ­
ever genre so rare, then any modern nation,
if willing to be
satisfied with only its own riches, would always be p o o r . " 2
She went on to exhort Italian writers to translate foreign
poetry and dramas,
especially those of Schiller and Shake­
speare.
Predictably, Madame de Stael's comments precipitated a
storm of vehement reaction from her readers. Many, taking
umbrage at a foreigner's harsh criticism of their litera1 Madame de Stall's essay, " D e 1'esprit dee traductions” , was trans­
lated into Italian by Pietro Giordani, and appeared under the title,
"Sulla maniera e la utilitd delle traduzioni," in La Biblioteca ita­
liana, vol. I, January, 1816. 9-18.
2 The Italian reads, "Trasportare da una ad altra favella le opere
eccellenti dell'umano ingegno & il maggior benefizio che far si possa
alle lettere; perch€ sono si poche le opere perfette, e la invenzione in
qualunque genere & tanto rara, che se ciascuna delle nazioni moderne
volesse appagarsi delle ricchezze sue proprie, sarebbe ognor povera."
Rpt. Nanifesti Romantici e altri scritti della polemica claeeico-romantica. Eds. Carlo Calcaterra and Mario Scotti (Turin: UTET, 1979) 83.
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2
ture, were quick to write to the journal in defense of their
poets. Three lengthy essays written independently at the
time by Lodovico di Breme, Pietro Borsieri, and Giovanni
Berchet, however,
tion. Di Breme,
tically
ture,"
strongly supported Madame de stael's posi­
for example, on the basis of how realis­
he thought the English poet had "imitated n a ­
cast aside historical and stylistic considerations,
and raised Shakespeare to the level of Homer, Sophocles, and
Dante.3 These essays eventually became known in Italy as the
"Manifesti R o m a n t i c i . " 4 Shakespeare, therefore,
in the
aftermath of the heated debates provoked by Madame de S t a ­
el's essay, emerged as the principal figure around whom most
nascent romantici rallied.
No one can deny, then, that Verdi's first Shakespeare
libretto sprang from the changing literary attitudes engen­
dered by the forces of Italian Romanticism. If it be a l ­
lowed, moreover, as one commentator has asserted, that
"Italian Romanticism was born in 1816, " 5 then its gesta­
tion most assuredly occurred during the preceding century.
Long before Carlo Rusconi published the first translation of
3 Ludovico Di Breme, " Intorno all'ingiustizia di alcuni giudizi letterari italiani. " Manifesti Romantici, 133.
4 All three essays are reprinted in Manifesti Romantici. See Ludovico
di Breme, Jntorno a l l 1ingiustizia di alcuni giudizi letterari italiani,
99-142/ Pietro Borsieri, A w e n t u r e letterarie di un g i o m o o c o n s i g n
d'un galantuomo a vari scrittori, 260-388; and Giovanni Berchet, Sul
"Cacciatore feroce" e Bull a " Eleonora" di Goff redo Augusto Burger:
Letters semiseria di Gristosomo al sul figliuolo, 492-514.
5 Dictionary of Italian Literature. Eds. Peter and Julia Conaway
Bondanella (Westport, Connecticut, 1979) 441.
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3
Shakespeare’s complete works in 1838, a version Verdi and
Piave consulted for their Macbeth libretto, and even before
Voltaire told the world in 1737 that Shakespeare had ruined
the theater in England,6 English poetry and drama had a l ­
ready piqued the curiosity of Italian men of letters. M o r e ­
over, voices were raised at various times throughout the
eighteenth century that argued not only for reforming the
rules of writing tragedy but also for translating foreign
works. If viewed within this wider historical context, M a ­
dame de Sta§l, in her celebrated essay of 1816, merely
echoed sentiments that time had ripened, making them more
palatable to the tastes of Italy's changing literary scene.
voices of reform were barely heard in the early eight­
eenth century, however, when French influence still pervaded
Italian literary circles. Works by Boileau, Corneille, R a ­
cine, F^nelon, Montesquieu,
Fontenelle, Lafontaine, Buffon,
Rousseau, and Voltaire were the most widely read by the letterati, but it was at the feet of Voltaire that Italian
writers, with rare exceptions, most frequently prostrated
themselves.7 Even Giuseppe Baretti, who later in the century
was to counter Voltaire's opinions with scathing rebuke, had
to acknowledge the profound influence the French exerted
over Italian literary attitudes.
" I n my opinion," Baretti
6 About ShakeBpeare, Voltaire wrote, " Je vais vous dire une chose hasard§e mais vraie: c'est que le m€rite de cet Auteur a perdu le th§£tre
anglais.” Lettrea Philosophiquea. "S u r la tragSdie."
7 Arturo Graf, L'Anglomania e l'influaao ingleee in Italia nel secolo
XVIII (Turin: Ermanno Loescher, 1911) 15.
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4
wrote,
" t h e Italians of today are as far beneath the French
in literary matters as the Moroccans are beneath the
Italians." 8
Baretti's remark was not groundless,
for Italy had in­
deed lost its dominance in literature. The creative energy
that had carried Italian literary culture to England,
France, and other parts of Europe during the Renaissance
seemed spent by the seventeeth century. A preoccupation with
overworked forms, triviality, and clever though essentially
hollow conceits had led to the poetic excesses cf Giambat­
tista Marino and his imitators, the proliferation of sterile
catalogues and handbooks, and hence to " t h e nadir of Aris­
totelian interpretation,"9 as exemplified by works such as
Tesauro's Cannochiale aristotelico.
In the meantime,
France had come to enjoy an indisput­
able position of superiority in literary matters, and
through the achievements of Corneille, Racine, Voltaire, and
others, she could easily justify her role as arbiter of good
taste. Because French literary attitudes necessarily adhered
to " les regies, " they were antithetical to the varied con­
figurations of Shakespeare's tragedies. As a result, the
dissemination of the English poet's works in Italy was e x ­
ceedingly slow. When critics discussed them at all, it was
8 Giuseppe Baretti, La Frusta letteraria, xix. Rpt. La Frusta letteraria. Ed. Luigi Piccione. 2 vols. (Bari: Laterza, 1932) II, 94.
9 J. G. Robertson, Studies in the Genesis of Romantic Theory in the
Eighteenth Century (New York: Russell & Russell, 1962) 5.
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5
generally by standards of classical aesthetics,
including
the so-called Aristotelian unities of time, place, and a c ­
tion, that his works were measured and evaluated.
Moreover, Shakespeare's apparent conflation of genres—
his inclusion of clowns in tragedies, or his presentation of
gravediggers who joke about the skulls they unearth—
was
seen as evidence of the English poet's "boorishness,"
a
sign of his utter lack of " t h e slightest knowledge of the
rules."
In the light of these formal criteria, Voltaire and
his avid followers in Italy, although willing to acknowledge
Shakespeare's occasional "beautiful scene"
and fearful passages,"
or his "grand
considered his plays little more
than "monstrous farces called tragedies."10
The force of Voltaire's influence was plainly summar­
ized by Collison-Moriey when he stated that " m u c h of Ital­
ian opinion upon Shakespeare till the end of the century and
beyond was derived from Voltaire." There was, then,
"no
chance of Shakespeare's becoming at all known in Italy until
he had aroused the interest of a Frenchman of sufficient
standing in the world of letters to command a t t e n t i o n . " 11
Nevertheless, while Collison-Morley's assertions are
generally accurate, to accept them unreservedly would be to
diminish the contributions made by Italians to the dis-
10 Voltaire, Sur la trag§die. "...il y a de si belles scenes, des
morceaux si grands et si terribles r6pandus dans ses Farces
monstrueuses qu'on appelle Tragedies..."
11 Lacy Collison-Morley, Shedzespeare in Italy (New York: Benjamin Blom,
1967) 15-16.
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6
semination of English literature in Italy during Voltaire's
lifetime.
Translations of English texts began appearing in Italy
during the early decades of the eighteenth century, a phe­
nomenon initiated not by men of letters but primarily by
philosophers and scientists who travelled to England,
seek­
ing new avenues for the exchange and dissemination of knowl­
edge. Eager to remain at the forefront of philosophical and
scientific developments,
these early translators of English
works wished to bring Italy, though most already considered
their native country an exemplar of civilized society, to an
even greater assimilation of foreign thought.12
As the century progressed,
interest in all facets of
English culture grew to such an extent that by 1775, Metastasio felt compelled to warn a friend about what he saw as
the impending lure of a new anglomanian that was sweeping
parts of Italy. As the following chapters will show, Verdi
owed a debt to three eighteenth-century men of letters,
Antonio Conti, Paolo Rolli, and Giuseppe Baretti, who fos­
tered the new spirit that eventually brought Shakespeare to
Italy.
12 Walter Binni, Preromanticismo italiano (Naples: Edizioni
Scientifiche Italiane, 1959) 129.
13 Pietro Metastasio, Tutte le opere. Ed. Bruno Brunelli. 5 vols.
(Milan: Mondadori, 1954) V, 321. In a letter to Rovatti, dated 18
January 1775, Metastasio wrote, "...non vi lasciate sedurre da
quell'anglomania che regna da qualche anno in qua in alcuna parte
d'Italia."
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7
CHAPTER I
Antonio Conti and " S a s p e r " :
" G r a n d Ideas and Noble Sentiments"
Antonio Conti was perhaps an unwitting initiator of the
anglomania about which Metastasio spoke, for he was among
the first men of philosophy and science to forge a link b e ­
tween the literary cultures of Italy and England. His jour­
ney to England in 1715 marked the beginning of his life as
an inveterate translator and man of letters. From English,
Conti translated John Sheffield's Essay on Poetry, Pope's
Letters of Heloise and Abelard,
The Rape of the Lock, and a
generous selection of Mary Wortley Montagu's poems. From
French, he produced translations of Racine's Athalie and
Voltaire's Mirope. From Greek, Conti translated several of
Anakreon's odes and a poem of Sappho's; and from Latin, he
fashioned numerous Italian versions of Horace and Virgil.
Although he may have suffered a decline in prosperity
near the end of his life,1 Conti mainly enjoyed the benefits
of material comfort, and never felt a need to publish in
order to subsist. Since he left no large body of published
works, little has been written in either Italian or English
about his life or literary work. The earliest biographical
account is the Notizie i n t o m a la vita e gli studi del Sig.
Abate Conti, written by Giuseppe Toaldo, which appears as a
preface to the second volume of Conti's Prose e poesie, pub­
lished at Venice in 1756. In addition to this biographical
1 Robertson, 109.
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8
account, there are several critical essays by Gioachino
Bronoligo entitled L'Opera letteraria di Antonio Conti in
the journal,
L'Ateneo Veneto, printed in a nuinber of issues
that appeared during 1893 and 1894. More recently,
Versioni
poetiche, a collection of Conti's translations, was p u b ­
lished in 1966, along with a fine analytical essay by the
editor, Giovanna Gronda. Marco Ariani's Drammaturgia e mitopoiesi: Antonio Conti, scrittore
is also noteworthy since
it presents a detailed analysis of Conti's work as a man of
letters. Studies in English that mention Conti include Collison-Morley's Shakespeare in Italy,
in which the author
devotes a mere two pages to him. There are chapters on Conti
in Robertson's The Genesis of Romantic Theory in the
Eighteenth Century, and in George E. Dorris's Paolo Rolli
and the Italian Literary Circle in London,
1715-1744. Not
surprisingly, both Dorris and Robertson draw heavily from
Toaldo's Notizie and Conti's works, especially his prefaces
and letters.
Conti came to the world of letters by a circuitous
route. Second son of Pio and Lucrezia Nani, he was born into
a prominent Paduan family on January 22, 1677.2 Ordained to
the priesthood in 1699, he acquired a firm PlatonicAugustinian education that initiated him into the rigors of
philosophy,
science, and French culture. In 1708, he left
2 Conti sometimes used the name Schinella, an old family name given to
him at birth. Giuseppe Toaldo, Conti's biographer, writes, "II vero suo
nome £ Antonio Schinella, nome ereditario di sua famiglia.... Nelle
carte legali egli si scriveva cosi, ma nelle lettere private usava il
nome pi£t comune d'Antonio." Prose e poesie (Venice, 1756) II, l.
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9
his order when the Veneto, his native region of Italy, was
witnessing the proliferation of numerous scholarly and p h i ­
losophical treatises dealing with Cartesian rationalism and
English empiricism.3
Conti enjoyed both the means and the
opportunity not only for studying these new philosophical
ideas but also for delving into the latest scientific, math­
ematical, astronomical, and medical tracts.
Cartesian philosophy, moreover, was taking a firm hold
in Italy at this time, and Conti, like many thinkers of his
day, became an ardent follower. After establishing contacts
with leading European philosophers, mathematicians,
and
scientists, Conti eventually sought out Michelangelo Fardella, a fervent Italian advocate of Descartes. Under Fardella's guidance, Conti read the French philosopher's M e d i ­
tations and Principes, and perhaps most important for the
development of his own wide-ranging philosophical outlook,
he studied Malebranche1s Recherche de la veritS, and read
Bacon, Leibnitz, and Locke. The mathematical sciences, about
which Conti always exhibited a lively interest, were e x ­
plained to him by various Italian masters.
It was, however,
in Malebranche1s philosophical hypoth­
eses, which presented objections to Cartesianism,
that Conti
found his first method for judging the emerging theories of
rationalism. He then set out to reconcile the metaphysics of
Descartes with the empiricism of Locke, but when he read
3 Dizionario biografico degli italiani. Eds. Vincenzo Cappelletti, et.
al. XXIII (Rome: Treccani, 1983) 352.
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10
Locke's Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Conti became
convinced of the fundamental incompatibility between these
two epistemological systems.
" I realized,"
he wrote later,
"that to begin philosophizing by starting from the senses
was very different from starting from G o d . " 4
Conti's attempt to reconcile opposing philosophical
views, and his widely circulated essay,5 considered by many
of his compatriots a vindication of Italian science and p h i ­
losophy, earned him a measure of celebrity.
In his essay,
Conti defended the methods of scientific research; empha­
sized the necessity for discarding all unverifiable the­
ories; made a clear distinction between experimental philos­
ophy and hypothetical philosophy; hailed scientific develop­
ments that had been
recently achieved in Europe; and d e ­
fended the cultural
contributions made by Italy, which were
then poorly valued in other countries.6
Eager to pursue his philosophical and scientific stud­
ies beyond Italy's borders,7 Conti left for France in 1713.
Upon his arrival in Paris, he found that he was already
known as a philosopher and man of science. Consequently,
he
was warmly received
the
in scientific circles, where he made
4 " B e n mi accorsi che il cominciar da' sensi a filosofare era
diversissimo dal cominciar da Dio." Conti, Prose e poeeie, II, 4.
5 Lettera del Sig. Abate Conte Antonio Conti a Monsignor Illustriss.
Reverendiss. Filippo del Torre, Vescovo d'Adria, sopra le Considerazioni
intorno alia generazione de'viventi, ecc.
6 Dizlonario biografico degli italiani, 354.
7 Conti's biographer writes, " l a sua perizia nelle Matematiche e
nelle filosofie veniva apprezzata ancora di 1& da'monti, quando gli
venne voglia di viaggiare, e di cercare le scienze ancora n e 'Paesi
stranieri. Prose e poeaie, II, 20.
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11
acquaintance of Malebranche,
Fontenelle, and others. At the
Academie des sciences, dominated chiefly by Fontenelle,
Conti continued his philosophical inquiries. Working on the
fundamental question of whether or not human intellect could
indeed systematically explore and comprehend reality, Conti
grew increasingly dissatisfied with Cartesianism, and to e x ­
tend his theoretical base, he began studying the works of
Newton.
Reveling in the heady stimulation of the French cap­
ital, Conti frequently attended lectures and social gather­
ings, where with increasing frequency he began meeting men
of letters. Conti's first contact with the French letterati
came through his acquaintances with Bourquet, Vallisnieri,
and his countryman, Scipione Maffei. Often accompanied by
the Italian poet, Pier Giacomo Martelli, Conti frequently
took long walks in the Tuileries and discussed, among other
things, the nature of tragedy.
" H e loved,"
said Toaldo,
" t o arrive at the same truths by diverse methods, and to
see them from all sides; he wished to drink from the source
and to listen to systems and theories from the lips of their
author s . " 8 I have detailed Conti's activities as a
philosopher in some detail simply to demonstrate that,
despite its extensive range,
Conti's work
there was thus far little about
except an insatiable curiosity for a broad
diversity of knowledge, to show that he might ever become
8 "Egli amava di entrare nelle medesime veritft per diversi metodi, e
vederle da tutti i lati: volea bere al Conte, e udire i sistemi e le
teorie dalla bocca dei loro Autori..." Ibid., 20.
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12
known in literary circles.
Certainly, when he sailed for England in April of 1715,
an event that would change his life, literary matters were
still far from his mind. Conti undertook his journey for
purely scientific reasons. He wished to fulfill his dream of
meeting Newton and to observe what promised to be an espe­
cially impressive eclipse of the sun.9 Conti remained in
England until March of 1718. During his stay, he met not
only Newton, who "received him p o l i t e l y , " 10 but also the
astronomer Edmond Hailey and members of the royal family. In
November of 1715, Newton, who by this time had come to know
Conti and his work, nominated him to the Royal Society, to
which he was admitted on November 17, 1715.
At about this time, Conti suffered an acute attack of
asthma. Seeking relief, he made his way to the less con­
gested, more tranquil ambience of Kensington, where in
quieter surroundings, he turned away from his usual pursuits
in philosophy and science, and tried his hand at writing
verses,
composing a poem of some two hundred lines that paid
tribute to Newton's theories. While Conti was sojourning at
Kensington, the wife of John Sheffield, Duke of Buckingham,
gave him a copy of her husband's essay on poetry.11 Conti,
who was learning English at the time, translated it with the
9 "Voi sapete che nel mese di Aprile dell*anno 1715, passai a Londra...
II sogetto del [mio] viaggio altro non fu, che la curiositH di vedere il
Newtono e la grande Bcclissi..." Ibid., 23.
10 Ibid.
11 J. Sheffield, An Essay upon Poetry, London, printed for Joseph
Hindmarsh at the Black Bull in Comhill, near the Royal Exchange, 1682.
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13
help of his friend, Pierre Coste,12 and sent a copy to the
scholar, Lodovico Antonio Muratori for comments. Muratori
suggested numerous corrections but warmly encouraged Conti
to follow his new literary interests.13
Precisely how much of Shakespeare's work Conti read
while visiting England is not clear. Judging from his own
words,
it is certain he knew Julius Caesar,
preface to his own tragedy,
for in the
Cesare, published at Faenza in
1726, Conti describes Shakespeare's play at some length. His
comments are worth examining, since they throw his views of
Shakespeare and English tragedy into sharp relief:
Soon afterwards, the Duke of Buckingham gave
me two plays he had written, Caesar and Brutus,
which are really nothing but Shakespeare's Caesar
divided in two. Shakespeare is the Corneille of
the English, but much more irregular than Cor­
neille, though equal to him in richness of grand
ideas and noble sentiments...Shakespeare made him
[Caesar] die in the third act; the rest of the
tragedy is concerned with Mark Anthony's harangue
to the crowd, then with the wars and the deaths of
Cassius and Brutus. Could the unities of time,
place, and action be any further violated? But u n ­
til Cato,14 the English disdained the Aristotelian
rules because tragedy was meant to please, and the
best is the one that pleases most — even if it
contains a hundred different actions, and trans­
ports characters from Europe to Asia, and they end
12 French translator of Locke's Essay Concerning Human Understanding
(EsBai philosophique concemant 1'entendement humain, Amsterdam, 1700} .
13 Muratori told Conti, “ La sua traduzione...mi fa ora sapere ch'ella
& anche maestro in poesia...[la sua traduzione] ha tutta l'aria
d'originale e spunta fuori anche l'estro del traduttore con versi
veramente rnusici, pensieri felicemente insieme e chiaramente espressi e
colori in una parola tutti poetici. Antonio Conti, Versioni poetiche,
Ed. Giovanna Gronda (Bari: Laterza, 1966) 595. Also, Prose e poesie,
II, 37.
14 Joseph Addison's Cato (1713).
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14
as old men after having started out as young boys.
Thus, I imagine, thought most Italians, spoiled by
the Spanish comedies of the 1600's; and I'm amazed
that in that century no one was advised to trans­
late into Italian the comedies and tragedies of
the English, full of incidents, just like the
Spanish, but certainly with more natural and
pleasing characters. Italy would have learned, if
not the entire history of the Kings of England,
which was brought to the stage by her poets, but
about each king whose life had provided material
for a tragedy.15
The observation that Sheffield's plays were nothing
more than Shakespeare's Julius Caesar divided in two clearly
indicates that Conti was sufficiently familiar with the Eng­
lish poet's tragedy to make such a judgment. More signifi­
cant, however,
is Conti's ambivalence toward Shakespeare,
since this was the primary sentiment that sounded a constant
refrain throughout eighteenth-century attitudes toward
Shakespeare in Italy and France.
Eight years after the publication of Conti's preface,
for example, Voltaire also called Shakespeare the Corneille
of the English and echoed Conti's views about the English
poet's " n a turalness,"
and deviation from the rules of dr a ­
matic unity.16 Moreover, Voltaire, as Conti had done, e s ­
teemed Addison's Cato as an appropriate model of English
15 The first edition of Conti's play is extremely rare, I sun therefore
grateful to J. G. Robertson for reprinting a portion of the original
text of Conti's preface on page 103 in Studies in the Genesis of
Romantic Theory in the Eighteenth Century. I have used it for my
translation here and have included the Italian text in Appendix A.
16 Voltaire wrote in Sur la tragddie, published in 1734, eight years
after the appearance of Conti's play in Italy, "Shakespeare qui
paissait pour le Corneille des Anglais, fleurissait & peu prds dans le
temps de Lope de VSga....11 avait un g§nie plein de force et de
f§condit€, de naturel et de sublime."
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15
tragedy since it was considered "regular;"
conformed to the " g o o d ta s t e "
that is, it
that les regies were
designed to protect. These correspondences between the
remarks of Conti and Voltaire seem to indicate that much of
what passed as French influence on Shakespearean criticism
in Italy might have in fact originated among the Italian
letterati.
Without denying the considerable force of French in­
fluence, it should be noted that Conti's friend, Muratori, a
passionate spokesman for Italian culture,17 was already a d ­
vocating literary reform as early as 1703. His first book on
matters of literary taste,
I primi Disegni della Repubblica
letteraria d'Italia, was followed, between 1708 and 1715, by
another work on the criteria of good taste, Riflessioni sopra il buon gusto nelle scienze e nell'arti. Moreover, his
most significant work on this subject, Della perfetta poesia, was originally to be entitled La riforma della poesia
italiana. For Muratori, buon gusto in poetry meant a concern
with the beautiful, which the poet must present in his work
as truth, that is, as the " p r o b a b l e , "
otherwise the work
will appear ridiculous. Most commentators therefore gener­
ally agreed that Shakespeare created scenes of rare beauty
and poetic power, but because he disregarded certain formal
standards, including that of "probability," he lacked the
17 Most of Muratori's life was spent in Modena, as archivist and
librarian to the Duke of Modena. He published a monumental series of
chronicles and documents that earned him the title, ‘Padre della Btoria
italiana.'
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16
refinement and elegance of taste to create tragedies that
were aesthetically satisfying. His works were therefore con­
sidered too unpolished to be taken seriously as models for
emulation.
Given this judgment of Shakespeare, the one most fre­
quently repeated during the first half of the eighteenth
century, Conti1s amazement that no one had yet translated
English comedies and tragedies is especially significant.
Although noting that Shakespeare egregiously violated the
unities of time, place, and action, Conti was willing to
overlook what he considered the English p o e t 's aesthetic
shortcomings for the sake of a higher objective —
the
knowledge of English history that Italian readers might have
gained from his plays.
Far from being a radical reformer, however, Conti, as
his ambivalence towards Shakespeare and the style of his own
tragedies indicate, embraced the neoclassical standards of
his times. Although these standards were by no means u n i ­
form, they were becoming more and more codified. For e x ­
ample, in addition to Muratori's Repubblica letteraria, the
Roman Arcadian Academy, with its thirteen hundred members
was advocating reform, chiefly as a reaction against the ex­
cesses of marinismo, not only in literature but also in the
sciences. Carini's description of the diversity and aims of
the Arcadian Academy at the time Conti wrote his tragedy is
most apt:
This was not an academy of mere poetry, but
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17
rather an eclectic gathering of the learned, d e ­
voted to every branch of human knowledge, brought
together only in this: to reclaim good taste in
Italy, where it was running to madness; to impede
the announcement of great truths in insipid and
rude language; to place in honor over every other
thing the art of giving form to thought; and to
join the amenity of style and the adornment of the
word to the real historical, moral, physical and
mathematical disciplines; a purpose, as is clearly
apparent, nobler than any other.18
When he came to write his own tragedy,
Cesare,19 Conti,
not surprisingly, placed it within the mold of early eight­
eenth-century Italian drama. For example,
instead of p r e ­
senting the death of Caesar in the third act, as Shakespeare
does, Conti reserves it for the last act, thereby preserving
the so-called Aristotelian unities. Moreover, Caesar's a s ­
sassination is not presented on-stage,
as in Shakespeare,
but is reported by Antonio in the final scene, thus adhering
to the traditional mode of reporting dramatic mayhem that
went back at least as far as the Greek tragedians.
Aspects of Conti's Cesare, especially its fourth act,
have nevertheless invited comparisons with Shakespeare.
Colagrosso,
for example, has written that "evidently Conti
has imitated Shakespeare in these scenes of the fourth act,
which are perhaps among the best in the tragedy.' ‘20 In the
relatively brief fourth act, Calpurnia attempts to placate
18 Isadore Carini, L 'Arcadia dal 1690 al 1890 (Rome, 1891) 46-7. Quoted
by Dorris, 30.
19 Conti's play dates from 1726. The earliest version I have been able
to find was published at Milan in 1824.
20 Francesco Colagrosso, La prima tragedia di Antonio Conti (Florence,
1898) 41. " Evidentemente il Conti ha imitato lo Shakespeare in queste
scene del quarto atto, che forse sono tra le migliori della tragedia."
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18
the gods, after having dreamed of holding the bloody body of
her husband in her arms. She then implores Caesar not to go
to the senate, but he refuses to be dissuaded, and says
sharply,
" I don't believe in crazy d r e a m s . " 21 Brutus, after
Calpurnia tells him of her portentous visions, also rebuffs
Calpurnia when he replies prophetically that "dreams do i n ­
deed reveal the future.''22
True, Conti's extended treatment of Calpurnia's plight
and her affecting pleas in this scene might suggest some­
thing of Shakespeare. On the whole, however, even consider­
ing textual similarities,23 connections between the trage­
dies of Conti and Shakespeare seem extremely tenuous, since
the range and dimension of Calpurnia's role in this scene
far exceed what Shakespeare allotted her in his work. Fur­
thermore, Shakespeare's Caesar seems more susceptible to
vacillation, and therefore more human, when he is torn b e ­
tween the conflicting calls of duty to state and to family.
For example, in contrast to Conti's Caesar, who shrugs
off his wife's entreaties, Shakespeare's character yields to
them and resolves to remain with her rather than going imme­
diately to the senate:
Caesar: Mark Antony shall say I am not well,
And for thy humor I will stay at home.
21 **del credulo volgo pazzi sogni.''
22 " l e cose future il sogno esprime alle menti."
23 Robertson has written, [In Conti's play] "Caesar says of Brutus and
Cassio: 'Di q u e 1 lor volti pallidi ed austeri nulla mi fido;' Portia is
'degna figlia di Cato;' 'Io lessi,' says Antonio, 'in certe cedolette,
che gli Schiavi trovar nel Foro e in Campodoglio sparse: Bruto, ancora
tu dormi?' etc." Op. cit., 104
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19
But when Decius asks him,
shall they not whisper,
" I f Caesar hide himself,
'Lo Caesar is afraid?'" Caesar
relents, calls for his robe, and says,
" H o w foolish do your
fears seem now Calpurnia! I am ashamed I did yield to
them.''
Conti's tragedy closes with the death of Caesar, which
takes place not on stage, as in Shakespeare, but off stage.
Antonio reports the moment of Caesar's death in a speech
that, while deeply poignant, bears little resemblance to
Shakespeare's treatment of the same event.
M a son confusi, e sbigottiti i Padri,
E fuggire, o soccorrere, o gridare
0 non sanno, o n o n osano. La turba
Incalza Giulio; e Cassio, e Cimbro, e Casca
Gl'impiagan a vicenda il dorso, e '1 petto.
Bruto alza il ferro; Cesare lo guarda
Con languid'occhio, e sospirando dice
Le voci estreme: E tu m i o figlio ancora?
An especially felicitous poetic touch is found, I believe,
in the lines,
" o soccorrere, o gridare/ 0 non sanno, o non
osano," where the deep, recurring " o - s o u n d s "
establish a
mournful cadence of lamentation that accompanies Caesar at
the instant his ministers murder him.
There is also significant difference in the way the
plays of Conti and Shakespeare end. Conti places Caesar's
murder within the broad perspective of Roman history,
condemning war and invoking gods:
Guerre, orride guerre!
0 di qual sangue spumar veggo il Tebro!
L'are vostre servate, o santi Numi.
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20
Conti therefore sees Caesar's death chiefly as an event
of historical significance, the consequences of which he
developed in his subsequent tragedies —
Giunio Bruto
(1743); Marco Bruto (1744); and Druso (1748). Shakespeare,
on the other hand, while not ignoring the historical impli­
cations of Caesar's murder, closes his play in a way that
focuses on Caesar as an individual human being. We are given
the sense that the death of " t h e noblest Roman of them
a l l " was as much a personal tragedy as an historical one.
Considered his best work, Conti's Cesare established his re­
putation as a poet. It was performed frequently during its
author's lifetime, and thinkers such as Vico, Doria, and Cesarotti held it in high esteem.24 When he wrote his tragedy,
there can be little doubt, then, that Conti came of age as a
man of letters.
Conti's primary significance as an early initiator of
"anglomania, "
however, rests not so much with the works he
created as with the works he translated. It was Conti's
lively enthusiasm for English literature, and his inexhaust­
ible curiosity that continually spurred his genuine desire
to participate in the learned debates of his day.25 For e x ­
ample, he would like to have seen Italian translations of
Shakespeare, he said, not only to satisfy his own curiosity
but also to bring knowledge of English history to his fellow
24 Prose e poesie, 62 .
25 Hardouin writes, " I n una parola egli accoppiava a una insaziabile
cupidita di sapere una singolar penetrazione, un senso vivo dilicato, un
gusto fino, e tutto cid che pud costituire in un ten5>o un'uomo dotto e
un bellissimo ingegno.” Prose e poesie. II, 52.
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21
Italians. Conti therefore often saw himself not only as a
mediator between diverse cultures but also, as his earlier
attempt to reconcile the incompatible philosophical systems
of Locke and Descartes had demonstrated, between two oppos­
ing modes of thought.
Viewed in the light of his role as mediator,
it is
quite possible, then, that Conti was participating in a con­
temporary literary debate when, just within months of his
arrival in England, he sent his translation of Sheffield's
Essay on Poetry to Muratori. Conti's Italian version of the
opening lines of Sheffield's poem would have fallen reassur­
ingly on the ears of any confirmed Arcadian:
Poesia non &, se dritto miro,
che musica, pittura ed eloquenza
leggiadramente temperate, in guisa
che accoppiano col nuovo il grande e '1 bello.
Le imagini e i color dalle pittura,
eloquenza gl'affetti e le ragioni,
musica il chiaro e dolce suon del metro:
tutte e tre d'imitar con grazia e forza
di non finta natura i parti santi.
Moreover,
considering the neoclassic tone of Sheffield's
poem, it is quite evident that Conti also aimed at inserting
the viewpoints of foreign authors into the context of p r e ­
vailing Italian literary tradition.
Conti developed his skills as a translator through long
periods of residence away from Italy (1713-1726), his daily
use of foreign languages, and his association with cultural
and social circles in England and France. In his later
years, he pursued extensive work in classical and Italian
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22
literature,
in natural sciences, and looked into the nature
of poetry and metrics, trying at times to write his own
poetry.
Despite his knowledge of foreign languages, his wide
erudition and elaborate philosophical theorizing, Conti left
no unified theory of translation. He seems to have distanced
himself from the general discussions on styles and methods
of translation which arose during his lifetime. These d e ­
bates continued throughout the century, continually occupied
the attention of critics and translators, and gave birth to
polemics of wide historical and literary significance.26
Many of these debates, as the writings of Rolli and Baretti
clearly demonstrate, carried significant implications for
attitudes towards Shakespeare.
Conti's thoughts on translation can be reconstructed
only from brief observations scattered throughout his let­
ters and literary prefaces. For example, in the light of d e ­
bates between " l i t e r a l "
in Italy, and " f r e e "
translation, advocated by Salvini
translation, promulgated by Voltaire
in France, Conti's statements and attitudes appear to v a c i l ­
late. When he freely translated Sheffield's Essay on Poetry
and Pope's Letter of Heloise to Abelard, Conti said he had
adopted a style " f a r removed from the rigorous laws of
translation."27 In the prefatory comments to his version of
26 Antonio Conti, Versioni poetiche. Ed. Giovanna Gronda. (Bari:
Laterza, 1966) 578.
27 A. Conti, " A 1 lettore. ” II Riccio raplto di A. Pope. "Nel tradurre
quest'opera io mi sono molto discostato dalle leggi rigorose della
traduzione.” Versioni poetiche, 616.
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23
The Rape of the Lock, begun in France in 1724, Conti was
quite possibly echoing the prevailing French view when he
said that he aimed at expressing the " i d e a s and spirit"
of
the original rather than the poet's actual "phrases and
images. " 28
In like fashion, Voltaire, when speaking of his own
translation of one of Hamlet's soliloquies,
cautioned his
readers not to assume that he had translated it "word for
word." Acknowledging that a translation is merely " a feeble
print of a fine painting," Voltaire said that a translator
who attempts a literal translation weakens the sense of a
work, and, with typical panache, added that " t h e letter
killeth but the spirit giveth l i f e . " 29 Apparently, for V o l ­
taire, giving life to a translation also allowed for the in ­
sertion of a translator's personal views as well. For ex ­
ample, in his translation of Hamlet's soliloquy that begins,
"To be or not to be," Voltaire included these lines:
0 mort! moment fatal! affreuse 6 t e m i t £ ,
Tout coeur a ton seul n o m se glace epouvante.
Eh! qui pourrait sans toi supporter cette vie,
D e nos Pr§tres menteurs b & i i r l'hypocrisie;
Shakespeare's text notwithstanding,
the anticlerical
Frenchman could not resist putting into Hamlet's mouth the
bitingly caustic phrase,
" t o bless the hypocrisy of our
lying priests."
28 "sono stato pill sollecito ad esprimere l'idee e lo spirito del
poema che le frasi e le figure del poeta; ho cangiato molte cose" Ibid.
29 cf. "Ne croyez pas que j'aie rendu ici l'Anglais mot pour mot; C'est
bien IS qu'on peut dire que la lettre tue, et que l'esprit vivifie."
Voltaire, Sur la tragSdie.
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24
We cannot exclude from consideration the extent of Con­
ti's knowledge of English, whatever it might have been, when
assessing his views on translation. His departure from what
he called " t h e rigid laws of translation"
in his versions
of Sheffield and Pope could have been determined by his
command of English. Although his English seems sufficiently
adequate, he experienced English primarily as a written,
literary language.
On the other hand, four years before translating Pope,
Conti was still living in France, where he displayed an e x ­
tensive knowledge of French and used it in both his writings
and daily conversations. It should come as no surprise,
then, given the similarities between Italian and French, and
the reverence Conti held for Racine, that when he translated
Athalie, he sedulously attempted to remain as faithful as
possible to the original language, which he viewed as " p e r ­
fect." Returning to Italy, Conti made extensive revisions
to his translation of Racine. When he finally published his
Italian version under the title Atalia, he declared that he
had been " r e l i g i o u s "
"faithful"
in exhibiting the poet's concepts;
in expressing meanings of words and turns of
phrases; and " d i l igent"
in assuming the tone and character
of the author.30
Conti also said in his prefatory remarks that when he
30 "lo sono stato religioso
rappresentare 1'espressioni
dell'originale, diligente e
dell'autore." Disaertazione
nell'esporre i concetti, fedele nel
delle parole e il giro delle figure
sollecito nel prender l'aria e il carratere
sull'Atalia. Versioni poetiche, 119.
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25
translated Athalie, he had followed the ideas in the preface
to Salvini's translation of Homer, which was published in
1723.31 Conti's citation of Salvini not only gives us some
inkling of to the methods of Italian translators but also
sheds light on his own approach to translation. In his
preface to his second version of Pope's Rape of the Lock,
which also dates from the years 1728 to 1730, Conti states
that he strove for a more precise,
literal translation in
his latest version of Pope's text than in his earlier
rendering.32
Nevertheless, it would be inaccurate to conclude, d e ­
spite Conti's eventual return to his native country, and his
choice of the literalist Salvini as a model for translation,
that he had embarked on a course of rigorous adherence to
the letter of the original. Such a view would be immediately
contradicted by Conti's other statements concerning his
methods as a translator. In his dedicatory letter to his
translations from the Greek,
for example, Conti chastised
earlier translators who had freely rendered Anakreon into
Italian because instead of translating,
structed
they had merely con­
paraphrases rather than translations.33 Then in a
31 " Nella mia traduzione ho seguito 1'idea adottata dall1abate Salvini
nella sua Prefazione ad Omero." Conti's reference is to Salvini's
L'IIlade d'Omero tradotta da ll'originale greco in verai aciolti, In
Firenze, MDCCXXIII, Gio. Gaetano Tartini e Santi Franchi. Ibid.
32 Conti wrote, "Confrontando questa con 1'originale inglese in
quest'anno io l'ho ritoccato per farla piQ letterale” "Prefazione del
traduttore." II riccio rapito di Pope. Versioni poetiche, 619.
33 A1 Signor Abbate Oliva, Bibliotecario di Sua Eminenza il Signor
Cardinale di Roano. " n e fecero piil tosto delle parafrasi che delle
traduzioni." Versioni poetiche, 292.
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26
remarkable reversal, Conti explicitly states that Salvini's
literal translations seemed to him too "rigid,
cold, and
obscure."34 Moreover, at about this time, Conti set about
making yet another revision, his third, of the Rape of the
Lock. When it was almost ready for the printer, Conti, a c ­
cording to his biographer, reverted to a more liberal ren­
dering of the English original.
Undoubtedly, Conti's shifts between one form of trans­
lation and another display an absence of any coherent meth­
odology. Conti lacked,
it seems, a lucid theory of transla­
tion to which he could remain loyal, and this might have im­
peded his entering into contemporary debates on the subject.
Furthermore, the most novel of his translated works —
of Pope, Montagu, and Sheffield —
those
were either published
posthumously or remained unpublished. Some, such as Merope
were even published anonymously. There was little, then,
given the publication history of his works, that could have
fostered Conti's participation in discussions on methods of
translation, or that could have contributed to the growth of
his critical acuity.35 In his translations, Conti seemed in­
fluenced mostly by the prevailing attitudes of the countries
in which he worked —
naturalisation in France, and fidelity
to the text in Italy, as exemplified by the work of Salvini.
Conti occasionally speaks of these two opposing a p ­
proaches in seemingly theoretical terms that are in reality
34 " l a traduzione letterale di Salvini a me par troppo aspra, fredda,
ed oscura." Ibid.
35 Giovanna Gronda, "Nota critica." Versioni Poetiche. 580.
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27
general formulations:
It seems that in translation it is not enough to
preserve the literal sense if one still does not
shade the copy with a " n o n so c h e " of the spirit
that sustains and animates the original.36
Although this sounds like common sense, Conti clearly sig­
nals his evasiveness toward any rigorous methodology with
his phrase,
" n o n so c h e . " On the other hand, his discern­
ment as a translator, his familiarity with the languages
from which he translates, his literary taste, and his intui­
tive grasp of the works he translates, all point to a vivid
mind that added to and reflected the cultural context of his
century. Examples of Conti's acumen as a man of letters can
be seen most clearly in his Dissertazione su 1 'Atalia, which
includes a critical evaluation of Racine's Athalie, and in
his preface to II riccio rapito, which contains keen in­
sights into Pope's art.
Conti always keeps the original at the center of his
comments, and even when he speaks of the difficulties in­
herent in translation,
it is always an image of the original
text that he keeps before him, often fearing that he has
missed something of its poetic value,
he once wrote to a friend,
" i n my translation,"
" y o u see only the skeleton of
Sappho's o d e . " 37 Always attentive to his imagined ideals of
36 Conti, A S. E. il Signor Girolamo Ascanio Giustiniani. "Mi pare che
nella traduzione non basta conservar il senso letterale se ancora non si
ombreggia nella copia un non so che di quello spirito che sostiene ed
anima 1 1originale." Ibid., 323.
37 A. Conti, " Annotazione sopra il Cantico di Saffo." Versioni
poetiche, 295.
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28
the authors he translated, Conti generally remained dissat­
isfied with his translations. He endlessly worked and r e ­
worked them, sent them to literary friends for comments,
then corrected and revised them once more. Remaining dissat­
isfied even after countless revisions, he frequently refused
to publish them, as was the case with his version of Shef­
field and four volumes of Horace's odes.
The choices Conti made for his translations reflect a
poetic sensitivity wide enough to have included both modern
and classical authors. Moreover, his choices among the a u ­
thors of his day range widely from Pope to Racine, from V o l ­
taire to lesser known figures such as Sheffield and Montagu.
Among classic authors, we find Virgil and Horace, and Kallimachos and Anakreon. Conspicuously absent from this list
are Milton, perhaps because of the appearance of Paolo
Rolli's translation of Paradise Lost during Conti's life­
time,38 and Shakespeare, of whose works Conti was certainly
aware. The absence of Shakespeare from Conti's list of tran­
slated works is not altogether surprising,
for he was invar­
iably drawn to authors and literary forms that conformed to
the literary tastes of eighteenth-century Italy.
Conti's avoidance of Shakespeare can be explained most
clearly perhaps by his own views on tragedy, which are
clearly explicated in his Dissertazione Sull 'Atalia. The a c ­
38 In his Notizie, Toaldo gives a list of authors Conti translated,
including Milton. He admits, however, that it is impossible to enumerate
all of Conti 'b translations. I have been unable to find any versions of
Milton that Conti might have made. Gronda states flatly that there are
none. See "Nota critica" Versioni poetiche, 582-83.
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29
tion of tragedy,
says Conti, is continuous and uninterrupted
and should proceed from beginning to end without encounter­
ing obstacles. Tragic characters are always in conflict with
one another,
and this conflict, emanating from the passions,
depends not only upon impulses of passion but also upon the
characters' diverse behavior and motivations, which are then
presented as consequences of those passions. Conti, fre­
quently referring to Aristotle's description of " p i t y and
fear," gives a graphic image of the structure of tragedy
when he compares it with the shape of a human hand. The out­
line of the five fingers of a hand, rising to a certain
point, then declining,
suggests the five acts and four in­
tervals by which the action of tragedy is configured.39
Given this highly structured view of tragedy,
it is
hardly likely that Conti aimed primarily at innovation when
he translated. Instead, seeing himself in his habitual role
as mediator,
he often attempted to clothe the cultural d i ­
versity of other nations in familiar garb so that it would
be recognizable to his countrymen. For example,
Conti took
these opening lines of Pope's The Rape of the Lock,
What dire offense from amorous causes springs,
Wh a t m i g h t y contests rise from trivial things,
I sing -- This verse to Caryll, Muse! is due:
This, even Belinda m a y vouchsafe t o view:
Slight is the subject, but not so the praise,
If she inspire, and he approve m y lays.
and translated them this way:
Canto l'offesa la vittoria e '1 pi a n t o
39
A. Conti.
" Dissertazione sull'Atalia."
Versioni poetiche, 110.
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30
lo sdegno, la battaglia e la sconfitta
pel riccio tronco, che die tanta briga
a' Gnomi, a' Silfi, a l l 1Ipocondria, al Cielo,
onde al fin risplendette astro novello.
Conti departed widely from the original here, I believe, in
order to bring the full force of Pope's mock heroic lines
within the bounds of a particular
Italian literary tradi­
tion. in this way Pope's satiric thrust would be readily
intelligible to a well-informed Italian reader.
The model for Conti's
Italian version, however,
is not
Ariosto's Orlando Furioso, as Dorris has asserted.40 Conti
specifically stated in a preface to a later version of his
translation,
that he had purposely departed from the rigid
rules of translation to pattern his translation after A l e s ­
sandro Tassoni
(1565-1635),41 who was generally considered
the originator of the modern mock-epic in Italy.42 Tassoni's
most well-known work in this vein is his La secchia rapita
(The Rape of the Bucket), whose title as well as style sug­
gested to Conti the model for his translation of Pope's
work.
The catalogue style of the opening of Conti's trans­
lation does indeed recall these lines from Ariosto:
Le donne, i cavalier, l'arme, gli amori,
le cortesie, l'audaci imprese io canto,
ch furo al tempo che passaro i Mori
40 Seeking a model for the opening of Conti's translation, Dorris
wrote: "More than Virgil's inevitable 'Arina virumque cano’ this would
suggest to the Italian reader the similar catalogue-opening of the
Orlando Furioso." George E. Dorris, Paolo Rolli and the Italian Circle
in London (The Hague: Mouton & Co., 1967) 220.
41 " n e l principio del poema espongo tutto il soggetto ad imitazione
del Tassoni" Versioni poetiche, 616-17.
42 Dictionary of Italian Literature, 506.
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31
d'Africa il mare, e in Francia nocquer tanto,
seguendo 1'ire e i giovanil furori
d'Agramante lor re, che si die vanto
di vendicar la morte di Troiano
sppra re Carlo imperator rctnano.
The first-time reader of Ariosto's poem, however, can easily
read these opening lines as representative of a serious
epic, since they deal with the defeat of the invading Moors
at the hands of Charlemagne. Although Ariosto will go on to
endow his work with incomparable invention, fantasy, and
humor, the reader has no way of telling at the outset p r e ­
cisely which way the poet will take him.
What is missing from the opening lines of Ariosto's
poem, then, is the sense of humorous mockery that Tassoni
vividly captures at the beginning of La secchia rapita with
these lines:
Vorrei cantar quel memorando sdegno,
Ch' infiammo gia ne' fieri petti umani,
Un' infelice e vil secchia di legno,
Che tolsero ai Petroni i Gemignani,
Febo, che mi raggiri entro lo 'ngegno
L'orribil guerra e gli accidenti strani,
Tu, che sai poetar, servimi d'aio
E tiemmi per le maniche del saio.
Tassoni's lines leave no doubt that we are
mock heroism. For example,
of the "bucket of woo d , "
dealing with
in addition to Tassoni's mention
he uses the family names of
Petroni and Geminiani, which were common in Bologna and
Modena, respectively,
as synonyms for the inhabitants of
those cities. This is an especially apt device that lightens
the poem and tells the reader exactly what to expect.
Similarly, Conti signaled the kind of poetry he was
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32
writing in II riccio rapito by juxtaposing the seriousness
of " l a battaglia e sconfitta" with the triviality of the
" riccio t r o n c o " . No reader would fail to notice the in­
tended light-heartedness inherent in these phrases.
More­
over, in his translation of Pope, Conti remained faithful to
contemporary tastes by maintaining throughout his work a r e ­
fined language,
for the most part metrically regular and
melodiously graceful. This particular translation, in fact,
prompted Toaldo to comment that Conti had translated it
"not as a grammarian, but as a p o e t . " 43
Conti began his work on Pope1s poem during his stay in
France, near Orleans, at a place called the " S o u r c e , "
or
" l a Sorgente." He completed his translation in five days,
a fact that can verified by Lord Bolingbroke, Conti says,
who accompanied him at the time. Conti translated a canto
each day, primarily for the amusement of Madame de Caylus,
who later made a French prose version that was published in
1728, that is, four years after C o nti’s version.44 Although
Conti was the first Italian to translate Pope’s The Rape of
the Lock, he was not the first to introduce Pope into Italy.
When Conti's translation appeared posthumously in Venice in
1756,
in the second volume of Prose e poesie, Pope was a l ­
ready known in Italy as the author of the Essay on Criti­
cism, the Pastorals, and the Essay on Man. Balducci, m o r e ­
over, had already published his Italian version of The Rape
43
44
"tradusse non da grammatico ma da poeta."
Versioni poetiche, 618-19.
Prose e poesie, 63.
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33
of the Lock in 1743 at Florence.
Conti's dissemination and advancement of English liter­
ature in Italy has been generally recognized, but perhaps
because much of his work was left either unfinished or u n ­
published, a precise evaluation of his contribution to Ital­
ian literature has seemed elusive. For example, judgments of
his work have ranged from disappointment
('‘the sum of Con­
ti's intellectual and literary life is disappointing"45) to
enthusiasm ( " o n e of the most important roles in introducing
contemporary English letters to Italy was that performed by
Antonio C o n t i " 46) . Only a few of Conti's letters and trans­
lations have survived, and until the Versioni poetiche,
published in 1966, none of his works had been issued since
the two volumes of Prose e poesie (1736 and 1756), which
were to have been part of a six-volume set comprising
Conti's complete works. In his influential Storia della
letteratura italiana, moreover, De Sanctis mentions Conti's
name only once, merely including it in a list of "learned
men"
alive at the time of Vico. In two standard reference
works in English, Bondanella's Dictionary of Italian Litera­
ture and Wilkins's A History of Italian Literature Conti's
name is omitted altogether.
Why, then, should Conti be included in a study of the
literary context of Verdi's first Shakespeare libretto?
True, he was an early and enthusiastic translator of English
45
46
Robertson, 108.
Dorris, 209.
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34
texts, and the first to mention Shakespeare in Italy, but
did Conti's work survive into the nineteenth century and
become part of the Romantic spirit that eventually embraced
Shakespeare as its hero?
Despite Conti's propensity for leaving works unfinished
and unpublished,
I would argue that his translations, espe­
cially that of Pope's The Rape of the Lock, exerted a cir­
cumscribed but clearly perceptible influence on Italian lit­
erature. in this respect, then, Conti's work as a translator
of English works represents an early, though subtle, shift
away from French literary opinion. During the period he
spent in England, Conti encountered, and to some extent e m ­
braced poetry that was averse to the spirit of Cartesianism,
which had provided the philosophical foundation for much
contemporary French criticism.47
Furthermore, the most striking, though neglected, ev i ­
dence that Conti foreshadowed the spirit that culminated in
the "manifesti romantici" of 1816, and that he is part of
the poetic consciousness of early nineteenth-century Italy
can be found in the work of the arch-romantic,
Ugo Foscolo.
Textual parallels and allusions to Conti's works appear
throughout Foscolo's writings. In Foscolo's Ultime Lettere
di Jacopo Ortis (1802), for example, we find " C o s i
vaneggio! cangio voti e pensieri,
',48 a phrase that reflects
47 Guido Pugliese, "'Lavorar fantasmi': L'arte poetica di Antonio
Conti.” Canadian Journal of Italian Studies. IV, 3. 1984. 250-63.
48 See Ugo Focolo. Opere. Ed. Franco Gavazzeni. 2 vol. Milan:
Ricciardi, 1981. 622, n. 2.
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35
Conti's translation of Pope's Letter of Eloise to Abelard,
where we read,
"cangio voti ed affetti in un istante. "
In his Origine e ufficio della letteratura
(1809),
Foscolo lists the various names by which the moon was w o r ­
shipped in antiquity, and states that the Phoenicians r e ­
vered the moon under the name of Astarte.49 Significantly,
in Conti’s G lobo di Venere, we read,
The celestial
Venus, worshipped by the idolaters in
Phoenicia,
Syria, and in
in
other regions of the East,seems
to have been the Venus called Sanconiatone, daughter of the
Sky, wife of Saturn, and mother of the seven Titans, but
modern critics claim, through many passages from the Old
Testament, that this Venus was Astarte, and Astarte,
according to them, was the Moon.50 In the same work, Foscolo
writes,
And Bacon of Verulam, pondering a way to reclaim
for philosophy that natural wisdom laid waste by
the
acuity of the
scholastics, sought principles
in nature, and he found them in those fables full
of moral and political wisdom of the first
philosophers.51
49 ''Onde la luna, emula del sole nelle prime adorazioni degli uomini,
era Astarte a ’ Fenicii..." Ibid. 1294-5.
50
“ La Venere celeste che, s'adorava dagl'Idolatri in Fenicia, in
Siria, ed in altre regioni dell'Oriente, pare che sia la Venere chiamata
Sanconiatone figliula del Cielo, moglie di Saturno, e madre delle sette
Titaniadi, ma i m o d e m i critici pretendono con molti passaggi
dell'antico Testamento che questa Venere fosse 1 'Astarte; e 1 'Astarte
Becondo loro S la Luna...." A. Conti, “ Sogno." Prose e poesie, xivxv.
51 “ E Bacone di Verulamio, meditando di rivendicare alia filosofia
l'umano sapere manomesso dall'arguzia degli scolastici, chiese norme
alia natura, e le trovd in quelle favole pregne della sapienza morale e
politica de'primi filosofi."
Foscolo, op. cit., 1304.
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36
Conti had made the same point:
A symbol is much more appealing when it is in the
form of a prism, representing many things, and
therefore Bacon of Verulam [in De sapentia veterum] greatly valued the composition of fables by
the ancients.52
Moreover, Foscolo obviously knew Conti's tragedy,
Ce-
sare. In Esame su le accuse contro v. Monte (1798), Foscolo,
mentioning three versions of the plays, writes,
"And I
refer to the Caesar of Shakespeare, Voltaire, and
Conti
" 53
It is in Foscolo's poetry, however, that we find even
more conspicuous allusions to Conti. In Le Grazie, naming
the aurora borealis " E r i n n e , "
Furies,
a clear reference to the
Foscolo writes:
Come quando esce un' Erinne
a gioir delle terre arse dal v e m o ,
maligna, e lava le sue mem b r a a'fonti
dell'Islanda esecrati, ove p i u tristi
fuman sulfuree l'acque; o a groelandi
laghi lambiti di cerulee vampe,
le tede alluma, e al ciel sereno aspira;
(217-23)
These lines recall passages from Conti's Riflessioni
sull 'aurora boreale, a prose work in which he wrote as a
scientist:
La miniera del zolfo che nutrisce l'Ecla n e l l 1Islanda,
52 " U n Bimbolo h tanto piii dilettevole quanto egli a guisa d'uno
specchio a faccette rappresenta piG cose, e percid Bacone di Verulamio
apprezzava molto la composizione delle favole degli antichi..." Conti,
op. cit., xv.
53 " E me ne appello al Cesare del Shakespeare, del Voltaire e del
Conti..." Foscolo, op. cit., 1052.
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37
e le sue diramazioni per tutto il terreno dell'lsola,
germogliano que'cespi bituminosi, che gli abitanti
adoprano per riscaldarsi. Vi sono in que'lsola fontane
calde che dove sgorgano, e cadono, impresse lasciano
orme sulfuree;...laghi che sempre fumano, fochi fatui,
che continuamente qua e It vanno vagando.54
And further along:
Nella Groelanda pure si ritrovano montagne e sotteranei
ardenti, e non mancano a'Lapponi piu alti de'bagni si
caldi, che non si possono soffrire l'invemo.55
Equally noteworthy is Foscolo's description of the fright
caused among the populace by an appearance of the northern
lights:
finge perfida pria roseo splendore,
e lei deluse appellano col vago
name di boreale alba le genti;
quella scorre, le nuvole in Chimere
orrende, e in imminenti arxni converte
fiammeggianti; e celar senti per l'aura
dal muto nembo l'aquile agitate,
che veggion nel lor regno angui, e sedenti
leoni, e ulular 1 1cmbre de'lupi.
(224-32)
We find a similar tone of agitation and fright in Conti's
poetic treatment of the same subject, an " agitatissima"
aurora borealis he had witnessed in London in 1716:
D'orror di meraviglia
la popolosa Londra alz6 le ciglia
allor che dqpo del Tamigi il gelo
tante fiamme a volar vide nel cielo.
Densa notte il copria
ad Occidente e verso Borea uscia
come da vasto e spalancato grembo,
di crinite ccmete un aureo nembo,
che per l'aere fischiando
or Iridi, or Parelii iva stampando:
s'inostra il Ciel, par che d'incendio awampi,
54
55
Conti,
Ibid.
” Riflessioni sull'aurora borealis."
Prose e poesie, lxx.
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38
ed in faville si disciolga e in lampi.
La luce e tanto grande,
tant'alto vola, si raggira e spande,
che furo ancor ne la Germania viste
l'argentee volte, e le vermiglie liste.
Il vulgo in un le mesce,
e co1fantasmi il suo terrore accresce;
pargli veder eserciti schierati
e conta i Duci, e i Cavallieri armati56
In his poem, Foscolo continues,
Innondati di sangue errano al guardo
della citta i pianeti, e van raggiando
timidamente per l'aereo caos;
(233-35)
the last line of which echoes Conti's:
Ma troppo vasto essendo il caos aereo.57
These few examples would seem to suffice, but in La
Chioma di Berenice we find even more significant allusions
to Conti. The opening phrases of Foscolo's translation of La
chioma di Berenice certainly recall the opening of Conti's
version. Conti's opening lines:
Quei che spio de l'ampio cielo i lumi
tutti, e gli occasi de le stelle e gli orti
scoperse: come del veloce sole
il fiammante candor si copra d'ombra,
find a strong parallel in Foscolo's:
Quei che spio del mondo ampio le faci
tutte quante, e scqpri quando ogni Stella
nasca in cielo o tramonti, e del veloce
Sole come il candor fiammeo si oscuri.
These similarities should not be considered coinciden­
tal, merely a result of translators working from the same
text, for Foscolo clearly used Conti's version as his
56
57
Prose e poesie, cxxi ff.
Ibid., lxxiii.
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39
model.58 It was, as a matter of fact,
in his commentary on
La Chioma di Berenice that Foscolo paid tribute to Conti's
translation of The Letters of Eloise to Abelard. Foscolo
said it was the only elegy that could be confidently com­
pared with those of foreign and ancient authors.59
Conti is significant for a discussion of the literary
context of Verdi's Macbeth libretto not only because he was
the first to mention Shakespeare in Italy but also because
his call for translations of English works early in the
eighteenth century, his own work as a translator, and his
gradual turning away from French literary criteria, can all
be viewed as an historical, though generally unnoticed,
shift toward the literary objectives that were to be he r ­
alded by Madame de Sta§l in 1816.
Although never an overt polemicist of reform, Conti
nevertheless left explicit statements indicating that a
poet's aesthetic criteria should be determined by his own
thought rather than by the dictates of rhetoric, grammar, or
poetic tradition.60 Furthermore, Conti's influence on Fos­
colo shows that his work had entered into early nineteenthcentury Italian literary tradition. Therefore,
it would not
58 F. Gavazzeni, "Nota introduttiva." La Chioma di Berenice. Foscolo,
op. cit., 255.
59 "Antonio Conti tradusse il poemetto e lo corredb di osservazioni
che se anche fossero nondimeno l'autore del Ceeare, tragedia, e della
eroide di Elisa [sic] ad Abelardo, unica poesia elegiaca da contraporre
con fiducia agli stranieri e agli antichi." Foscolo. La Chioma di
Berenice. Milan: Dal genio Tipografico, 1803. "Editori, Interpreti, e
Traduttori, " 15-6.
60 " N o n v'fe che la filosofia che possa fissare i principi dell'arte.”
Conti, Della poeaia e delle aue apecie. Cited by Pugliese, 254.
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40
be an exaggeration to consider Conti's work as part of the
literary context that eventually led to the birth of the
Italian Romantic spirit, and to the translations of Shake­
speare from which Verdi drew his libretto for Macbeth.
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41
CHAPTER II
Paolo Rolli and Hamlet:
" T h a t most original and sublime poet"
Conti, who most frequently chose to express his ae s ­
thetic judgments through creative work rather than public
debate, was followed on the English literary scene by an
outspoken Italian literary figure who directly challenged
Voltaire1s opinions with widely circulated statements and
polemical essays. Paolo Antonio Rolli, like Conti, had also
traveled to England, where he lived for an extended period,
participating actively in lively literary debates and p r o ­
moting the exchange of ideas between two diverse cultures.
Rolli still remains little known although his life and
work have been extensively documented in Tarquinio Vallese's
Paolo Rolli in Inghilterra (Milan, 1938) and in George E.
Dorris's Paolo Rolli and the Italian Circle in London 17151744 (New York,
1967). For this reason, my discussion of
Rolli will be limited to a few biographical notes, his
statements regarding Voltaire's criticism of Italian a u ­
thors, and, because it is most germane to my study, his own
translation of Shakespeare. Considering the extent of his
fame in his own time, it is truly surprising that Rolli is
known today only for a few anthology pieces and, among e n ­
thusiasts of Baroque opera,
for his work as Handel's libret­
tist .
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42
Pope, however, conferred a sort of enduring fame upon
Rolli when he included him in the second book of his Dunciad, where we read of Rolli's solicitation of support from
a patron of the opera:
He [the patron] chinks his purse,
and takes his seat in state:
With ready quills the Dedicators wait;
Now at his head the dextrous task commence,
And, instant, fancy feels th'imparted sense;
Now gentle touches wanton o'er his face,
He struts Adonis, and affects grimace:
Rolli the feather to his ear conveys,
Then his nice taste directs our Operas:
Equally noteworthy is Goethe's oblique tribute to
Rolli. Reminiscing about his childhood, Goethe tells of his
mother's playing the clavichord while accompanied by a
“ cheerful old Italian teacher, named Giovanizzi...[who] did
not sing badly." Goethe said,
“ I soon got to know and
learned by heart 'Solitario bosco ombroso' before I under­
stood i t . " 1 The lyric Goethe mentions is from Rolli's Di
Canzonette e di Cantate, which dates from 1727.2 Rolli had,
of course, won fame in his lifetime as a poet. His Rime, for
example, went through ten editions in Italy and England, and
selections were subsequently published well into the follow­
ing century. His odes, translations,
and epigrams were
widely read throughout Italy, and the town of Todi, his
mother's birthplace, honored his achievements by conferring
upon him a title of nobility. Rolli never hid the pride he
1 Goethe, Aus Meinen Leben: Dichtung und Warhheit. Goethe's Werke
(Hamburg, 1955) IX, 14. Cited by Dorris, 125.
2 Dorris, 125.
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43
felt in the elevation of his social status.
sir,"
he wrote to a friend,
"Yes,
indeed,
" I am an a r i s t ocrat."3
Still, many details of Rolli's life remain obscure. The
principle source of biographical material can be found in
his correspondence, especially in letters to the Modenese
diplomat, Giuseppe Riva, housed in the Biblioteca Communale
at Siena. Included in this collection are records of Rolli's
published works and references to Rolli from prefaces and
pamphlets. Another primary source is a memoir, written by
Giambattista Tondini, that appeared in 1776, eleven years
after Rolli's death, as a preface to Marziale in A l bion,4
The son of an architect, Rolli was born in Rome on June
13, 1687. He received his literary training under Gian Vin­
cenzo Gravina, who, along with others, had founded the A rca­
dian Academy,
it was under Gravina's tutelage that Rolli and
his fellow-pupil Pietro Mfetastasio first absorbed their
shared neo-classical concepts. There is some evidence that
Rolli may have taken minor religious orders, an essential
prerequisite at that time for securing any sort of civil
post in Italy.
in 1715, the same year Conti had sailed to England, the
Earl of Pembroke5 invited Rolli to England. Accepting the
3 Rolli wrote to Riva, "Sissignore sono un patrizio." The document of
title is dated 30 July 1735. Ibid., 141.
4 Marziale in Albionpremesse le memorie della vita dell •autore
compilate dall'ab. Giambattista Tondini (Firenze, 1776).
5 When he Italianized the name of Rolli's patron, Tondini caused confu­
sion about the patron's identity. He wrote, "Tra quelli che piU degli
altri seppero conoscere il di lui merito, fu Mylord Steers Sembuck,
erudito Viaggiatore Inglese." The identity of "Steers Sembuck" has
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44
invitation of his patron, Rolli moved to London, where he
remained for twenty-nine years. He earned his living by
teaching Italian language and literature to a number of
aristocratic families, including the children of George II.
In time, Rolli was able to widen his cirlce of patrons so
that it eventually included the Prince of Wales, Lords
Burlington and Bathurst,
and the Duke of Rutland.6
Before long, he published several volumes of poetry, a
work on Italian grammar,
and translations of Anakreon, V i r ­
gil, and other classical authors. Working as an editor, he
brought to fruition an edition of Alessandro Marchetti's
translation of Lucretius
(1717), a selection of Ariosto’s
works, and Boccaccio's Decamerone (1725). Rolli's most im­
portant and impressive work as a translator is his version
of Milton's Paradise Lose, published between 1729 to 1735.
Having labored on it for over eighteen years, Rolli said it
was " t h e most exact transposition from one language into
another that has ever been read." He explained that he had
preserved the "Miltonic style"
and that he had rendered
into Italian not only the sense of Milton's text but also
the poetry, an achievement made possible, he said, by the
similarities of the two langauges.
Then, revealing his
views on translation, Rolli concluded by saying that he
beer) variously given as the Earl of Stairs or the Earl of Pembroke. Some
have said that Rolli received invitations from both Englishmen. See, for
example, Winton Dean, "Paolo Antonio Rolli." The New Grove Dictionary
of Music and Musicians. Ed. Stanley Sadie. 20 vols. London: Macmillan,
1980) XVI, 116.
6 N e w Grove Dictionary, 116.
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45
should not be accused of having fallen short of sublimity or
poetic beauty on the grounds of his literalness. Merely e x ­
plaining the sense of a poem in another language, he said,
is not enough for a good translation.7
Dedicated to the Prince of Wales, Rolli!s monumental
Paradiso perduto was the first complete Italian translation
of Milton's epic, its importance was immediately recognized,
and the year after it was published in England, Maffei p u b ­
lished the first six books at Verona in 1730. An edition of
the completed work was issued in 1735, after which a number
of additional printings followed. The most important were
those of Paris (1740), and Paris-Verona (1742). Rolli also
translated a number of works by other Englishmen, among them
Sir Richard Steel's play The Conscious Lovers (1724) and
Newton's Chronology (1757). As Conti had done, he also
translated Racine's Athalie (1754), and in 1729, was elected
a Fellow of the Royal Society.
Rolli is recognized in the music world chiefly for his
work as a librettist. In 1719, he served as Italian sec­
retary to the Royal Academy of Music, but after a quarrel
with the directors in 1722, he lost his post. During this
7 "D i questa mia Traduzzione io penso ch'ella sia la piQ esatta
Metafrasi che siasi mai letta, e cio per l'estrema correlazione delle
Sintassi nelle due Lingue e particolarmente nello Stil Miltoniano; e
siccome io pretendo d'aver non solo litteralmente tradotto i sensi di
MILTON, ma pur anche la Poesia; cosi dico non esBer nell'Opra mia parte
alcuna ch'io voglia scusare come dificiente di Sublimitd e poetica
Bellezza; per aver voluto esser Traduttor litterale. No, non basta per
ben tradurre tali Opere, s p i e g a m e il senBO in altra lingua (Fol. l v.)
Cited by Dorris, 168-69).
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46
period, he produced ten librettos, including Porta's Numitore, Bononcini's Astarto,
Crispo, Griselda, and Emtinia,
and Handel's Floridante. Further collaboration with Handel
produced three more librettos, Scipione, Alessandro, and
Riccardo primo. He broke with Handel eventually, and was
frequently implicated in controversy and intrigue. Rolli
helped to establish the Opera of the Nobility,
for which he
wrote nine librettos; six of them, including the oratorio
Davide and Bersabea, were prepared for the composer Porpora.
He also based a pasticcio opera, Sabrina, on Milton's Comus,
and Handel set at least three of Rolli's texts as cantatas.8
After his long sojourn in England, Rolli returned to Italy,
where he died at Todi on March 20, 1765.
For the purposes of this study, Rolli's role as polemi­
cist and his attacks on Voltaire are especially germane, for
they signal a definite shift away from eighteenth-century
literary attitudes. The extent to which Voltaire's opinions
dominated Italian criticism of Shakespeare can be seen most
clearly in the work of the Jesuit, Francesco Saverio
Quadrio. Writing in Della Storia e della ragione d'ogni
poesia in 1743, Quadrio repeats verbatim the criticism of
Shakespeare that Voltaire had given in his essay, Sur la
tragedie. He specifically mentions Voltaire's name and lists
the Frenchman's enduring opinions of the English poet.
Shakespeare, Quadrio echoes, was reputed the Corneille of
8
Dean, The New Grove Dictionary, 116.
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47
the English; he was indeed endowed with gifts of "fecundity
and power;"
but he had no idea of the "p r o p e r rules"
"good taste."
of
Quadrio also follows Voltaire in the view
that, notwithstanding Shakespeare's occasional scenes of
grandeur and power, he had led the English theater to total
ruin. Shakespeare's tragedies, Quadrio echoes, are little
more than "monstruous farces, exceeding the bounds of
regularity and t a s t e . " 9
Rolli's opportunity to challenge Voltaire occurred in
1727. While Voltaire was visiting England, a slender volume
was offered for for sale by a London book dealer. The title
read, An Essay upon the Civil Wars of France, extracted from
curious Manuscripts and also upon the Epick Poetry of the
European Nations, from Homer down to Milton, b y Mr. de Vol­
taire. From the year of its first appearance until 1761, the
book underwent a number of reprintings in England and Ire­
land. As the title indicates, the book actually comprised
two essays, which were then translated into French and
9 Quadrio wrote, "Certo fe, che non s ’ascoltavano n e ’ Teatri Inglesi,
che Opere simili a quelle degli Spagnuoli, prima che sorgesse il celebre
Shakespear, che fu poi riputato quasi il Cornelio de quella Nazione. Ma
questo Poeta, non ostante che ingenio avesse pieno di feconditS, e di
forza; d'uno spirito fosse dotato, che univa alia naturalezza la
sublimity; non aveva a agni modo, come srive il Signor di Voltaire,
veruna cognizione delle buone regole; e niun lume di buon gusto si
vedeva nelle sue poesie apparire. Quindi in iscambio di portar vantaggio
all'Inglese Teatro, coreggendone i difetti; egli lo condusse a totale
rovina. E come che nelle sue farse mostruose, si chiaman Tragedie,
alcune scene vi abbai luninose, e belle, e alcuni tratti si trovino
terribili e grandi; cid non ostante esse Farse son fuori di regola, e
dal gusto lontano." Della etoria e della ragione d'ogni poesia.
(Milano: Francesco Agnelli, 1743) III, 149-50.
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48
published separately, the Essay on Epic Poetry in Paris
(1728) , and the Civil Wars of France at The Hague (1729) .
By choosing English for the language of his Essay on
Epic Poetry, it is clear Voltaire intended to prepare the
English reader for his L ’Henriade, a work that proved to be
his principal attempt at a French epic. Although a French
translation of the English essay had been printed at Amster­
dam in 1732, when Voltaire published L ’Henriade separately
the following year, he replaced the translated version of
his essay with a new one he had written in French. There is
no doubt that it was quite different from the English essay
and more in accordance with French taste. The English and
French versions of the essay can be found in standard edi­
tions of Voltaire's works immediately after L ’Henriade.10
Voltaire divides his essay into nine sections, an in­
troduction and a discussion of the works of Homer, Virgil,
Lucan, Trissino, Camoens, Tasso, d'Ercilla y Zuniga, and
Milton. Ariosto is conspicuously excluded, except as a tar­
get for occasional adverse criticism. Rolli's response11 to
Voltaire's essay was therefore focused chiefly on what the
Frenchman said about Italian authors, and on the scornful
comments he directed at Ariosto.
Rolli's answer to Voltaire was also published in two
translations. Abbe Antonini made a French version, which he
10 Florence Donnell White, Voltaire's Essay on Epic Poetry: A Study and
an Edition (New York: Phaeton Press, 1970) v.
11 Paolo Rolli, Remarks upon H. Voltaire's Essay on the Epick Poetry of
the European Nations (London, 1728).
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49
titled Examen de 1 'Essais de M. Voltaire sur la poesie
Spique (1728), and Rolli himself rewrote his essay in Ital­
ian and dedicated it to Scipione Maffei. It was published
along with the first six books of Rolli's Paradiso perduto
at Verona in 1730 and appeared under the title Osservazioni
sopra il libro del Signor Voltaire che esamina l'Epica
Poesia delle Nazioni Europee, scritta originalmente in Inglese, e stampate nel 1728.
In his remarks, Rolli seems at times to be quibbling
rather than addressing substantive literary issues. For
example, he takes Voltaire to task for unnecessarily using
the phrase "European Nations"
in his title, saying " I
have never yet heard of Asian or American Epic poems."
Rolli's comments sound unjustifiably harsh,
since Voltaire
appears extremely tolerant of "National Taste,"
which he
says is based upon the "T y ranny of Custom." Voltaire,
for
example, writes,
The best modern Writers have mix'd the Taste of
their country, with that of the Ancients. Their
Flowers and the Fruits, warm'd and matur'd by the
same sun, yet draw from the Soil they grow upon,
their different Colours, their Flavours and the
their Size. It is easy to distinguish a Spanish,
an Italian, or an English Author, by their Stile,
as to know by their Gate,12 their Speech, and
their Features, in what Country they were born.13
When Voltaire says,
"Hen c e it is that the long, but
noble Speeches of Cinna, and Augustus,
12
13
Gait.
Voltaire, Essay, 84.
in Corneille, could
(X am using White's edition for all citations.)
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50
not be tolerated upon the English stage,"
Rolli attempts a
puerile refutation by counting lines. He points out that the
longest speech in French drama runs to a hundred forty lines
in Cinna, and then to show the inanity of Voltaire's obser­
vation he cites two speeches from Shakespeare, one of
ninety-nine lines, the other of sixty-seven.14
Rolli nevertheless produces passages of true eloquence
when he defends the achievements of the Italian language and
literature, which, he says, begin at the time of Dante and
Boccaccio. This was meant to counter Voltaire's claim that
the " Italian Tongue was at the end of the fifteenth Century
brought to the Perfection in which it continues now, and in
which it will remain as long as Tasso in poetry and
Machiavel in Prose shall be the Standart of the Stile,"
Rolli responded by saying that Dante, Boccaccio, and
Petrarch, who belonged to the late thirteenth and fourteenth
centuries, displayed " t h e first, best, never-interrupted
standards of s t y l e . " 15 in contrast to the petty fault­
finding and personal attacks that run throughout his reply
to Voltaire, when Rolli speaks in defense of his country's
literature, he speaks with reason and insight, and achieves
a tone of genuine literary criticism.
For example, Rolli found it impossible to accept V o l ­
taire's views on the limited application of fantasy in epic
14 1 Henry IV, III, ii. (29-128), and Richard II (V, v. 1-66),
respectively
15 Voltaire, Essay. White, 104.
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51
poetry. Voltaire's position on the role of fantasy explains
his denigration of Ariosto. In fact, Voltaire generally
praises Milton's Paradise Lost, but when he believes
Milton's sense of fantasy has exceeded neo-classical limits,
he chooses to deride him. One such instance afforded V o l ­
taire an opportunity to aim a barb at Ariosto at the same
time:
They would laugh justly at the Paradise of Fools,
at the Hermits, Fryars, Cowles, Beads,
Indulgences, Bulls, Reliques, toss'd by the Winds,
at St. Peter's waiting with his Keys at the Wicket
of Heaven. And surely the most passionate Admirers
of Milton, could not vindicate those low comical
imaginations, which belong by Right to Ariosto.16
Voltaire meant his essay to be a prologue to his L'Henriade,
which is based on historical fact, and is therefore more
rationalistic in approach and far removed from the liveley
world of enchantment and whimsy that Ariosto had created in
his Orlando furioso.
When he objected to Voltaire's remark that enchantment
(fantasy) had no place in the taste of the English and the
French, Rolli displayed a view of poetry that is more
inclusive, more liberal, and more accepting of national
differences than the neo-classicism of Voltaire. Rolli
replied,
for example, that the Fairie Queene,
greatly admired in England," Macbeth,
tragedy,"
" a poem
" t h e finest English
and The Tempest must have been unknown to V o l ­
taire, for they all attest to the English taste for " m a ­
16
Voltaire, Essay. White, 141.
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52
chinery grounded upon Enchantment."17 Rolli went on to show
that tales of the fantastic had originated in France from
legends based on French history, and that Boiardo, Ariosto,
and Tasso had borrowed them to construct their epics. Rolli
continues,
saying that by " m a c h i n e s "
Voltaire meant alle­
gory, and to exclude allegory would result in nothing more
than " i n v e n t i o n , " which would result in " m e e r
[sic] G a ­
zettes in v e r s e . " 18
Voltaire certainly was aware of Rolli's rebuke of his
essay. In 1733,
for example, the same year he published the
French version of his essay, Essais sur la poesie §pique,
Voltaire wrote to a friend,
" . . . q u i conque ecrit en vers doit ecr i r e en beaux vers, on
ne sera p oint lu. Les poetes ne reussissent que par les
beautSs de detail; sans celu Virgile et Chapelain, Racine et
Campistron, M i l t o n et Ogilbi [John O g i l b y ] , le Tasse et Rolli
seraient e g a u x . " 19
Notwithstanding Voltaire's derisive linking of Rolli’s name
to Milton's,
it seems that when he wrote his essay in
French, Voltaire took much of Rolli's criticism to heart.
For example,
in addition to correcting numerous small
factual errors that Rolli had pointed out, Voltaire also
mollified his adverse opinion of Ariosto. Years later, he
was to give credence to Rolli's charge that his knowledge of
Italian was far from extensive. Speaking of his changed at­
titude toward Ariosto, Voltaire wrote,
17
18
19
ed.
" J e ne l'aimais pas
Dorris, 201.
Rolli, Remarks. Cited by Dorris, Ibid.
Letter to Jacob Vernet, 14 September 1733. Voltaire, Correspondence,
T. Besterman (Geneva, 1953) III, 139. Rpt. Dorris, 198.
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53
assez dans ma jeunesse; je ne savois pas assez l'ltalien."
And, in a statement that reveals a complete reversal of his
former disdain of Ariosto, Voltaire said,
"L'Arioste ...est
mon Dieu. Tous les po§mes m'ennuient, hors le s i e n . " 20
Finally, Rolli eloquently defended the use of fantasy
when he wrote,
In short, Poetry in all its kinds is the more perfect,
the more it imitates Nature in her beautiful
performances; wherefore Poetry, like her only model,
Nature, does renew, but never changes its Productions.
Even when Poetry invents marvellous things, as
Transformations, Winged Horses, &., it does nothing
else but join different natural Productions, that in
Nature are never together. The mind cannot express any
Image but such as it has first received through the
senses.21
Thus, Rolli, writing in 1728, confirmed the neo-clas­
sical concept of poetry as imitation of nature's beauty. But
at the same time, his statement that " t h e mind cannot e x ­
press any image but such as it has first received through
the senses"
has the ring of English empiricism. Rolli's
defense of poetic imagination,
I believe, represents an
early step in the necessary distancing from Voltaire and
Cartesianism that eventually prepared the way for the wave
of Romanticism about to sweep through Europe at the b e ­
ginning of the next century.
Undoubtedly, Rolli had become familiar with Shakespeare
and the English theater from years of residing in London.
20 Voltaire, Oeuvres, XLI, 153. Also, White, 50.
21 Rolli, Remarks, 11. Cited by Dorris, 202.
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54
The preface to his Paradiso perduto contains numerous allu­
sions to Shakespeare, in direct contrast to Voltaire's claim
that Shakespeare had brought the English theater to ruin,
Rolli said that Shakespeare,
in his tragedies, had raised
English theater to "unsurpassable sublimity," and of the
historical plays, Rolli said that the events and characters
came alive, and were poetically and appropriately drawn.22
Rolli also commented on Othello, Henry the Fourth, and
Richard II. Furthermore, Rolli also accused Voltaire of
having read neither Shakespeare's Macbeth, which he con­
sidered the best English tragedy, nor The Tempest.23
I can think of no clearer way to demonstrate the oppos­
ing attitudes held by Voltaire and Rolli than to compare a
portion of their translations of Hamlet's famous soliloquy.
Rolli made his " l i t e r a l "
translation in 1739 purposely to
demonstrate how far Voltaire had deviated from the language
and poetics of " t h a t original and sublime p o e t . " 24 Here is
the opening of Voltaire's version:
Demeure; il faut choisir et passer a 1'instant
De la vie a la mort, ou de l'etre au neant:
Dieux cruelsl s'il en est, €clairez mon courage.
Faut-il viellir courbe sous la main qui m'outrage,
Supporter ou finir mon malheur et mon sort?
22 " [Shakepseare] elevd il teatro inglese a insuperabile sublimity,
con le sue tragedie...i Fatti e i Caratteri d e ' Personaggi interlocutori
sono cosi vivi e poeticamente, e con adattatissimo stile espressi...."
23 "Voltaire non ha letto ancoran# la Tragedia di Macbeth di Shake­
speare, che a mio senno & la piil bella Tragedia inglese, n6 l'altra sua
Tragedia intitolata La Tenpesta.t' Cited by Anna Maria Crind. Le traduzioni di Shakespeare in Italia nel Settecento. (Rome, 1950) 37.
24 "Questa litteral traduzzione [sic] mostrerd quando egli devid da'
sentimenti e dallo stile di quell1originalmente sublime poeta." Cited
by Crin&, Ibid., 38.
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55
Qui suis-je? qui m'arrete? et qu'est-ce que la mort?
C'est la fin de nos maux, c'est mon unique asile;
Apres de longs transports c'est un sommeil tranquille;
On s'endort et tout meurt; mais un affreux reveil
Doit succeder peut-etre aux douceurs de scmmeil.
Voltaire did not render Hamlet's speech word for word. Such
an approach would weaken its sense. Instead, Voltaire has
dressed Shakespeare's blank verse in rhymed French alexan­
drines, adhering as always to les regies. Amid the regular­
ity of his translation, Voltaire has perhaps retained a su g ­
gestion of the existential dilemma mulled over by Hamlet,
but he has effaced all of Shakespeare's imagery. Further­
more, to bind the uncertainty of the afterlife that Hamlet
is contemplating with the shackles of rhymed couplets,
destroys the feeling of free-floating anxiety that Hamlet
feels at the moment he utters his lines.
On the other Rolli found the means to render Hamlet's
soliloquy so that it captures the spirit of the original in
ways that sound surprisingly modern:25
Esser o no, la gran Questione & questa:
Qual nella mente 6 forte pid? Soffrire
Colpi e Saette d 'oltraggiosa Sorte;
0 prender l'Armi contra un mar d'Affanni,
E dar loro, in opporsi, a un tratto il fine?
Morir! Dormire: Altro non 6. Nel Sonno,
Dicon, che fine avrS il Cordoglio, e mille,
Retaggio della C a m e , altre Sciagure-.
Consumazion, d'avida Brama oggetto!
Morir! Donnir! Dormir? forse Sognar! Ah
Qui 6 1 1introppo!...
Rolli's versi sciolti and literal rendering of imagery show
that he has understood the sense of Hamlet's words as well
25 I have included the complete version of Rolli's translation in
Appendix C.
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56
as the spirit of Shakespeare's language. This translation
can readily stand comparison with those that were to follow
in the next century. In addition to the polemical outbursts
he directed against Voltaire, Rolli left an indelible mark
on Italian literary history by bringing to fruition the
first rendering in Italian of the English poet's work.
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57
CHAPTER III
Giuseppe Baretti and Voltaire:
" A n Enormous Dunghill"
Years after Rolli's Remarks upon M. Voltaire1s Essay on
the Epick Poetry of the European Nations had appeared in
1728, another Italian polemicist living in London responded
to Voltaire's essay, in 1753, Giuseppe Baretti published a
treatise in which he fiercely countered Voltaire's evalua­
tions of Italian poets.1 Baretti, in fact, spent a lifetime
opposing prevailing cultural and literary views. He often
cast himself, especially in the pages of La Frusta let teraria, a journal he founded and sustained for a number of
years, as a champion of literary progress. Critic, avid tra­
veler, journalist, poet, translator, and multi-lingual p o ­
lemicist, Baretti either associated with or opposed the a r ­
biters of literary taste in his times, as his close friend­
ship with Johnson and his enduring dispute with Voltaire
attest.
The most comprehensive biographical material on Baretti
can be found in Luigi Piccioni's Bibliografia analitica di
G. B . f con un'appendice di cronologia biografica barettiana,
published at Turin in 1942. Collison-Morley's extensive
1 Giuseppe Baretti, A Dissertation upon the Italian Poetry, in which are
interspersed some remarks on Mr. Voltaire'b Essay on the Epic Poets.
London: printed for R. Dodley at Tully's Head, Pall Mall, 1753. Luigi
Piccioni, Baretti's biographer, classes this as a lost work, but
Collison-Morley states there is a copy in the British Museum. Lacy
Collison-Morley, Giuseppe Baretti, with an account of His Literary
Friendships and Feuds in the Days of Dr. Johnson. (London: John Murray,
1909) 364.
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58
study in English, Giuseppe Baretti,
with an account of His
Literary Friendships and Feuds in the Days of Dr. Johnson,
deals primarily, as its subtitle indicates, with Baretti's
London years and his association with Johnson's London lit­
erary circle. During his stay in England, Baretti learned to
speak and write English extermely well, and frequently asso­
ciated with Dr. Johnson, Sir Joshua Reynolds, the Thrales,
Garrick, Goldsmith, Boswell, and Fanny Burney.
The esteem with which Baretti was held by members of
this select circle can be inferred from an account in Dr.
Burney's memoirs that describes the portraits, all painted
by sir Joshua Reynolds, that hung in the home of the
Thrales:
Mrs. Thrale and her eldest daughter were in one
piece, over the fire-place [of the library — the
room where the family loved to make Johnson talk
Ramblers] at full length. The rest of the por­
traits were all three-quarters. Mr. Thrale was
over the door leading to his study. The general
collection then began by Lord Sandys and Lord
westcote (Littleton), two early noble friends of
Mr. Thrale. Then followed Dr. Johnson, Mr. Burke,
Dr. Goldsmith, Mr. Murphy, Mr. Garrick, Mr. B a ­
retti, Sir Robert Chambers, and Sir Joshua Rey­
nolds himself -- all presented in the highest
style of this great master.. .2
Baretti had sat for Reynolds in 1774, and that his p o r ­
trait took its place in an array of distinguished subjects
demonstrates not only the high favor in which he was held by
the Thrales but also the degree of success this Italian man
2 d'Arblay, Madame (Frances Burney), Memoirs of Dr. Burney, arranged b y
bis daughter. 2 vols. London, 1832. Cited by Collison-Morley, 254-55.
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59
of letters had achieved in a foreign country among members
of an august literary society. Since the details of Baretti's life are available elsewhere,3 a summary of a few sali­
ent features, especially as they pertain to his work as a
man of letters will suffice here.
Giuseppe Marc'Antonio Baretti was born at Turin on
April 25, 1719, the first of four brothers. His parents were
Antonia Caterina Tesio and Luca Baretti, an architect, who
also held the position of treasurer (economo) at the Royal
University. After having inherited an ecclesiastical
benefice, Baretti began his schooling with the Jesuit order.
He traveled widely even as a youth and lived in various
cities of northern Italy, including Milan and Venice. In
most of the cities he visited, Baretti invariably formed
friendships with leading literary figures.
He read widely but, as he said, not wisely. Before
long, however, he began his own literary work by translating
parts of Ovid and the tragedies of Corneille, in 1750, he
produced a volume of poetry, entitled Le piacevoli poesie di
Giuseppe Baretti. The following year, he traveled to London
and began supporting himself by teaching Italian and working
as a theatrical writer for the Italian Opera of London. He
later satirized his experiences at the opera house in a work
entitled La Voix de la Discorde ou la Bataille des Violons,
published at London in 1753, along with an English transla-
3 Collison-Morley's Baretti and His Friends is the most detailed work
on Baretti in English.
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60
tion. One of his students, the author Charlotte Lennox,
introduced him to Henry Fielding and Dr. Johnson.
Through his innate facility for languages, Baretti was
soon able to publish a number of works in English on Italian
poetry and grammar. For example, during the the years b e ­
tween 1753 and 1760, Baretti published,
in addition to his
response to Voltaire's comments on the epic poets, a number
of other works that included: Remarks on the Italian La n ­
guage and Writers from M r Joseph Baretti to an English Gen­
tleman at Turin, written in the year 1751 (London, 1753); An
introduction to the Italian Language (1755); The Italian
Library, containing an Account of the Lives and Works of the
most valuable authors of Italy(llSl) . Baretti's two-volume
Italian-English dictionary, dedicated to Johnson, appeared
in 1760 and remained a standard reference work until the b e ­
ginning of the twentieth century.4 Although he never saw it
through to publication, Baretti made a French translation of
Johnson's Rasselas.
in August of 1760, Baretti left London, and after
brief stays in Portugal, France, and Spain, returned to
Italy. He described this trip in a diary entitled A Journey
from London to Genoa, published in 1770. In the meantime, he
had written his Lettere familiari di G. B. a' suoi fratelli
Filippo, Giovanni,
e Amedeo (Milan, 1762) . Ever the wan­
derer, Baretti soon found himself in Venice, where, in 1763,
4 Dictionary of Italian Literature, 31.
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61
he began publishing La Frusta letteraria under the pseudonym
of Aristarco Scannabue. Baretti issued his journal every two
weeks, and before he ceased publication a year later by
order of the local authorities, he had completed twenty-five
issues that had sporadically provoked literary and political
controversy. Baretti hurriedly left Venice and made his way
to Ancona, where he managed to produce an additional eight
issues of his polemical journal. Modelled on London's
Spectator, Baretti's journal was his voice for waging war on
what he saw as excessive French influence in matters of
Italian culture. He used his forum to pronounce judgment on
sundry literary topics,
to praise the works of favored
authors, and to denigrate the opinions and works of those
with whom he disagreed. For example, Carlo Gozzi, whose
works deviated from precepts of neo-classicism, greatly
appealed to Baretti and consequently received a generous
share of critical acclaim from him.
Baretti returned to London in November,
1766, and r e ­
sumed his friendship with Johnson, who had by this time
founded the "Literary Club."
In 1768, Baretti issued a
biting reply to Samuel Sharp's Letters from Italy (1766),
which Baretti considered an attack on Italian culture. Baretti’s work was entitled An Account of the Manners and C u s ­
toms of Italy with Observations on the mistakes of some tra­
vellers, with regard to that country (London, 1768). The
following year, Baretti was named secretary for foreign
correspondence of the Royal Academy of Painting, Sculpture,
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62
and Architecture, which was headed at that time by Sir
Joshua Reynolds.
Shortly after assuming his new post, Baretti became i n ­
volved in a bizarre incident that resulted in his being
accused of homicide. While walking one night in Haymarket,
Baretti was accosted by a prostitute, whom he brusquely r e ­
pulsed. Her protectors then ran to her rescue, and in the
ensuing scuffle, Baretti stabbed one of them with a small
fruit knife that he always carried with him. His assailant
died shortly afterward in a hospital. Baretti was arrested,
charged with murder, and tried in Old Bailey, where he chose
to conduct his own defense. Johnson, Burke, Reynolds, G a r ­
rick, and Goldsmith were among those who spoke in his d e ­
fense; Baretti was subsequently acquitted.
In 1770, he undertook a translation of Don Quixote,
published the account of his journey to Portugal, Spain and
France, and in the slimmer of that year visited Paris, and
traveled to Piedmont to see his brothers. He returned to
London in May, 1771, published another edition of his
Italian-English dictionary, and continued to publish works
intended to teach the Italian language to his English p a ­
trons and their families, in 1772, he produced a noteworthy
three-volume set on the Italian works of Machiavelli,
Tutte
le opere di Niccold Machiavelli segretario e cittadino fiorentino,
con una prefazione di G. B.
During the latter phase of his career, Baretti was o f ­
fered a position at the university in Dublin, which he re-
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63
fused. He eventually quarrelled with Johnson and broke off
their friendship. Johnson's death, which occurred soon
after, in 1784, precluded any possibility of a reconcilia­
tion between these two longtime friends. Baretti never saw
Italy again after his return to London in 1771. He died on
May 5, 1789, and was buried in the cemetery at Marleybone.
Baretti made his most eloquent defense of Shakespeare
and hurled his most scathing critical comments at Voltaire
in his Discours sur Shakespeare et sur Monsieur de Voltaire,
published simultaneously in late spring of 1777 in London
and Paris.5 The incident that prompted Baretti's diatribe
against Voltaire had occurred the previous year. In the
spring of 1776, two volumes of Shakespeare's plays, trans­
lated into French and edited by Fontaine Malherbe, the Count
of Catuelan, and Pierre Le Tourneur, were published in
Paris. Le Tourneur, who had been the translator and guiding
spirit of the work, stated in a dedicatory preface addressed
to the king of France that the aim of his translation had
been to render justice to the great English poet, who had in
the past fallen victim to inferior translators. Le Tour­
neur's comments provoked a heated reaction from Voltaire,
who perhaps felt that Le Tourneur was including him in the
group of translators who had done violence to Shakespeare.
5 I am using as my source the version of Baretti's essay that appears in
Giuseppe Baretti, Opere. Ed. Franco Fido. Milan: Rizzoli, 1967. All page
references are to this edition.
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64
After having read Le Tourneur's introductory comments,
Voltaire immediately sent a letter to the Academie Frangaise, voicing his opposition to Le Tourneur's translation
on grounds that the " p olished taste" of the French people
was incompatible with the "gross barbarities"
speare.
of Shake­
Voltaire was outraged not only because he consid­
ered Shakespeare unworthy of translation into French, but
also because the " m i s e r a b l e "
Le Tourneur had not mentioned
in his introductory statement two authors who had brought
the greatest glory to French dramatic art— Corneille and
Racine. In this way, Voltaire provided Baretti with an o p ­
portunity for writing a heated polemical tract in defense of
Shakespeare.
Baretti, an admirer of Shakespeare, a frequent observer
of Garrick's Shakespearean interpretations on the London
stage, and an ardent follower of Johnson, fired back with
his Discours.6 Writing in French, Baretti obviously aims his
comments directly at French readers. More important, his e s ­
say carries significant importance in the formation of the
literary context from which Verdi's Macbeth libretto sprang,
since it is a clear pre-romantic rejection of Voltaire’s
neoclassicism. As far as I know, there is no detailed study
of Baretti's essay in English. What follows is an exposition
of Baretti's critical statements, especially as they relate
to Shakespeare's dramas.
6 See Appendix C for a reproduction of the original title page.
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65
Baretti begins his essay with a brief introduction that
relates an anecdote about " u n e dame anglaise.',7 While vi s ­
iting Paris, she learned of Voltaire's condemnation of Le
Tourneur as ’‘impudent, •• "imbecilic,"
cally"
“ mean,"
and “ ras­
for having translated Shakespeare's plays into
French. Appalled at Voltaire's disrespectful treatment of
the unfortunate translator, the English lady was outraged
that Voltaire had the audacity to attack Shakespeare himself
by calling his works “ an enormous dunghill." Baretti then
relates how the English lady, bristling at the word “ dung­
hill,"
responded by saying that Shakespeare's “ dunghill"
had rendered fertile an ungrateful land. Baretti found the
English lady's " b o n m o t " quite apt, but said she had
missed the mark by assuming that Voltaire knew English well
enough to have read all of Shakespeare's work when he made
his condemnatory judgment.
Following these brief introductory remarks, Baretti d e ­
votes the first chapter of his essay to belittling Vol­
taire's knowledge of English. Voltaire, claims Baretti, has
often attempted to persuade his public that he has English
“ at his fingertips."
The evidence Voltaire has offered for
this assertion, however, amounts to only two treatises writ­
7 The dame anglaise might be Elizabeth Montagu, who had also countered
Voltaire's opinions with a vigorous defense of Shakespeare entitled An
Essay on the Writings and Genius of Shakespeare, compared with the Greek
and French dramatic Poets, with some Remarks upon the Misrepresentations
of Monsieur de Voltaire.
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66
ten in English years previously,8 and translations of a few
isolated passages from English works. Baretti acknowledges
the many references to Shakespeare scattered throughout V o l ­
taire's works and letters, but these, he says, prove neither
Voltaire's proficiency in English nor his knowledge of the
English poet's works. This was not of course the first time
Baretti had accused Voltaire of not knowing English. Baretti
had scattered similar statements throughout his Frusta
letteraria. He once wrote,
for example, that " i f Voltaire's
knowledge of English had been more than superficial, he
never would have uttered those stupidities about Milton,
Shakespeare, Dryden.... " 9
Baretti admits that Voltaire's English essays are well
written and that the ideas expressed are definitely those of
the French writer. He would have no trouble accepting the
essays as Voltaire's work were it not for the fact that the
"English seems too E n g l i s h . " 10 Baretti finds not one im­
proper word, not one lame phrase, not the slightest Galli­
cism, not the least bit of linguistic infelicity to reveal
the foreigner, and not the minimum error in the use of au x ­
8 An Essay upon the epic Poetry of the Europeans Nations, from Homer
down to Milton, and An Essay upon the civil Wars of France extracted
from curious Manuscripts. Both were published at London in 1727; they
are discussed in Chapter II of this study.
9 **Discorso sopra le vicende della letteratura di Carlo Denina. "
Turin, 1761. La frusta letteraria. Ed. L u i g i Piccioni. 2 vols. (Bari:
Laterza, 1932) I, 221.
” Se Voltaire intendesse la lingua inglese piu
che superficialmente, gli § impossibile persuadersi mai ch'egli avesse
potuti dire gli spropositi che ha detti di Milton, di Shakespeare, di
Dryden...”
10 *'si ce n'§tait que l'anglais y est trop anglais.” Discours, 742.
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67
iliaries. All, he says, is exact, graceful, and elegant from
beginning to end. Baretti states that Voltaire published his
essays shortly before or after his thirtieth birthday during
his stay in London,11 an insufficient amount of time for him
to have acquired the degree of proficiency in English exhib­
ited in his essays.
Leaving these considerations aside, Baretti then notes
that Voltaire had not written anything in English in the
fifty years since the appearance of the London essays. B a ­
retti is amazed that Voltaire, after having acquired such
skillful command over English should have abandoned its use
once he stepped off English soil, despite the Frenchman's
penchant for presenting himself as a learned man in so many
languages.
Baretti sustains his tone of humorous mockery by m e n ­
tioning the wide correspondence Voltaire maintained with
noted Englishmen over a long period. He wrote them countless
letters, but not one contains a page of English. Had V o l ­
taire been the true author of the essays, he would have been
able to write thousands of letters in English "without ever
having to lift pen from paper."
Finally,
in an especially
cutting tone, Baretti claims that Voltaire's vanity and d e ­
sire for glory certainly would have induced him to seek even
more occasions to write in English.12 But no, says Baretti
11 Born in 1694, Voltaire was in fact thirty-three years old when he
published his English essays. He sojourned in London from 1726 to 1729.
12 Discours, 745. " s a vanit6, ou l'int§r§t de sa gloire, lui aurait
fait chercher les occasions d'en 6crire le plus qu'il lui aurait £t§
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68
with caustic humor,
among Voltaire's countless letters writ­
ten in French there is only an occasional " H o w do you do?"
or " 1 am very glad, " or " I love you much,"
or some other
civility, obviously copied from an English grammar.
To prove Voltaire's poor grasp of English,
Baretti
turns to an evaluation of Voltaire's Shakespeare transla­
tions. Citing Hamlet's well-known soliloquy that begins,
" T o be or not to b e , "
Baretti states that Voltaire trans­
lated this monologue so freely that if it were to be trans­
lated back into English from Voltaire's French,
it would not
be recognizable as Shakespeare's. Baretti then points to
specific details, saying that Voltaire erred gravely when he
rendered the first six syllables of Hamlet's speech with two
lines of alexandrines. This not only adds inexcusable heavi­
ness to the words but also destroys the sense of the solilo­
quy.
to
support this last assertion, Baretti cites Johnson's
commentary, saying that Hamlet delivers his meditation
calmly, without even a minimum show of emotion. At the
moment Hamlet is about to apply his general reflections
about death to his own situation, he notices his loved one,
and that prevents him from doing so. Baretti's argument here
closely follows Johnson, who wrote,
" W e may suppose that he
possible."
Baretti's assertion that Voltaire never used English in his
letters is unfounded, as even a cursory examination of his correspond­
ence reveals. There is only a question as to the measure of assistance
he might have received from London friends when he wrote his essays. See
White, 19.
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69
[Hamlet] would have applied these general observations to
his own case, but that he discovered O p h e l i a . " 13 Citing an
extended passage from Voltaire's version, Baretti conjec­
tures that Voltaire, after having made a literal transla­
tion, did nothing more than to re-translate it into lines of
"clamorous eloquence"
that evoke feelings highly reminis­
cent of " l a S c u d £ r i . " 14 As a result, Baretti says, the
reader is taken far from the original.
Baretti then turns to one of Voltaire's prose rendi­
tions, citing this passage from Hamlet:
A little ere the mightiest Julius fell, the graves
stood tenantless, and the sheeted dead did squeak and
gibber in the Roman streets.
Baretti states that in this passage there are three words
that cannot be rendered by three other single French words.
He mentions the adjectives,
"tenantless"
and the verb,
Each of these words, says Ba ­
" t o gibber."
and "sheeted,"
retti, requires a paraphrase that weakens their sense. To
illustrate, Baretti offers his own version:
Un peu auparavant que le tr&s puissant Jules fut tu6,
les torabes rest&rent sans habitants, et les morts,
enveloppSs dans leurs tristes robes,
firent des cris et parl&rent entre eux un langage inintelligible dans les rues romaines.
Voltaire's translation of the same passage reads:
Du temps de la mort de C€sar les tombeaux s'ouvirent, les
morts, dans leurs linceuls, crifirent et sautSrent dans les
13 Johnson, Hamlet. C£. " A u moment qu'il va appliquer ses remarques k
sa situation, il aperpoit son amante, ce qui l'emp§che d'achever le
soliloque." Discours, 748.
14 This is a reference to the author Madeleine de Scudfery (1607-1701),
who wrote novels under the name of her brother Georges.
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70
rues de Rome.
Baretti points out that the verb " t o squeak,"
when used with the auxiliary " d i d , "
especially
inparts a meaning
quite different from the French " c r i e r , "
but, he contin­
ues, it is impossible to convey the force of idiomatic ex­
pressions to those who do not understand a language.15
Baretti is also quick to take Voltaire to task for
having translated " t o g ibber" with the French " s a u t e r . "
Baretti explains that " t o gibber" means " t o speak an
incomprehensible language,"
or " t o speak inarticulately."
Turning once again to humorous mockery, Baretti says that
Voltaire's " s a u t e r "
would produce a laughable image in a
reader's mind when he reads that the spirits, who have
emerged from their graves, go "jum p i n g "
through the
streets of Rome.
Other details of Voltaire's translation provoke B a ­
retti 's unrelenting ridicule. For example, Baretti says that
Shakespeare calls the cock " t h e bird of dawning,"
and
notes that this English phrase is poetic, whereas Voltaire's
" l ’oiseau du point du jour,"
Baretti says sarcastically,
is a " f ine example of French p o e t r y ! " 16 Baretti,
more, explains that Hamlet's reference to his
denotes a black cloak because " i n k y "
formed from the noun,
"ink."
further­
" i n k y cloak"
is an adjective
But, Baretti says, the black­
ness of the ink further connotes a mantle of mourning, an
15 "mais il est impossible de faire sentir certains tours forts d'une
langue a ceux qui ne 1'entenderent point." Discours, 752.
16 "Voiia qui est bien po6tique en francais!" Ibid., 753.
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71
apposite image, given Hamlet's condition. Therefore, by
translating Shakespeare's words as " m o n habit couleur d'encre, "
Voltaire has merely emphasized the literal sense of
the word rather than its connotation. Wondering whether V o l ­
taire is acting through ignorance or malice, Baretti says
that Voltaire's word for word translation is similar to what
would be done by a ten-year-old schoolgirl with a diction­
ary, after having learned a dozen or so conjugations. How,
Baretti asks, can we then grant Voltaire the right to be
both judge and hangman (le jnge et le bourreau)
of Shake­
speare?
Until this point, Baretti has indulged in personal a t ­
tack and ridicule. MOst of the essay in fact consists more
of opposition to Voltaire than defense of Shakespeare. A l ­
though Baretti's tone is generally conversational, he fre­
quently lapses into harsh derision and contempt. While fault
may be found with Baretti's digressionary and vituperative
tone, much of what he has to say about the English language,
translation, and Voltaire's views about Shakespeare rings
true and sounds surprisingly modern. There can be no doubt
that Baretti's knowledge of English was profound. His long
residence in England, his association with Johnson and the
London literary circle, had made him proficient in speech
and knowledgeable about English literature.17 But beneath
17 In a letter to Chiaramonti, dated June 1, 1764, Baretti wrote, " I
cannot help thinking rather in the English way, and despising the men of
letters who make no mental effort when they write.” Cited by CollisonMorley, Giuseppe Baretti and Bis Friends, 152.
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72
the surface of mockery and derision that Baretti uses to
cover his critique of Voltaire,
there lies much good sense,
and as the examples from his textual remarks indicate, he
possessed a keen understanding of Shakespeare's language.
An example of Baretti's eloquence in defense of Shake­
speare occurs near the conclusion of his first chapter.
Turning away from a personal attack on Voltaire, Baretti
rises to a high degree of linguistic elegance and delivers
an impassioned plea for Shakespeare. His main argument thus
far has been that Voltaire judged Shakespeare on the basis
of his own French translations, which, as Baretti never
failed to point out, are of inferior quality, full of lin­
guistic infelicities and connotational errors.
Still wondering whether or not a poet of Shakespeare's
ability should be judged and condemned on the basis of a
schoolgirl's translation, Baretti asks his readers how light
can possibly be shed upon the judicious choices Shakespeare
made for his words and lines? Can anyone render the purity,
the elegance, the energy of Shakespeare's expressions? The
harmony of his verses,
the fluidity of his style, the p r o ­
priety of his images, the splendor of his metaphors,
the
buoyancy of his witticisms, the spirit of his allusions,
eloquence and pathos of his exclamations and apostrophes,
the sweetness, the nobility, the loftiness of his poetry,
and the hundred other things that ultimately converge to
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the
73
form the overall beauty of his work?18 Baretti !s remarkable
passage,
full of genuine passion and feeling for Shake­
speare, certainly foreshadows the changes in literary
attitudes that were needed to bring about the acceptance of
Shakespeare in Italy.
Baretti begins his second chapter b y questioning the
reasons for Voltaire's heated reaction to Le Tourneur's
translations. What harm did Le Tourneur do, asks Baretti, by
giving to his country the works of a foreign author? Madame
de Stael, of course, was to ask this question implicitly in
her celebrated essay of 1816, and in terms that foreshadow
Madame de Stael's exhortation, Baretti continues his argu­
ment. For example,
if Le Tourneur's version is good, he will
have brought to his compatriots one more pleasure. If it is
poor, his work will pass into oblivion as soon as it is
published, resulting in no disgrace to France.
Baretti then launches into a discussion of Shake­
spearean poetics,
and says he believes Le Tourneur's new
French translation will be of little worth because Shake­
speare's English is not translatable into French. Poetry,
says Baretti,
is like good wine. It cannot be poured into
18 " Donne-1-on par 13 le choix judicieux qu'on grand Scrivain a su
faire de ses mots et de ses phrases? donne-t-on la puretg, 1'616gance,
l'gnergie de ses expressions? Donne-t-on l'harmonie de ses periods, le
coulant de son style, la justeBse de ses figures, le brillant de ses
mgtaphores, le vif de ses saillies, 1'esprit de see allusions, l'emphase
et le pathgtique de ses exclamations et de ses apostrophes, la douceur,
la noblesse, la fiertg de sa versification, et cent autres choses qui
concourent toutes 3 la fois 3 former le beau total d'une composition."
DiBCoure, 755.
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74
another bottle without losing some of its flavor. Baretti
goes even further by claiming Shakespeare cannot be trans­
lated adequately into any of the Latin languages because the
beauties of English do not resemble the poetic beauties of
the Latin languages. Shakespeare, says Baretti, had no
knowledge of Latin, Greek, or any other language. He had in
his favor only a profound feeling for human nature, a rare
ingenuity for invention,
and a fiery imagination. With these
three qualities, Shakespeare formed a language that was at
times base and full of emotion, but more often compact, e n ­
ergetic, and forceful enough to move the soul. This is the
kind of poetry, Baretti explains, that would be impossible
to translate into a Latin language.
According to Baretti,
the French language, to a greater
degree than her sister languages,
demanding,
too disdainful,
is too restrictive,
too
to be able to render the poetry
of Shakespeare. When sublime thoughts have to be expressed,
French cannot tolerate any vulgar term, any shift of empha­
sis, any neologism, or any archaism. An enj ambement, a rhyme
that does not correspond precisely, a hemistich improperly
separted from its counterpart, are considered unbearable
defects. Although Baretti is speaking here of the language
advocated by 1'AcadSmie frangaise, I am tempted to think
that he is speaking of Voltaire himself. In contrast to the
constraints of French poetic taste, the beauty of Shake­
speare's language is enhanced, Baretti says, rather than
diminished by these so-called defects. A certain sound, a n ­
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75
cient and at times untamed, enriches Shakespeare's poetry.
When choosing his poetic expressions, Shakespeare was there­
fore as free as the ocean wind to write as he wished.
For this reason, Baretti notes, Shakespeare used rhymed
verse, blank verse, and prose,
and at times wrote only one
or two words in place of a whole line. His language submits
to all demands without resisting. Fetter his language with
the rules of French, chained to alexandrines that march like
a procession of monks, walking two-by-two with heavy m e a ­
sured gait, and Shakespeare's language becomes unrecogniz­
able. It would be like making someone dance the minuet who
can only jump like a deer. Render it in prose from beginning
to end and you make a stew without spice. Translate it com­
pletely in rhyme, and you shackle it. Put it entirely in
blank verse? —
God forbid!19
After these remarkable insights, Baretti again turns to
a consideration of Voltaire's motives for attacking Le Tour­
neur. At this point, the level of Baretti's discourse d e ­
scends to mere conjecture and malicious attack. The beauty,
passion, and imaginative turns of phrase that he mustered
for a defense of Shakespeare's language earlier in the chap­
ter are no longer present.
19 " S a langue se souraet k tout cela sans broncher. Allez, selon le
g€nie de la po€sie franchise, l'enchainer dans des alexandrins, qui vous
rapellent une procession de moines marchants deux k deux d'un pas €gal
et grave le long d'un rue droite, vous ne le reconnaitrez plus. Ce sera
faire danser des minuets k qui ne sait que s'€lancer comme un cerf.
Allez le faire parler en prose tout du long, ce sera un ragoQt sans sel.
Le traduirez-vous en vers rim§s? Vous lui donnerez des entraves. Le
traduirez-vous en vers blancs? Mis&ricorde!” Ibid., 760.
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76
Admitting that he is indeed conjecturing, Baretti
claims that Voltaire fears to encourage the acceptance of Le
Tourneur's translations because they would be injurious to
young French writers who hope to distinguish themselves in
the theater. Baretti claims that Voltaire acted as he did
because he feared his own translations would be compared
with and found inferior to those of Le Tourneur. All of
Paris would then come to know that Voltaire had misled his
public. His reputation as a translator of Shakespeare would
go up in smoke, and everyone would take up cudgels against
him. These,
says Baretti, were Voltaire's motives for issu­
ing his "poisonous invective" against Le Tourneur.
Baretti, echoing the sentiments of his 1753 essay,
again reproaches Voltaire for his low opinion of Italian au­
thors, for his former disdain of Ariosto,
and for his objec­
tions to Homer. Consistently, Baretti's bases his accus­
ations against Voltaire on nationalistic grounds. Although
Baretti is willing to allow for a certain amount of national
bias, he claims Voltaire does not render impartial critical
judgments but instead forms his opinions solelyout of devo­
tion to his own nation.
It is possible, Baretti says, that his readers would
like him to offer evidence that Shakespeare truly merits the
exceptional approbation that he has given him thus far. A
demonstration of the evidence is not possible because if he
were to cite passages from Shakespeare in English, his read­
ers would not understand them. Nor can he translate p a s ­
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77
sages, for he has just told them that Shakespeare is u n ­
translatable. Furthermore, a collection of random passages
would not suffice for a just evaluation of the English poet.
To present an isolated passage would be like exhibiting a
single brick for someone to judge the house from which it
came.20
One of Shakespeare's chief virtues, says Baretti, was
his ability to place before our eyes characters that were
often “ types." His principal characters therefore do not
represent individuals but “ species."21 To know Shakespeare
really well, one must travel to London and begin a serious
study of English. The English people should not be observed
through the eyes of Frenchmen but through the eyes of human
beings. Above all, the English should never be seen through
the faulty spectacles that Voltaire has offered his
countrymen. Those lenses distort one's vision. Even if one
should arrive at a firm knowledge of the language and the
people of England,
it would still not be possible to know
Shakespeare. One would then have to study Shakespeare's
language, which, says Baretti,
is far from what is used
everyday in England. Shakespeare's language has a quality
all its own, a masculine quality, an unconstrained quality,
at times even a wild quality, which is one of its marvels.
20 Baretti is echoing his English friend. Cfr. Johnson, Preface to
Shakespeare. “ He that tries to recommend him by select quotations, will
succeed like the pedant in Hierocles, who, when he offered his house to
sale, carried a brick in his pocket as a specimen."
21 Cfr. “ In the writings of other poets, a character is too often an
individual: in those of Shakespeare, it is commonly a species." Ibid.
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78
Baretti takes pains to refute several of Voltaire's
specific statements about the English language. For example,
Voltaire's assertion that nearly all English words were
taken from French receives an extended refutation in which
Baretti cites a vast list of English words, mostly of AngloSaxon origin, to demonstrate the utter fatuity of Volta i r e 's
claim. Furthermore, when Voltaire began learning English,
Baretti says, he could not understand why the people of an
enlightened nation like England admired an author of such
waywardness as Shakespeare. But when Voltaire had acquired a
little knowledge of English, he thought their admiration was
well-placed. At one time, then, Voltaire displayed a flash
of good sense which has long ago escaped him. Should not
Voltaire, long before he had learned a smattering of En g ­
lish, have thought that the English appreciation of Shake­
speare was justified? After all, argues Baretti,
concerning national " s p i r i t "
in matters
a knowledge of a nation's
language is not a prerequisite for making judgments, especi­
ally when the inhabitants of "enlightened nations"
are
unanimous in their opinions for centuries. A knowledge of
the languages of Greece and France, for example, are not r e ­
quired to acknowledge that the Greeks and French were justi­
fied in admiring Homer and Corneille.
Baretti also refutes Voltaire's assertion that every­
where, especially in free nations,
rior m i n d s . "
" t h e people rule supe­
Baretti is quick to point out that such a
notion could not be true in matters of literary taste. Did
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79
Pope and Warburton, after Ben Jonson and Milton, admire
Shakespeare simply because the people did? Does Voltaire a d ­
mire Corneille and Racine because the idlers of Paris admire
them? No doubt,
says Baretti, people think that Voltaire
rightly accused Shakespeare of violating the three unities,
recommended by Aristotle,
and briliantly executed by Cor­
neille. We know that Shakespeare has indeed violated them by
moving his characters from one locale to another, from one
act to another, grossly violating the unity of place. Conse­
quently, the duration of time expands the action, and
stretches it over months and even years instead of three or
four hours, clearly violating the unity of time. What can be
said in defense of such an absurd and monstruous practice?
Before answering, Baretti asks his readers a few ques­
tions. How can those sitting in the audience at the Comedie
Frangaise in Paris believe they are in ancient Rome or some
other distant city? How can they, watching Vestris or Lekain,22 believe that one is Agrippina or Lucrezia, the
other, Tarquinio or Tiberio? How do the countesses sitting
in the boxes endure a king of Macedonia or a dame of Hindu­
stan who, instead of amusing them by speaking in their b a r ­
barous tongue, declaims in beautifully rhymed French verses?
The countesses, moreover, often manage to supply the last
hemistich before that king or dame has pronounced it. How
22 Marie-Rose Gourdaud (1734-1804) actress of the Comgdie Italienne,
also acted at the Comgdie Fran<paise. She was the wife of Henri-Louis
Lefkain (1728-1777), an actor of the Comgdie Fran<paise and a celebrated
interpreter of Voltaire's tragedies.
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80
can the seamstresses seated in the balconies get into their
minds that the cloths painted by Servandoni or Luterbourg23
are apartments, galleries, gardens, palaces,
temples,
cities, fields, or seas?
Baretti answers that only with the help of their imag­
ination do the men and women of the audience find all these
things possible. If events which seem so far from reality
are made real with the help of the imagination in Paris, why
cannot other things, not the least bit more distant from
reality, be made real in London? What does it matter if the
Consul Marcantonio stays in Rome during the entire play, or
if he departs for Mexico in the second act, or for Peters­
burg in the third, or makes a leap to Pondicheri in the
fourth, or goes off to Ireland for a cappuccino in the
fifth? There can be no difficulty as long as the author lets
us know where Marcantonio is as soon as he appears on stage,
or if he tells us from time to time why Marcantonio is
obliged to leave the consulate for his cappuccino.
Baretti continues his amusing, though forceful, argu­
ment by asking his readers whether they truly believe a
greater effort is required to imagine characters wandering
from one country to another than to imagine them remaining
in Rome for all five acts, when members of an audience know
for certain that they themselves remain seated in a Parisian
23 Giovanni Nicola Servandoni (1695-1766), architect and scenic de­
signer, worked at Paris. Philippe-Jacques Luterbourg (1740-1814),
painter of battlefields, hunting scenes, and landscapes, lived for a
long time in England, and died at London.
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81
theater. In his refutation of the dramatic unities, Baretti
is following Johnson. Compare,
for example:
The necessity of observing the unities of time and
place arises from the supposed necessity of making the
drama credible. The criticks hold it impossible that an
action of months or years can be possibly believed to
pass in three hours; or that the spectator can suppose
himself to sit in the theatre, while ambassadors go and
return between distant kings, while armies are levied
and towns beseiged, while an exile wanders and returns,
or till he whom they saw courting his mistress, shall
lament the untimely fall of his son.24
If the audience knows precisely where it is at all
times, how can it possibly be deluded? With this question,
Baretti is again echoing Johnson:
Delusion, if delusion be admitted, has no certain
limitation; if the spectator can be once persuaded
that his old acquaintances are Alexander and
Caesar, that a room illuminated with candles is
the plain of Pharsalia, or the bank of Granicus,
he is in a state of elevation... ,25
Regardless of what our poets and critics tell us, says
Baretti, we do not attend a performance of Cinna, Britannico, Hamlet, Macbeth,
or even La chercheuse d'esprit or Le
convie de pierre to procure the pleasure of a delusion,
which in any event would be impossible to obtain.
Instead,
we go to enjoy the representation. If it pleases us, we lis­
ten and applaud, but if it bores us, we whistle. That is the
case whether the poet models his art on certain rules con-
24 Johnson, "Preface to Shakespeare, 1765." Selections from Johnson on
Shakespeare. Ed. B. H. Bronson with J. M. O'Meara. New Haven: Yale UP,
1986, 23.
25 Ibid., 24.
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82
sidered valid in Paris, or whether he conforms to other
rules considered valid in London.
Baretti also refutes Aristotle's precept that a theat­
rical work should represent only a single event so that the
attention of the spectator is not interrupted or distracted.
Baretti wonders why it is that Aristotle assumes that the
audience's attention will wander. He argues that our experi­
ence of Shakepeare, Lope de Vega, and many others, has d e m ­
onstrated that our attention does not wander. Must we there­
fore deny our own experience, Baretti asks, for the sake of
what Aristotle said or did not say? At the time of A r i s ­
totle, dramas containing only a single plot were performed,
and they turned out perfectly. Aristotle studied them and
reduced them to rules. If comedies containing two, three,
four, or five plots or events had been successful in his
day, would he not also have determined what made them suc­
cessful and formed precepts for them in the same way?
The French cannot tolerate the slightest deviation from
the Aristotelian unities, Baretti says. This is perfectly
acceptable. They are free to do whatever they wish in their
own house and to be satisfied with whatever they desire. He
is not criticising them for their methods,
for he is a sin­
cere admirer of Corneille, Racine, and of Voltaire himself.
He would give a finger to be able to create a drama equal to
Cinna, but he is quick to add that he would give two fingers
to be able to create a character like Shakespeare's Caliban.
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83
Baretti says that the French theater, devoid of trans­
lations of English drama,26 is the poorer for insisting on
only one type of drama. By contrast, the English theater is
by far the richer for tolerating in their theaters dramas of
diverse kinds.
In terms similar to Madame de Stael's exhor­
tation that was to follow his remarks by thirty-nine years,
Baretti says that the English are made even richer by the
number of translations of works by Corneille, Racine and
Voltaire.
English dramatic poetry, freed from the constraints of
rhyme, easily lends itself to sublimity,
tenderness, and
elegance. Shakespeare therefore was able to create a large
variety of inimitable characters. In addition to Caliban,
for whom Shakespeare needed a profound poetic imagination to
render with verisimilitude, Baretti places Shylock and Falstaff among Shakespeare's dramatic triumphs. Baretti sees
Falstaff as a liar, glutton, lecher, thief, sloth, braggard,
blusterer,
flatterer, and slanderer. Nevertheless, we cannot
hate him because he possesses a fundamental and inexhaust­
ible good humor. He knows how to be witty without seeking to
eclipse the wit of others. Shakespeare's depictions of Cali­
ban, Shylock, and Falstaff are extremely instructive. Char­
acters like Falstaff are fascinating and dangerous to soci­
ety, but because they bring good cheer,
the world readily
26 Baretti, of course, meant there were no translations of English
works prior to Le Tourneur's Shakespeare edition. Obviously, he had
forgotten or never knew the translations of English works done thirty
years earlier by Pierre-Antoine de La Place.
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84
forgives their vices. Baretti doubts that Le Tourneur will
be able to do them full justice, and exhorts his readers to
learn English. Only then, he says, will they be able to
realize the true genius of that "English b u f f o o n . " 27 While
his remarks on individual Shakespearean characters are not
extensive,
it should be recognized that Baretti was the
first Italian critic to understand, appreciate, and write
about Falstaff, Caliban, and Shylock.
Shakespeare's characters,
continues Baretti, are com­
pletely diverse creatures from Alzire and Zaire. To compare
these characters of Voltaire's with those of Shakespeare's
would be tantamount to comparing miniature ivory figurines
with Michelangelo's David and Moses. Again in terms fore­
shadowing Madame de Stael, Baretti tells his readers it is
all well and good to enjoy their own works of literature and
those of the Greeks, but these are only two nations of the
world. There are, however, many other nations, and if the
French and Greeks possess masterpieces, other nations p o s ­
sess them as well. Baretti then lists as examples works by
Metastasio in Italy, by De Vega, Calderdn, and Moreto in
Spain, by Shakespeare in England, and concludes his argument
by saying there are poets even in places as far away as B e i ­
jing. Baretti exhorts his French readers to learn at least
the works of their neighbors,
for they would gain much from
the knowledge and acceptance of such works. Above all, he
27 Baretti is citing one of the many epithets Voltaire used for
Shakespeare.
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85
tells his readers to avoid disparaging everything that is
not French,
or that is not immediately understood, as Vo l ­
taire, their "universal genius"
has done. Voltaire, B a ­
retti concludes, is so great and worthy in some things, and
so limited and contemptible in others.28
Baretti wrote his essay in French, he says, not to pose
as a master of that language, although he had studied it at
length, but because no one else has challenged Voltaire.
Everyone allows him to speak without contradiction. Baretti
therefore has taken it upon himself to " u n m a s k "
lent impostor," who,
an " i n s o ­
" f o r half a century has made all of
Europe believe he is learned in English and Italian although
he knows nothing of one or the other.''29
Baretti felt some misgiving about his own command of
French, for in a letter to a relative he wrote,
"Even I
know that my Discourse is not without a few linguistic e r ­
rors because I had to publish it in installments even as I
28 " J e vous y exhorte d'avance. TSchez, en attendant, de voir et de
sentir toutes celles de vos voisins qui sont A votre portde. Vous y
gagnerez beaucoup plus qu'd tout mdpriser, qu'H censurer tout ce qui ne
se fait point chez vous, ou, pour mieux dire, tout ce que vous
n'entendez point, comme fait votre gdnie universel, si grand, si
estimable dans tant de choses, si bornd, si mdprisable dans tant
d'autres!" Discours, 801-02.
29 " E n dcrivant dette pauvre apologie de ce pofete, je ne cherche pas &
me donner pour un maitre passd dans votre langue, quoique, 5 vrai dire,
je l'aie beaucoup dtudide. Mais voyant que tout le mond dort et qu'un
vous laisse dire sans jamais vous contredire, je me suis fait courage &
ddmasquer un imposteur insolent, qui depuis un demi-sidcle a cherchd de
faire accroire d toute l”europe qu'il est trds savant en anglias et en
italien, quoiqu'il ne sache goutte ni de l'un ni de 1'autre." Discours,
847.
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86
was writing i t . " 30 He closes his essay with an appeal to the
young people of France, the future readers of world
literature.
" W o e to the young who will have read the works
of Voltaire before having read Homer, Virgil, and all the
others whom we call 'writers of classics.' Woe, w o e ! " 31
Although he had hoped to win a measure of recognition
for his essay,32 none came. In England, where Shakespeare's
place in English literature had been solidly established,
there was no need to add Baretti's voice, the voice of a
foreigner, to the local chorus of praises.33 in France,
where Voltaire was an imposing cultural icon of long stand­
ing, more than a single essay written by an Italian, no m a t ­
ter how vitriolic or convincing, would have been required to
topple him from his burnished pedestal.
French authorities, moreover, had excised a number of
passages from Baretti's essay,
and J. B. Suard, noted jour­
nalist and royal censor, attacked it on linguistic grounds.
" T h e pamphlet is written in poor French," he wrote,
in the language of the market-place."
"and
Nevertheless, Suard
30 " L o so anch'io che quel mio D iscorao non 6 senza qualche difetto di
lingua, perch§ mi fu duqpo stamparlo a miBura che lo scrivevo.”
Baretti,
Scelte delle lettere familiari. II, xxix.
31 "Malheur aux jeunes gens qui auront lu les ouvrages de monsieur de
Voltaire avant que d'avoir lu Hom&re, Virgile et tous les autres que nos
appelons '§crivains classiques': malheur, malheur!'' Discours, 892.
32 " I I libretto franceBe, che pubblicherd sulla fine del mese
presente, sono certo me ne procurer^. d e 1 nuovi amici " Letter of
Baretti to Bicetti. 5 May 1777. Epistolario. II, 208-9.
33 For example, in An Essay on the Writings and Genius of Shakespeare,
compared with the Greek and French dramatic Poets, with some Remarks
upon the Misrepresentations of Monsiuer de Voltaire (1769), Elizabeth
Montagu had already taken issue with Voltaire.
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87
rendered it a modicum of praise by saying that the essay
displayed the spirit and vitality of good criticism, but
found the tone of it " i n t o l e r a b l e . " 34 Suard was obviously
taken aback at the personal attacks Baretti had levied
against Voltaire,
for he went on to say that the French
government should not authorize a diatribe against " a man
who honors his n a t i o n . " 35 Thus, Suard summarized the extent
of the reception Baretti's essay could have been expected to
reap in France.
Baretti*s essay has been too little recognized as a
sign of the changes in literary attitudes that had occurred
by the end of the eighteenth century. This might be because
of Baretti*s rough-hewn, confrontational critical style. In
contrast to his friend Dr. Johnson, whose precise thought
and imaginative eloquence imparted a degree of inportance
even to the trivialities he uttered, Baretti*s abrupt arro­
gance often tended to detract from the pith of his judg­
ments. One Italian, however, who had also lived for a time
in England, was able to see Baretti*s Discours in the light
of a new kind of literary criticism. Baretti, wrote Ugo
Foscolo,
" w a s the first to introduce a new code of criti­
34 " L a brochure est Scrite en mauvais frangais et en langage des
halles. Elle ne manque ni d 1esprit, ni de vivacit#, ni de bonnes cri­
tiques, mais le tone en eBt intolerable." Cited by Franco Fido in in­
troductory essay to Baretti's Discours. Baretti, Opere, 737.
35 “ Je ne crois pas que le gouvernement doive autoriser de semblables
grossiSret§es contre un citoyen, quel qi'il soit, encore moins contre un
hontme qui honore sa nation."
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88
cism',36 in Italy. Baretti's essay therefore represents still
another step toward the quiet shift in literary attitudes
that occurred throughout the eighteenth century, attitudes
that would eventually emerge more clearly defined and more
vehemently expressed during the controversy provoked by
Madame de Stael's essay in 1816.
36 Ugo Foscolo, Italian Periodic Literature. Opere. Ed. Cesare Foligno.
(Florence, 1958) 344.
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89
CHAPTER IV
Translations Available to Verdi
Works describing the reception of Shakespeare in Italy
during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries are far from
numerous. Arturo Graf presented a vivid account in Chapter
XIII of his magisterial L'Anglomania e l'influsso inglese in
Italia nel secolo XVIII (1911). Lacy Collison-Morley1s
Shakespeare in Italy (1916) provides a broader and finely
detailed treatment in English. Two years later, Siro Nulli
published his Shakespeare in Italia, which aimed at "seeing
how the Italian spirit reacted before the great figure of
Shakespeare, and what an abundant conflict of ideas the
reaction might have stirred u p . " 1
In his essay,
Shake­
speare Translations in Italy,2 Mario Praz extended this
inquiry into the twentieth century, and concluded his his­
torical survey by discussing Ungaretti's translation of a
Shakespeare sonnet. Although limited to the eighteenth cen­
tury, Anna Maria Crino's Le traduzioni di Shakespeare in
Italia nel Settecento stands out for its scholarship and
abundance of detail.
I am, in fact, indebted to this work
for many of the facts about Valentini and his translation
included in this chapter. I have also consulted Valentini's
1 "vedere come lo spirito italiano si sia atteggiato di fronte alia
grande figura dello Shakespeare: quale feconda lotta d'idee questo atteggiamento abbia suscitato.” Siro Attilio Nulli, Shakespeare in Italia
(Milan: Ulrico Hoepli, 1918) 3.
2 Mario Praz, "Shakespeare Translations in Italy." Shakespeare Jarhbuch. 92 Heidelberg: Quelle & Meyer, 1956. 220-31.
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90
original text in the collection at Harvard's Houghton Li­
brary .
Seventeen years elapsed between Rolli's translation of
Hamlet's soliloquy and the appearance of the first Italian
version of a complete Shakespeare play. In 1756, a teacher
of ecclesiastical history at the University of Siena, Do­
menico Valentini, translated Julius Caesar.3 Valentini's
choice is not surprising since the play would certainly have
appealed to an Italian predilection for Roman history. More­
over, interest in the dramatic possibilities of the subject
had undoubtedly been stimulated and sustained by Voltaire's
La Mort de CSsar and Conti's Cesare, both of which had
already gained renown.
Details of Valentini's life are scarce. He was born
March 11, 1690 at Pari di Castello in the province of Grosseto, and died at Siena on December 23, 1762. He took a d e ­
gree in theology in 1714, and later studied ecclesiastical
history at the Studio Senese, where he was appointed pro­
fessor after completing his studies. He remained in that
post until his death. To augment his income, he also taught
physics and gave private lessons in Italian to English ge n ­
tlemen “ who paid him w e l l . " 4
3 Domenico Valentini. II Giulio Cesare, Tragedia Ietorica di G. Shake­
speare tradotta dall'inglese in Lingua Toscana, in Siena, Stamperia di
Agostino Bindi, 1756.
4 Dava, per arrotondare lo stipendio, lezioni private di Fisica
Sperimentale e “ insegnava privatamente il Toscano ai Cavalieri Inglesi
che lo pagavano bene." Cited by Anna Maria Crind. Le traduzioni di
Shakespeare in Italia nel Settecento. (Rome: Edizioni di Storia e
Letteratura, 1950) 42.
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91
Valentini quite candidly admits that he knew no Eng­
lish, and says that for his translation, he relied on " s e v ­
eral gentlemen of that illustrious Nation who understood the
Tuscan tongue perfectly, and who had the kindness and the
patience to explain this tragedy to m e . " 5 Given Valentini's
ignorance of English,
it might be that those English ge n ­
tlemen who " e x p l a i n e d "
Shakespeare's Julius Casare to V a ­
lentini did the actual translating while valentini merely
transcribed. To cast him as a transcriber of Shakespeare,
however, appears not only unfounded but also unfair, con­
sidering Valentini's classical and ecclesiastical training.
It is quite conceivable that Valentini brought the proper
forms and idioms of the Tuscan language to the finished
translation. More significant, unlike La Place's first
French translations, which were fragmentary and little more
than summaries, Valentini's translation is a complete and at
times faithful rendering of Shakespeare's tragedy that d e ­
serves to be recognized for its quality as well as for its
historical importance.
In his preface, Valentini stated that he used Theo­
bald's edition of Shakespeare as his source. He lists the
dramatis persons in the same order as they appear in Theo­
bald, but omits the designations of " c o b b l e r "
and " c a r ­
penter," possibly because he felt, given the period in
5 "alcuni cavalieri di quella illustre Nazione che perfettamente
intendono la Lingua Toscana hanno avuto la bontS e la pazienza di
spiegarmi guesta tragedia.''
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92
which he wrote, that they would be out of place in a tragedy
on such lofty themes. He also omits the two poets and the
ghost of Caesar from the list of characters, but closely
follows Theobald in determining the names of places where
the action unfolds throughout each act. There are times,
however, when Valentini changes geographical references to
make them more recognizable for an Italian reader. For ex­
ample, Theobald's "I s l a n d near Mutina" becomes "Island
near Bologna."
Other discrepancies in Valentini's trans­
lation are due to errors in Theobald. Near the end of the
last scene of the second act, for example, Valentini writes,
"Enter Artemidoro,"
instead of "Enter Soothsayer." V a ­
lentini, however, departs from Theobald altogether in the
division of scenes. Theobald identified each scene according
to where the action takes place, even though it often shifts
during the course of an act. Valentini, on the other hand,
determined his scenes according to traditional Italian prac­
tice by the number of actors appearing on stage.
Considering Valentini's translation without reference
to the original, Crin6 has pointed out that Valentini's lin­
gua toscana at times seems removed from his lingua italiana
and does not always conform to the style required for Shake­
speare's characters.6
servirla, "
For example, the carpenter's " p e r
Lucio's " S a r a servito, signor padrone,"
Antonio's " L o r signori,"
and
addressed to the conspirators,
6 Anna Maria Crind, Le traduzioni di Shakespeare in Italia nel
Settecento. (Rome: Edizioni di Storia e Letteratura, 1950) 46.
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93
all sound a discordant note in an Italian ear. Moreover,
Valentini's use of personal pronouns, a critical matter in
Italian dialogue,
is often inappropriate. Where " t u "
would
be proper, considering the relationship of the characters in
a given scene, Valentini often uses " v o i "
without any ap­
parent justification. Casca, for example, commits this kind
of egregious error at the moment he is about to strike
Caesar with his sword.
" M i a destra, "
he shouts,
"parlate
voi per m e !•’ Antonio too speaks with impropriety when he
addresses Caesar's corpse, saying "Voi,
esangue cadave-
r e ....''
Often Valentini lapses into redundancy or supplies
adjectives for nouns when none appear in the original. For
example, in Marullo's lines in the first scene of the first
act,
" h i s chariot" becomes "aspettato trionfal carro, "
"holiday, becomes "briosa festa, "
four lines we read,
" g r a n Pompeo, "
dine, "
and within three of
"superbo Cesare, "
" g r a n gastigo,"
"n o b i l pompa, "
"mostruosa ingratitu-
and " e ssere supremo," where in the original the
nouns appear unmodified.
Valentini also fails to render Shakepseare's poetic im­
agery with any degree of fidelity. For example,
in the ex­
change between Cassius and Brutus that occurs in the first
act:
Cas: Tell me, good Brutus, can you see your face?
Bru: No, Cassius, for the eye sees not itself
but by reflection of some other thing.
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94
Valentini writes,
Cas:
Bru:
Ditemi, o caro Bruto, conoscete voi ben voi medesimo?
No, Cassio, purtroppo mi § noto quanto § difficile
all'uomo di ben conoscer se stesso.
The Italian " e difficile all'uomo di ben conoscer se
stesso"
loses the poetic thrust of Shakespeare's " t h e eye
sees not itself except by reflection of some other thing."
Moreover, the image of the mirror, with its implications for
notions of reality versus reflection,
is gone, making the
Italian phrase utterly limp and prosaic.
We find in Caesar's description of himself another
example of Shakespeare's imagery that Valentini weakens.
Caesar's phrase,
is rendered as,
" B u t I am constant as the northern star,"
" M a io sono costante come uno scoglio."
This is an especially infelicitous transformation,
for C a e ­
sar's equating himself to the North Star is highly appropri­
ate. As ruler of the Roman Empire, he is subject, like the
stars,
only to the laws that govern the universe; and,
shining more brightly than all other stars of the firmament,
he is the light to which all earthly inhabitants look for
guidance. Valentini's substitute,
"scoglio,"
symbolic of strength and durability,
while perhaps
remains nevertheless
glaringly earthbound and lifeless.
Valentini, moreover, lapses into occasional instances
of explaining rather than translating.
You know that you are Brutus that speak this.
Io soffro quest'ingiuria perchfi viene da Bruto.
(IV, 3)
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95
Let me tell you, Cassius, you yourself
Are much condemned to have an itching palm.
Permettetemi di dirvi, Cassio, che voi medesimo stimato
siete soggetto a lasciarvi corron5>ere. (IV, 3)
Did not great Julius bleed for justice1 sake?
What villain did stab,
And not for justice?
Non abbiamo noi ucciso il grande Cesare per amor della
giustizia? Se alcun di noi sparso avesse il suo nobil sangue
per altro fine che per la libertA della Patria, sarebbe certamente
uno scellerato. (IV, 1)
There are passages where valentini seems to alter the
original in ways that suggest he is ridding Shakespeare's
text of excessive crudeness, making it more acceptable to
contemporary taste. The following lines, for example,
I had rather be a dog, and bay the moon
Than such a Roman.
are translated this way:
Vorrei piuttosto essere il piil sordido e il piQ abbietto animale
che un tal Romano.
Valentini has gone to great lengths here to avoid the word
"dog,"
trying to preserve a minimum of dignity for Caesar,
but his extended periphrasis effaces Shakespeare's colorful
imagery and destroys the sense.
These few weaknesses of Valentini's should in no way
detract from the magnitude of his achievement. There are
many passages,
in spite of a tendency toward prolixity,
where Valentini manages to capture quite vividly the feeling
and mood of Shakespeare. Antonio's celebrated speech about
Caesar’s bloody mantle is a striking case in point:
Se avete qualche fondo di lacrime, preparatevi a
spargerle. A noi tutti fe ben cognito questo Manto; Mi
ricordo, che per la prima volta, che Cesare se ne copri, fu
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96
una sera nel suo Padiglione in tempo di state, ed in quel
giorno vinse gloriosamente i valorosi Nervi...Per qui trapassd il pugnale di Cassio. Vedete qual taglio fece l'invidioso Casca. A traverso di questo taglio il diletto Bruto il
trafisse e nel ritrarre il suo maledetto Acciaro osservate
come il prezioso sangue impetuosamente sgorgando lo seguitd
per ischiarirsi se Bruto era quello, che si barbaramente il
feriva. Perchfe Bruto, come voi ben sapete, fu il favorito di
Cesare. Ditelo voi, o gran Numi! quant' egli fu amato da
quel magnanimo Principe. Questo fu il taglio pid di tutti
crudele...
Moreover, Graf's charge that Valentini might have used
La Place's French version for his translation instead of r e ­
lying on an English text is unfounded. Stating that he was
unsure whether Valentini used an English text or La Place's
translation, Graf called attention to the inscription on the
frontispiece of Valentini's edition:
tragedia tradotta
dall’inglese, but cautioned his readers to distrust such an
assertion.7 Crino, however, who compared La Place's version
with Valentini's states quite flatly that even a superficial
perusal of the two versions shows that Valentini did not
rely at all on La Place's TheMtre Anglois ,8 nor did v a l e n ­
tini avail himself of Voltaire's La Mort de C4sar when he
did his translation.9 Valentini's Giulio Cesare, then,
is
the first Italian translation of a complete Shakespeare play
from English. Unlike La Place and Ducis, who fashioned su m ­
7 "Ignoro se tale fosse [that is, a translation from the English], o
non altro che una traduzione della traduzione del Delaplace (1746), il
Giulio Cesare stampata nel 1756 in Siena da Domenico Valentini..” Graf,
327.
8 " H a un esame anche superficiale del ThSStre Anglois di La Place
basta a convincere ch'esso d quanto si pud immaginare di meno fedele
all'originale...mi sembra che non occorra Bpendere molte parole a dimostrare che questo primo traduttore italiano [Valentini] di un dramma di
Shakespeare non si & servito affatto della traduzione francese. Crind,
53.
9 Ibid., 54-5.
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97
maries of Shakespeare, Valentini gave Italian readers a
richer and more faithful idea of Shakespeare's dramatic in­
novations .
Valentini pointed out in his preface that many of his
countrymen held the notion that translation was merely a
facile and servile craft. Practioners of this questionable
art, being incapable of thinking for themselves,
simply
search about for authors who have done their thinking for
them. Lacking the acumen to create original works,
they
paint with various colors the thoughts of others, in the
manner of copyists who specialize in imitating great paint­
ings. The masters of the past, however, were not of this
opinion, Valentini says. Foreshadowing the argument Madame
de Stael was to make in her essay of 1816, Valentini
explains that the wise ancients knew that their countrymen
would benefit from being able to read in their native tongue
the works of the most famous authors. For this reason, Livy,
Plautus, and Terence translated into Latin the works of
Greek poets. Valentini concludes by saying that the mistaken
view that the translator acts as a mere copyist accounts for
the poor quality of modern translations. He then compares
the texts of seven translators, among which is the work of
Paolo Rolli.
It is hardly surprising that Valentini's translation
failed to ignite the smallest spark of enthusiasm for Shake­
speare in an age when adverse assessments of the English
poet had been clearly enunciated by Voltaire in France and
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98
Quadrio in Italy. Nevertheless, Valentini looms as a bold
innovator and keen precursor of the movement that was even­
tually to recognize and appreciate Shakespeare.
Valentini's prefatory remarks clearly indicate that he
fully recognized and appreciated the merits of Shakespeare's
work. Unlike many of his countrymen, Valentini was willing
to explain away Shakespeare's violation of les regies.
abundant was his spirit, "
"So
wrote Valentini of Shakespeare,
" a n d so fervid and fertile his extraordinary imagination
that he was led to neglect the rules prescribed by d r a m a . " 10
Valentini described Shakespeare's imagination as an im­
petuous river that, disdaining to be constrained by the lim­
its of its narrow bed,
flows beyond its banks and extends
into the surrounding countryside. The rules fixed by Ar i s ­
totle, Horace, and others, are sufficiently adequate for
mediocre talent. For an imagination as strong, as quick, as
lively as that of Shakespeare's, however,
they are too r e ­
strictive, and if by chance Shakespeare had adhered to those
prescribed limits, we certainly would have been deprived of
great riches.
It is fitting, then, to be indulgent of his defects by
respecting the grandeur of his images and the sublimity of
his thought. Thus, Valentini explains,
and Longinus, who attributed " e r r o r s "
thought Quintilian
in Homer and other
io " T a l fu la soprabbondanza del di lul Spirito, e cosi fervida, e
cosx fertile la Bua straordinaria Immaginazione, che lo trasportd a
trascurar le Regole." Valentini. Preface to Giulio Cesare.
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99
famous authors to inadvertance rather than to ignorance of
the rules. Because those authors always had their thoughts
turned toward great matters, they could not take heed of
trifles.11 This, then, should be our attitude toward Shake­
speare. The defects of this sublime poet, originating from
the traditions of the century in which he lived, are every­
where surrounded by such noble and luminous thoughts, d e ­
picted in resplendent colors, and so alive that they appear
pardonable to any judicious and impartial reader.
Valentini's acceptance of Shakespeare,
poet's " f a u l t s , "
in spite of the
are indicative of changing literary atti­
tudes that continued to develop as the century progressed.
An exchange between Lorenzo Pignotti and Mrs. Montagu illus­
trates that these changes were frequently fueled by direct
contact between English and Italian literary figures. After
Mrs. Montagu had sent him a copy of her Essay on the writ­
ings and Genius of Shakespeare, Pignotti responded by say­
ing,
" w h e n the poet succeeds in moving and delighting his
listeners by sinning against the laws of criticism, we
should condemn the rules and not the p o e t . " 12
The Milanese novelist and poet, Alessandro Verri, fol­
lowed Valentini as a translator of Shakespeare. Working sed­
11 “ ...stimo nondimeno che questi siano sbagli scappati lor per
inawertenza, non per mancanza di cognizione; perchS sempre avendo lo
Spirito rivolto alle cose piQ grand!, badar non potevan alle piQ
piccole, e pid minute." Longinus, cited by Valentini.
12 "Quando il poeta riesce a commuovere, a dilettare i suoi ascoltatori peccando contro le critiche leggi, noi dobbiamo condannare le re­
gole e non il poeta." Crind, 63.
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100
ulously from 1769 to 1777, he completed translations of two
Shakespeare plays, Hamlet and Othello. Averse to sterile
pedantry and inclined toward innovation, Verri embodied the
qualities of the ever increasing cosmopolitan spirit that
evolved in Italy toward the end of the eighteenth century.
He joined forces with other imaginative young writers who
had collaborated in writing for il CaffS, a new Milanese
journal that had modeled itself on Addison's Spectator. In
1769, Verri, a student of many languages, said he began
translating Hamlet so that he could gain greater mastery of
English.
By that time, the impetus for translating and imitating
foreign works had grown to universal proportions in Italy.13
Despite this growing interest in foreign authors, neither of
Verri's Shakespeare translations were ever published. Per­
haps Verri,
finishing his Otello in 1777, felt his work had
come too late after Le Tourneur's translations, which,
since
they comprised all of Shakespeare's plays, would disseminate
a fuller knowledge and awaken a deeper appreciation of
Shakespeare in Italy.14 Verri might also have hesitated to
publish his translations of Shakespeare because he still
smarted under the disappointing reception afforded his
translation of the Iliad.15
13 Ibid., 65.
14 This is the view of Verri's biographer, G. Antonio Maggi. See Vita
di Alessandro Verri, preface to Vicende memorabili dal 1789 al 1801
narrate da Alessandro Verri. Milano: Guglielmini, 1858.
15 Mario Praz, " Shakespeare Translations in Italy. " Shakespeare
Jahrbuch. (Heidelberg: Quelle & Meyer, 1956) 220-31.
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101
In his translations of Shakespeare, Verri sought
concision and clarity, but in achieving his end, he did not
abandon Shakespeare's figurative language, as Valentini had
done. For example,
the imagery of these lines of Shake­
speare 's :
Like to the Pontic sea,
Whose icy current and compulsive course
Ne'er feels retiring ebb, but keeps due on
To the Propontic, and the Hellespont,
Even so my bloody thoughts with violent pace.
Shall ne'er look back, ne'er ebb to humble love.
Till that a capable and wide revenge
Swallow them up.
is rendered thus by Verri:
II Pontico mare non ritira le sue acque, ma senza riflusso
mantiene le invariabili correnti verso l'Ellesponto, cosi i sanguinosi miei pensieri non mai ritorneranno alia pace, non mai ad
un vile amore, ma sol bramano saziarsi in condegna e ampia ven­
detta .
True, the similarity of the English “ p a c e "
and the Italian
word for peace has led Verri into a glaring error; neverthe­
less, the passage for the most part faithfully reproduces
Shakespeare's imagery. In contrast, Le Tourneur's version of
the same passage wanders far from the original:
Jamais nulle puissance ne fera rStrograder mes projets
et ne me p r o s t e m e r a devant le faible amour que ma pleine
vengeance ne soit €tendue sur eux et les ait engloutis.
Verri occasionally translates in a non-literal way but none­
theless manages to capture accurately the sense of the orig­
inal. For example, Verri translates Desdemona's phrase:
I am not merry, but I do beguile
The thing I am by seeming otherwise
this way:
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102
Non sono allegra, ma inganno la mia tristezza nascondendola
agli altri.
As these few examples show, the quality of Verri's work
as a translator of Shakespeare varies considerably. Never­
theless,
the translations, even with their shortcomings,
have considerable merit. There is no doubt, moreover, that
Verri was motivated to undertake his translations by a sin­
cere and profound admiration for the English poet. Verri's
work,
completed after long and diligent dedication, demon­
strates his desire to experience Shakespeare's works d i ­
rectly through their original language, a goal rarely e x ­
pressed by Verri's contemporaries.
After Verri, Ranieri dei Calzabigi tried his hand at
translating Shakespeare. He also admired Shakespeare, and in
a preface to an edition of Alfieri's tragedies, he expressed
his views about the English theater. With the exception of a
few sublime works by the celebrated Shakespeare, he wrote,
the English are as wretched as the Italians.16 More impor­
tant, Calzabigi noted that the English had adopted their own
style for writing tragedy. In the light of Shakespeare's
works, Calzabigi could only view the unities as chains that
were appropriate only for slaves.17 Calzabigi said that u n ­
like the works of Corneille, Racine, and Voltaire, Alfieri's
tragedies resembled those of Shakespeare's in their energy,
16 [gli inglesi siano] " a noi ugualmente meschini, se si eccettuino
non le tragedie Intere, assai piil difettose delle nostre, ma alcuni
sublimi pezzi del celebre Shakespeare." Preface to Tragedie di Vittorio
Alfieri da Asti. Cited by Crind, 84.
17 [per Shakespeare] “ le unitS sono catene proprie per gli schiavi."
Ibid.
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103
brevity, and intensity. To confirm his views, Calzabigi
offered his readers two passages from Richard III and one
from Romeo and Juliet, which he had translated, he said,
only as an exercise.
In the last quarter of the eighteenth century, Shake­
speare came to the Italian stage through the adaptations of
Ducis.
in 1774, there appeared at Venice a work entitled
Amleto tragedia di M. Ducis ad imitazione della Inglese di
Shakespeare. The preface contained remarks from the trans­
lator, Francesco Gritti, who gave a summary of the play so
that the reader could properly judge whether or not the
French author had corrected the "deformities of that old
model."
This version of Shakespeare has the distinction of
being the first Shakespeare play enacted on an Italian
stage.
It ran for nine nights at the San Giovanni Grisostomo
Theater in Venice during the Carnival season of 1774.
Italians undoubtedly found the play's subject matter
and supernatural elements strange and puzzling.
clear," wrote Gritti,
" I t is
" t h a t the merit of Signor Ducis in
greatly improving Shakespeare's original palliates in some
degree, but not altogether, his mistake in choosing a sub­
ject which he should have left entirely to the English
stage, since it turns on a fact quite outside of nature.
In
spite of some good qualities which distinguish it, it d a z ­
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104
zles the vulgar instead of pleasing and instructing them and
disgusts every reasonable spectator or r e a d e r . " 18
In spite of Gritti's translation of a highly altered
French adaptation of Shakespeare, his close adherence to the
French point of view regarding Shakespeare marks him as one
of the many who impeded the progress of Shakespeare in
Italy. Ducis's work nevertheless inspired two other Italian
versions of Shakespeare.
In 1778, the Florentine abbot,
Antonio Bonucci, published his translation,
Giulietta e
Romeo di Mr. Ducis dal vero francese trasportata in vero
italiano, and the following year Gritti produced a version
of the same play, based on Ducis1 Romeo et Juliette.
Before the century ended, however,
the Venetian noble­
woman, Giustina Renier Michiel, published a much more ambi­
tious work in 1798, entitled Opere drammatiche di Shake­
speare volgarizzate da una Dama veneta. This volume contains
a translation of Othello, preceded by a translator's pr e ­
face, a life of Shakespeare, a critical evaluation of the
play, and a version of the original Italian work on which
Shakespeare based his tragedy, Cinthio's Novella del Moro di
Venezia. With her translation of Othello, Renier Michiel
brought the Moor back to his Italian roots,
so to speak,
since hers is the first Italian translation of this play.
For those who knew no language but Italian, it was im­
possible to have learned anything of Shakespeare's work be-
18
Cited by Collison-Morley, 79-80.
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105
fore 1756, the year of Valentini's translation of Julius
Caesar. Those who knew French, however, could have availed
themselves of La Place's ThSatre Anglois, published between
1745 and to 1747, even though it is less a translation than
a paraphrase, and at times, a mere summary of Shakespeare.
True, Verri had translated two plays directly from English,
but, as already noted, they were never published. Le Tour­
neur's version of Shakespeare's complete works began appear­
ing in 1776, and readers wishing to familiarize themselves
with the English poet could have read him in French, a po s ­
sibility for most educated Italians of the time. Renier M i ­
chiel 's work is significant historically because she aimed,
with versions that were " volgarizzate, " at reaching those
Italians who either could not or wished not to read Shake­
speare in French. Moreover,
from all of Shakespeare's plays,
she wisely chose Othello for her first translation, which,
with its Italian origins and Venetian setting, would have
been sure to please her compatriots.
Giustina Renier Michiel presided over a Venetian salon
that attracted the best of Venetian society as well as for­
eign dignitaries, mostly English, until the treaty of Campoformio ended Venetian independence by ceding Venice to A u s ­
trian control. She moved to Padua where she made the ac­
quaintance of Cesarotti, who helped her to revise her trans­
lations. In 1798, she published Macbeth, and two years
later,
Coriolanus. Cesarotti's influence has been noted not
only in the many corrections scattered throughout Renier
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106
Michiel's manuscripts but also in the prefaces to the p u b ­
lished versions and notes to the text. These, it seems, d e m ­
onstrate a classical erudition that cannot be attibuted to
Renier Michiel.19 Nevertheless, praise did come from her
many friends and acquaintances,
and Foscolo, in the dedica­
tion of an ode in honor of Bonaparte, referred to her as
''la traduttrice di Shakespeare."
Those who have written about Renier Michiel have either
ignored her work as a translator of Shakespeare or have
rendered a low opinion of it. Her biographer, Malamanni, has
stated, for example, that her translations do not warrant
serious consideration.20 Praz has repeated a similar view.
" T h e i r artistic merits,"
Michiel's translations,
he said, speaking of Renier
" a r e sligh t . " 21 Collison-Morley
states flatly that "Giu s t i n a Renier Michiel did not know
enough English to understand Shakespeare in the original and
she merely translates Le Tourneur... from whom the notes,
the
critical opinions from English writers, and the biographical
details are t a k e n . " 22 There is no doubt that Renier Michiel
relied on Le Tourneur. She admits as much in her preface,
saying that she included notes taken from Le Tourneur, who
had " w i t h great merit translated into French all the works
19
20
21
22
Crind, 93.
Ibid.
Praz, 222.
Collison-Morley, 77.
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107
of Shakespeare, and had provided [her] with almost all the
means for acquainting Italy with this celebrated a u t h o r . " 23
Thanks to Crind's study, we now know that Renier M i ­
chiel, while relying on Le Tourneur, not only exercised her
own judgment in textual matters but also consulted the orig­
inal in Pope's edition. For example, in Otello Renier M i ­
chiel suppressed much of the clown's bawdiness, but not
nearly to the extent that Le Tourneur did. Nevertheless, the
result is the same since instead of a typical Shakespearean
clown, we see a more conventional servant in both the Ital­
ian and French versions. Renier Michiel's treatment of the
clown, however, represents perhaps the greatest liberty she
took, and she attempts to justify it with notes explaining
that the clown's "foolishness" had not been written by
Shakespeare.
Renier Michiel also explains that some of Iago's lines,
especially his songs, are not by Shakspeare; hence,
she de­
cided not to translate them because " t h e y are little folk
songs that in translation would lose all their spiri t . " 24
She does, however, translate Iago's first song in two quat­
rains of eight syllables, making them lighter and more ap­
propriate for the text than Le Tourneur's heavy and senten­
tious alexandrines. At times, wishing perhaps to render a
23 ''Aggiungero alcune note, la maggior parte tratte dal Sig. Le
Tourneur che con sommo merito traduBse in lingua francese tutte le mezzi
far conoscere all'Italia questo celebre autore." Crind, 93-4.
24 "oltredicch# sono piccole canzoni nazionali che nella traduzione
perderebbero tutto lo spirito." Ibid., 94.
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108
phrase in terms more idiomatic to Italian, Renier Michiel
departs from a literal translation, but when she does so,
she virtually always explains the English expression liter­
ally in a footnote.
For example, when Roderigo tells lago
that,
I take it much unkindly
That thou, lago, who hast had my purse
As if the strings were thine, shouldst know of this
Renier Michiel translates " A s if the strings were thine"
this way:
Tu, Jago, che disponi della mia borsa come della tua
and adds a note for her Italian readers,
" A s if the strings were thine"
explaining that
literally means " c o m e se i
legami di questa fossero tuoi." Another example of this
kind of footnoted explanantion occurs when Cassio,
of Desdemona,
speaking
says,
And in the essential vesture of creation
Does bear all excellency.
Renier Michiel's note for this passage reads,
" E tra gli
ornamenti della creazioni ella merita il primo posto."
Her version of Coriolanus also shows a reliance on Le
Tourneur, but in this translation, there is greater evidence
of the translator's recourse to Pope's edition. Far from
"reductions,"
as Malamanni had called them, Renier
Michiel's translations of Otello, Macbeth, and Coriolanus
present Shakespeare's plays in their entirety with the
exception of a few brief passages that are occasionally cut
in the interest of contemporary taste.
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109
Renier Michiel's translations were followed,
in 1811,
by another version of Julius Caesar. This was the work of
Michele Leoni, a respected man of letters who served for a
long time as secretary of the Accademia delle Belle Arti at
Parma. By 1822, Leoni had succeeded in translating almost
all of Shakespeare's tragedies, which were published
individually in various cities, and then in a collected
edition by La Societa Tipografica at Verona in 1822. Often
called the "Hercules of Translators,"
lated Milton, Thomson,
Pope,
"Ossian,"
Leoni also trans­
Sheridan, Hume, and
Byron.25 Leoni's profound desire to disseminate the works of
foreign authors in Italy won him immediate favor with many
caught up in the fervor of change that was sweeping Italian
literary culture in the early decades of the nineteenth
century. Madame de Stael,
for example, knew Leoni's work and
referred to him in an essay she wrote during the heat of the
controversy she had provoked by her exhortation to Italian
writers in i-_6.26 Berchet said that Leoni possessed ingenu­
ity, spirit, erudition,
critical acuity, facility in Ital­
ian, and great knowledge of English, everything required for
being a worthy translator of Shakespeare. But, Berchet con-
25 II Conciliatore, no. 44.
26 " U n letterato a Firenze, il signor Leoni, ha fatto studi profondi
sulla letteratura inglese, ed ha intrapresa una traduzione di tutto
Shakespeare, poich#, cosa da non credere! non esiste ancora una tra­
duzione italiana di questo grand uomo. La Biblioteca italiana, June,
1816.
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110
tinned, Leoni's verses are good Italian verses that oblit­
erate the original.27
in one of his prefaces, Leoni admits that he first at­
tempted to translate Shakespeare from Le Tourneur's French
versions, but decided instead to study English for two years
so that he could work directly from the original. Leoni says
he used Monti, Cesarotti, and Alfieri as models when he made
his translations. With roots in neoclassicism,
these writers
held concepts of poetry and drama that were far removed from
Shakespeare, and it is perhaps for this reason that Leoni
was astonished that Julius Caesar, a play with such lofty
subject matter, could begin with dialogue between a carpen­
ter and a cobbler.
Leoni therefore neither hesitated to eliminate whatever
he thought improper for popular taste nor change whatever he
thought could be inproved. For example, in Macbeth he elimi­
nated the scene of Lady Macduff and her child because he
found it too distasteful for current sensibilities. Noting,
moreover, that Ladies Macbeth and Macduff had no first
names, Leoni corrected Shakespeare's " o v e r s i g h t "
and named
them Margherita and Emilia, respectively. In his revision of
1820, however, he omitted these names.
27 ” 11 sig. Leoni ha ingegno, anima, erudizione, acutezza di critica,
disinvoltura di lingua italiana, cognizione molto di lingua inglese,
tutti insomma, i requisiti per essere un valente traduttore di
Shakespeare. Ma...i suoi versi sono buoni versi italiani...Shakespeare 6
svisato." Giovanni Berchet, Letters semiaeria di Grisostomo al auo
figliuolo. Manifest! Romantici. 425-6.
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Ill
There is no doubt, then, that Leoni worked fast and at
times carelessly. Foscolo made a humorous but revealing
comment on this point.
" L e o n i , " wrote Foscolo,
"trans­
lates a poet in less time than the author spends in correct­
ing his m a n u s c r i p t . " 28 Leoni's chief fault, it seems to me,
lies in his having transformed Shakespeare's language into
an Italian poetic form that often obscures the rough-hewn
profile required by the dramatic moment of the original. A
good case in point is Leoni's rendering of Macbeth's dagger
speech, where the translator starts out in close imitation
of Shakespeare's lines, but then imposes the regularity of
his Italianate versification:
...Che veggo? Un ferro a me davante? Ha l'elsa
Rivolta alia mia man...Vien; ch'io t 'impugni...
Che! non ti strinsi? Pur ti scorgo sempre.
Non se' tu forse, o vision funesta,
Evidente alia man come alio sguardo?
O w e r non sei che un'ombra vana, o ferro,
Di che sia solo artefice la mente?
Pur ti discemo; e a me palpabil tanto
Tua forma par, quanto il medesimo ferro,
Che appunto fuor della vagina or traggo.
Nevertheless, even considering the many errors and
shortcomings of Leoni's work, it remains a notable achieve­
ment. It helped to disseminate awareness of Shakespeare in
Italy during the early flush of the Romantic Age by freeing
Italians from a reliance on Le Tourneur's French transla­
tions, often criticised as "feeble, not to say altogether
28 "egli traduceva un poeta in meno tempo che l'autore non ispendesse
a correggere il suo manoscritto." Epistolario, Ediz. Naz. (Firenze: Le
Monnier, 1966) VI, 314. Also, I Manifesti romantici, n. 2, 425.
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112
lifeless v e r s i o n s ; " 29 and, most important, it played a role
when Verdi and Piave created their Macbeth libretto.
The reference division of the Boston Public Library
holds a curious version of Macbeth.
Macbet,
Its title page reads:
tragedia di Shakespeare, recata con alcune varia-
zioni in versi italiani da W.E. Frye, Inglese. Membro d e l l 'Academia degli Arcadi in Roma, Ex-Maggiore d'lnfanteria nel
servizio Brittanico.
(Mannheim: Schwan & Goetz, 1827) . There
would be no reason to mention this work, an abridged v e r ­
sion, except that it is the only pre-1847 version that uses
versi tronchi for some of the witches' lines. When he p r e ­
pared his libretto, Verdi had entreated his librettist to
find a suitable language for the witches in their opening
scene, and had suggested versi trochi as a suitable device.
Theses are poetic lines that end on accented syllables, an
anomaly for Italian verse. Verdi's finished libretto has:
A1 dimdn la mi caccid...
Ma lo sposo che Balpd
Col suo legno affogherd.
Un rovajo io ti dard...
I marosi io leverd
Pe le secche io lo trarrd (odesi un tamburo)
Un tamburo! Che sar&?
In Frye, Act I, scene 4, we find:
Grazia tanto! al voler mio
Tutto il resto ubbidird.
Ora il bal commincierS!
Quale ossesso l'uom vivrS!
Fame spesso il rodera!
Ei del sonno po' godrd!
Si; quantunque non morr&,
29
Praz, 223.
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113
Gran disagio soffrird!
There are of course no textual parallels here. I offer this
comparison merely as an example of a curious coincidence.
The 1830's spawned a number of Italian translations of
Shakespeare. Before the decade ended, Gaetano Barbieri
fashioned a new version of Romeo and Juliet, and Giunio
Bazzoni and Giacomo Sormani created new versions of Othello,
The Tempest, King Lear, Macbeth, and Midsummer N i g h t 's
Dream. All these were verse translations, but prose versions
also made their appearance around this time as well. For
example, Virginio Soncini made prose renditions of Othello
and Macbeth in 1830, and Ignazio Valletta produced prose
translations of three Shakespeare plays: Julius Caesar
(1829),
Othello (1830), and Coriolanus (1834).
In contrast to Frye's spiritless version, Giuseppe
Nicolini30 produced a much more significant verse transla­
tion of Macbeth that was published at Brescia in 1830.
Nicolini's work is more accomplished than those of many of
his contemporaries, as his rendering of Macbeth's
(V,5)
speech beginning " S h e should have died hereafter"
illustrates:
Dovea morir pi\l tardi--Avrei trovato
Per l'esequie di lei qualche mamento-Doman, domani, e poi domani ancora;
E cosi via di questo sordo passo
Fino a 1'ultima nota de l'istoria.
E ogni di che passd non fu che un lume
Che scorse la follia per lo viaggio
30 Inexplicably, Praz spells the name of this translator as Niccolini,
perhaps confusing him with the Italian tragedian, Giambattista Niccolini
(1782-1861).
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114
De la tamba--Muor, muor, breve facella!
Non 6 la vita che fuggevol'ombra;
£ un infelice attor che in sulla scena
Per la sua volta s'agita e pompeggia,
Poi scompare per sempre; d una novella
Mai raccontata, tutta smanie e rcmbo,
E senza senso.
Although it sounds dated, the passage conveys fairly well
the sense of the original.
More important,
Piave consulted Nicolini's translation
when he collaborated with Verdi. This is evidenced not only
by textual parallels between the libretto and Nicolini's
work but also by a letter Piave wrote to Giovanni Ricordi.
The letter shows that when he prepared his preface to the
libretto, Piave relied on Nicolini's own Notizia ai lettori.
Referring specifically to Nicolini, Piave wrote,
Shakespeare, egregiamente dice il chiarissimo G.
Niccolini [sic], fece delle streghe tante ministre
d*inferno in un imprese ordinata al sacrificio
d e l l 'innocenza e alia rovina dello stesso colpe v o l e .31
Precisely how much Nicolini's translation contributed
to Verdi's libretto is not clear, but Porter, citing speci­
fic lines in Nicolini's translation, states that one of the
witches'
songs came directly from it. Nicolini has:
Spirti bianchi, spirti neri,
Spirti rossi, spirti bigi,
Voi che I 1arte ne sapete,
31 Piave to Giovanni Ricordi. Venice, 28 January 1847. David Rosen and
Andrew Porter, eds. Verdi's Macbeth: A Sourcebook (New York: Norton,
1984) 39. [hereafter, Sourcebook] Nicolini, it seems, followed Schlegel's view of the witches as “ ministers of hell." Piave obviously
concurs.
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115
Rimescete, rimescete.32
The 1847 libretto reads:
E voi, Spirti
Negri e candidi,
Rossi e ceruli
Rimescete!
Voi che mescere
Ben sapete,
Rimescete!
Rimescete!
That the witches are red in Piave's final version strongly
suggests that Nicolini's translation must have been con­
sulted at one time or another during the formation of the
libretto since all other translations that could be associ­
ated with the opera's text are devoid of red witches. Leoni,
for example, wrote,
Spirti neri, Bpirti bianchi,
Spirti azzurri, e spirti grigi
Mescolate. D e 1 prodigi
Ha tal arte il germe in sS.
Rusconi's translation,
the most frequently consulted by
Verdi, reads:
Spirti neri e bianchi, spirti azzurri e grigi, fondete,
fondete, fondete, voi che mescolare sapete.
Porter argues that "Nicolini is evidently responsible not
only for the red spirits but also the meter and wording of
the subsequent l i n e s . " 33
In the light of Piave's epistolary
reference and the textual parallels adduced by Porter, N i c o ­
lini 's version must certainly be counted among those con­
sulted by Piave while he shaped his libretto.
32
33
Porter, Other Music for 'Macbeth. ' Sourcebook, 456.
Ibid.
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116
The color of the witches also sheds some light on the
question of which English editions Italian translators might
have consulted. The question is of course too large to e x ­
plore in any depth here, but the witches' song referred to
above occurs in Middleton's The Witch (Act V, sc.iii), w r i t ­
ten around 1609, and in Davenant's adaptation of Macbeth
(IV, i) dating from 1674, but not in the Quarto of 1673.
Possibly deriving his text form an earlier prompt-book,
Davenant wrote,
Hec. Black Spirits, and white,
Red Spirits and gray;
Mingle, mingle, mingle,
You that mingle may.
Middleton's witches are also red, but his play, though
written in 1609, was not published until 1778. It was seven
years later, in 1785, that Steevens discovered them and used
them in his well-known edition of Shakepseare. The Italian
translations of Leoni and Rusconi,
since they contain
references to blue and gray witches instead of red and blue
ones, must have been drawn from editions that pre-dated the
one made by Steevens.
In 1838, Carlo Rusconi published the version that was
consulted the most frequently not only by Piave and Verdi
for their Macbeth libretto, but also by whoever read S h a k e ­
speare in Italy. Printed many times, even into this century,
it filled the need for a complete, relatively inexpensive
edition of the English poet's complete works. It is a wordy
prose version that has drawn conflicting commentary from
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117
critics. Weaver has pronounced it " e x e c r a b l e . " 34 CollisonMorley, on the other hand, wrote that " i t is far more
accurate than Leoni's and often really g o o d . " 35
Two other works that have been mentioned in connection
with Verdi's Macbeth should be considered briefly. They are
Giulio Carcano's translations, published between 1843 and
1853; and Andrea Maffei's translation of an adaptation of
Macbeth that Schiller had made for the Court Theater at
Weimar in 1800.
Carcano, a close friend of Verdi's, published trans­
lations of most of Shakespeare's plays between 1843 and 1853
(including Macbeth in 1848) that superseded Leoni's work.
Similarities between Carcano's translation of
Macbeth and
the opera's libretto have been found. These seem to suggest
that Carcano's translation,
though not published until a
year after the opera's first performance, had influenced
Piave's libretto. Furthermore, it is true that towards the
end of 1846, Carcano and Verdi had sojourned at the villa of
Clarina Maffei in Clusone, where, word had it, Verdi heard
Carcano read his version of Macbeth. Given the chronology,
however, a simpler reading of the evidence is that the
libretto influenced Carcano's translation.36 I have been u n ­
able to find any evidence that Carcano's translation of M a c ­
beth was either read or heard by Verdi during the period he
34 William Weaver, " T h e Shakespeare Verdi K n e w . " Sourcebook, 145.
35 Shakespeare in Italy, 136.
36 See Porter, Verdi and the Italian Translations of Shakespeare.
Sourcebook, 352.
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118
worked on his opera. Carcano, however, settled the question
when he wrote to Andrea Maffei in February of 1847, denying
that he had anything to do with Verdi's libretto.37
Finally, the notion put forth by Frits Noske, that
Maffei's translation of Schiller's adaptation was used as a
basis for the Macbeth libretto has simply not gained wide
acceptance.38 Verdi, moreover, did not hesitate to call upon
his friend Andrea Maffei for assistance whenever Piave was
unable to satisfy his demands.39 Verdi was always willing to
consult not only more than one text but also more than one
librettist when the need arose. This was his modus operandi
even as late as 1886, when he worked on Otello. in a letter
noteworthy for the mention of the sources he consulted,
Verdi, puzzled over a particular line, wrote to Boito:
Sui tre versi fatti ultimamente ho consultato
1'originale...
For, Sir, were I the Moor I would not be lago
PerchS Signor fossi io il Moro io vorrei non eeaer Jago
Cosi pure Hugo dice
37 "...Vorrei invece scriverti qualche novitG; ma in questa nostra
pettegola Milano c'G ben poco di nuovo; e ho detto pettegola, perchG le
ciancie le piG ridicole sono moneta corrente. Ieri in un palco mi venne
domandato se fosse vero ch'io avessi scritto una parte del Macbeth. Che
sciocchi! ho dovuto protestare che non c'era sillaba del mio, e ch'io
non feci altro che parlare di tragedia coll'amico Verdi." Opere
complete di Giulio Carcano Milano, 1896. 2nd Ed. X, 37. Also,
Sourcebook, 46.
38 See Frits Noske, Schiller e la geneai del 'Macbeth' verdiano. Nuova
riviata muaicale italiana 10 {1976) 196-203.; and Ritual Scenes in Ver­
di 'a Operaa. Muaic and Letters 54 (1973) 415-39. Rpt. The Signifier and
the Signified, The Hague: Nijhoff, 1977. 241-70.
39 For a thorough discussion of Maffei's contribution to the original
libretto, see Francesco Degrada's Observations on the Genesis of Verdi's
'Macbeth.' Sourcebook, 156-73.
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119
Si j 'etaia le More je ne voudraia pae
Stre Jago
Anche nella traduzione di Maffei
Quand'io potessi
Traaformarmi nel Moro easere un Jago
Gict non vorrei
E cosi la traduzione di Rusconi non d esatta... eppure non mi
dispiaceva
Vedermi non vorrei d ' a t t o m o un Jago-40
In a single letter, Verdi mentions the original English
line, Francois victor Hugo's French translation, and the
Italian versions of Rusconi and Maffei. Verdi's letter not
only identifies the sources of the Otello libretto but also
demonstrates most clearly that the composer's method always
included some sort of collation. It is clear from this sur­
vey that there were a number of Italian translations of
Shakespeare available in 1847. Of all these versions, the
work of Rusconi, as the next chapter shows, eventually
emerged as the one most frequently relied upon by Verdi and
Piave.
40 Verdi to Boito, 8 May 1886. Carteggio Verdi-Boito. Eds. Mario Medici
and Marcello Conati. (Parma: Istituto di studi verdiani, 1978) 103.
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120
CHAPTER V
Verdi's genere fantastico
and Italian Operatic Tradition:
"... nothing in common with the others..."
Verdi's decision to base an opera on Shakespeare's M a c ­
beth was not unusual even for nineteenth-century Italy. A l ­
though Macbeth was not among them, a number of the English
poet's works had already been adapted for the Italian oper­
atic stage. Rossini's Otello had already appeared at Naples
in 1816. The following year, opera-goers of Milan were able
to witness Romani's curious version of King Lear that was
set in Spain, and it was also at Milan that Mercadante pro­
duced his Amleto in 1822. The tragedies, however, were not
the only Shakespeare plays that contributed to Italian oper­
atic fare, as early as 1799, Luigi Caruso chose La Tempesta
from the romances,1 and Giuseppe Nicolini, having selected
one of the Roman plays, presented his Coriolano to the Milanesi in 1808. Two versions of an historical play also a p ­
peared, one by Pacini in 1820 and another by Mercadante in
1834. They were known as La Gioventu <3'Enrico V .
Of all Shakespeare's plays, Romeo and Juliet was the
most frequently chosen by Italian opera composers in the
early ninteenth century. Before Bellini's version,
letti ed i Montecchi,
I Capu-
for example, there had already been
two others: Vaccai's in 1825 and Torriani's in 1828. An
1 This opera was performed around 1798 at the Teatro Nuovo in Naples.
It is listed in Shakespeare in Music (London, 1964), but whether or not
it was actually based on Shakespeare has not been confirmed.
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121
earlier libretto based on the same theme had already been
written by Giuseppe Maria Foppa and set to music in 1784 by
Luigi Monescalchi. Zingarelli later chose to set Foppa's
libretto for an opera of his own in 1796.
This modest list is, I believe, sufficient to demon­
strate that Verdi's choice of Macbeth was in itself not
unusual in 1847, given the number of Shakespearean operatic
precedents. What sets Verdi's Macbeth apart from all other
Italian Shakespeare operas that preceded it, however,
is the
composer's dramaturgy and its reflection of an unprecedented
fidelity to Shakespeare's play. All the other Italian Shake­
speare operas that came before Verdi's were based on imita­
tions or adaptations of Shakespeare derived either from the
works of the French neo-classical actor and dramatist, JeanFrangois Ducis, or, as in the cases of Bellini's I Capuletti
ed i Montecchi and Gasparini's Amleto, from Shakespeare's
own sources. Even Francesco Maria Berio, librettist of Ros­
sini's otello, which is often cited for its close conformity
to Shakespeare's text, based his libretto on Ducis's adapta­
tion. Adherence to Shakespeare, however, is apparent only in
the opera's third act. Moreover, Rossini not only used music
from previous operas but also provided a happy ending after
the opera had sparked unfavorable reaction from the critics.
As an example of how far it was possible to wander from
Shakespeare in order to make him conform to neo-classical
ideals, we need only look at what Romani said of Amleto:
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122
It is fairly well known that Hamlet is the Orestes
of the North; Claudius is the Aegisthus; and Ge r ­
trude, the Clytemnestra; for this reason, the poet
has modelled these three characters on those of
the Greeks. In this fashion, he felt they could be
made, if not more interesting, at least more
suited to our stage than they are in the English
original, which is a bit too fantastic....2
in Romani's version, Amleto survives the final carnage of
the original play and lives to greet the appeased ghost of
his father, who makes an appearance during Gertrude's death
scene at the end of the opera.
The first libretto that mentions Shakespeare is Gi u ­
seppe Foppa's Giulietta e Romeo, which was set to music by
Zingarelli, and first performed at La Scala during the Car­
nival season of 1796. Foppa had been attracted to the play
not by Shakespeare's work, but by its Italian sources. He
says in a preface to the libretto that the events that sweep
Giulietta and Romeo to their tragic end are well known in
Italy. After recallng the principal elements of their fate,
Foppa says,
This tale is drawn from Stories of Verona by G i ­
rolamo della Corte...this served as a tragedy by
Shakespeare and as a French one by Ducis, as it
now serves for a music drama [Melodramma] . .. .3
2 " £ noto abbastanza che Amleto 6 l'Oreste del Nord, Claudio l'Egisto
e Gertrude la Clitennestra: egli 6 percid che il poeta ha modellato i
caratteri di questi tre personaggi su quelli dei Greci. Gli d sembrato
in tal guisa di renderli, se non pid interessanti, almeno piu adatti
alle nostre scene di quello che per a w e n t u r a non sieno nell'originale
inglese un po' fantastico...." cited by Hilary Gatti, Shakespeare nei
teatri milaneei dell'Ottocento. (Bari: Adriatica Editrice, 1968) 17.
3 " C i d d tratto dalle Storie di Girolamo Della Corte...e questo fatto
ha servito ad una Tragedia Inglese di Shakespear [sic], e ad una
Francese di Ducis, come serva ora per Melodramma...." Ibid., 12.
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123
Until Verdi's Macbeth, then, whenever Shakespeare's
works were presented,
they were freely altered in whatever
way it was thought necessary to please their viewers. Even
ballets based on Shakespeare, which were produced in ample
number in the early nineteenth century, underwent extended
modifications. In an introductory note for his 1830 produc­
tion of his five-act ballet, Macbetto, for example, Luigi
Henry stated that he had not altered Shakespeare's basic
plot, but that he had omitted the "marvellous,"
as he
called it, because people no longer believed in "s o r c e r y . "
He did, however, retain a role for the witches since they
were important for developing the action, but he deliber­
ately avoided "apparitions and visions." He made these
changes, he said, primarily to please his audiences, which
did not seem to enjoy '' that type of entertainment." 4 A l ­
though Henry did retain the witches, they can hardly be
called faithful representations of Shakespeare's Weird Sis­
ters, since they act more like ordinary mortals by plotting
to gain material wealth through their secret knowledge of
Malcolm's true birth. Henry, like so many who had adapted
Shakespeare for the Italian theater, held no compunctions
about modifying Shakespeare's drama to suit contemporary
taste. The witches and the idea of the supernatural were the
most difficult concepts for Italian audiences to accept;
hence,
4
there were constant discussions about the meaning and
Luigi, Henry. Macbetto: Ballo mimico in cinque atti. Sourcebook, 359.
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124
function of the witches in Macbeth.
In fact, this problem caused friction between Verdi and
Piave in the early stages of the preparation of their li­
bretto. After having sent Verdi a preliminary draft of
verses for a chorus of witches, Piave received a response
from the composer that said in part:
Although I didn't like this chorus of witches at
all, I nevertheless had a good laugh reading at
the head of the scene— "Witches in ceremonial
d r e s s " — The witches in ceremonial dress? Is this
Shakespeare's intention? Have you really
understood what Shakespeare wanted to do with
these witches?5
True, operas dealing with supernatural subjects were
already known in Florence. Meyerbeer's Robert le diable, was
performed in 1840, and Weber's Der Freischutz had followed
three years later, but while garnering favorable critical
reception, both operas, precisely because of their genere
fantastico, were not considered part of either operatic or
dramatic tradition in Italy. Works of this genre could be
accepted by Italian opera-goers only if they were seen as
products of foreign,
transalpine cultures.6 Verdi's decision
to set Macbeth and to present its witches and other fantas­
tic elements, not in subsidiary or ceremonial roles, but in
ways that faithfully mirrored Shakespeare's dramatic intent,
was therefore a bold move on the part of the young composer.
5 Verdi to Piave. 10 December 1846. Ibid., 21.
6 See Aubrey Garlington's unpublished disseration on the subject of the
"marvellous" in opera.
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125
The measure of Verdi's innovative intention can be
gauged best perhaps in the light of remarks made by Peruzzini, librettist of Buzzola's Amleto, performed at Venice's
Teatro Fenice only two months after the first performance of
Verdi's Macbeth at Florence:
Whoever knows Hamlet, Shakespeare's sublime
creation, can easily see that it is not in the
least adaptable to the restricted form of a
"d r a m m a per musica...." So I declare that from
the great Englishman's Hamlet I have taken nothing
but the n a m e .
7
Peruzzini's statement not only reveals how slightly an
operatic adaptation could resemble a Shakespeare play and
still retain its title, but it also brings to light the
stringent formal restrictions of nineteenth-century opera.
Peruzzini implies quite clearly that a faithful operatic
adaptation of any Shakespeare play was a task that ordinar­
ily lay beyond the demands of the "restricted form"
re­
quired by Italian operatic conventions. For Verdi, then, his
first adaptation of Shakespeare represented overwhelming
formal and interpretive challenges that would lead him, in
an effort to remain faithful to Shakespeare,
to deviate not
only from traditional operatic forms but also from typical
libretto writing.
In a letter to Escudier, his French publisher, Verdi
clearly indicated that he had been intrigued by the world of
7 Giovanni Peruzzini, in the A wertimento introducing his opera,
Amleto. Ibid., 4.
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126
Shakespeare's witches and that he had assigned them an
essential role in his opera. He told Escudier to
Abide by the rule that the main roles of this
opera are, and can only be, three: Macbeth, Lady
Macbeth, and the chorus of witches. The witches
dominate the drama; everything stems from them—
rude and gossipy in Act I, exalted and prophetic
in Act III. They make up a real character, and one
of the greatest importance.8
To represent Shakespeare's "ot h e r wor l d "
on the
Italian operatic stage, Verdi engaged actively in all as­
pects of its creation. Long after his opera's first perfor­
mance, Verdi wrote to Tito Ricordi, his friend and p u b ­
lisher, revealing the extent of his involvement with the
preparation of the libretto:
Ten years ago I got it into m y head to do Macbeth;
I wrote the scenario myself and, indeed, more than
the scenario, I wrote out the whole drama in
prose, with divisions into scenes, numbers, etc.,
then I gave it to Piave to put into verse.9
Verdi gave meticulous instructions to his singers,
urging them to pay particular heed to the drama and at the
expense of traditional singing styles. For example, he told
Barbieri-Nini, the opera's first Lady Macbeth, that he felt
fortunate having her perform this role, but that she should
consider it "extremely dramatic" and not a mere vehicle
for displaying fine singing. He declared he had tried to
adhere faithfully to the play's words when structuring what
8 Verdi to Escudier. 8 February 1865. Autograph in the Teatro Colon,
Buenos Aires. Rpt. Sourcebook, 99.
9 Verdi to Tito Ricordi. 11 April 1857. Sourcebook, 69.
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127
has become known in English as the opera's "situat i o n s . "
The word Verdi actually used when referring to a scene's
dramatic consequences was "po s i z i o n e . "
For example,
"Io
non cessero mai di raccomandarti di studiare bene la
posizione e le parole." Also,
posizione."
synonym.
" A b b i bene sott'occhio la
Occasionally he used " p u n t o drammatico"
as a
"Qu e s t o d un bellissimo punto, drammatico e
poetico." And again,
"...formano molti punti drammatici
eccellenti.. . . " 10
Continually emphasizing the importance of Shakespeare's
words, Verdi said it was his wish that the singers serve the
poet better than they serve the composer. This last was a
startling notion in the light of an earlier lament from
Romani, who had written the libretto for Verdi's second
opera,
Un giorno di regno. A libretto, claimed Romani,
"springs from a hasty birth,
[is] but little educated,
still rough and unpolished: the composer takes charge of it
and sometimes subjects it to the torture of Procrustes; he
cuts it and stretches it to fit the proportions of the bed
on which he has laid it.. ..11
In ways that Romani had accurately described, Verdi
"t o o k charge"
of the Macbeth libretto and clearly indi­
cated to his singers that he was making odd demands on their
10 These excerpts from Verdi's sketches appear in Abbiati, I, 656-71.
They are also cited by Daniela Goldin, " I I 'Macbeth' verdiano: geneei e
linguaggio di un libretto. " Analecta Muaicologica, 19 (1979) 334-72.
11 Cited by David R. B. Kimbell, Verdi in the Age of Italian
Romanticism (London: Cambridge UP, 1981) 69.
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128
usual style of singing, not " t o cut and stretch"
Shake­
speare's text, but to adhere more closely to its spirit. For
example,
in spite of their audience's expectation of hearing
" g r a n d singing," Verdi pointed out places in the score to
Barbieri-Nini and Varesi, who first sang the role of
Macbeth, where they should sing sotto voce. He aimed to
create, he said, effects that were " d a r k and mysterious."
He also told Varesi that the dagger scene was a "most beau­
tiful moment, both dramatically and poetically"
and that it
therefore should be sung " s o t t o voce and with a hollow
voice
[that would] arouse t e r r o r . " 12 Verdi's unusual orches­
tration would also help the singers create the feeling of
muffled terror in the murder scene.
" S o that you'll under­
stand m y ideas clearly," Verdi wrote,
" l e t me tell you
that in the entire recitative and duet, the orchestra con­
sists of muted strings, two bassoons,
two horns, and a ke t ­
tledrum. You see, the orchestra will play extremely softly,
and therefore you two will have to sing with mutes too.13
Furthermore, Verdi not only advised his singers how he
wanted them to sing, but also called their attention to the
importance the text held for the success of the drama. In­
structing varesi in Macbeth's death scene, he referred to
Donizetti's Lucia di Laimermoor and said that " i t won't be
one of those usual death scenes, oversweet, etc....Macbeth
should not die like Edgardo and his like do. In short, pay
12
13
Verdi to Varese. 7 January 1847. Sourcebook, 31.
Ibid.
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129
attention to the words, and to the subject--that1s all I
ask."
Indicating another departure from custom, he told
Varesi to take special heed of a new cabaletta because " i t
isn't in the usual form." Apparently, Verdi had initially
tried a traditional cabaletta which he had liked, but when
he joined it to the dramatic material that preceded it, he
found it trivial and "unbearable with its usual ritorn e l l i . " 14 A week later, Verdi was to repeat his instructions
to Varesi concerning Macbeth's death and again cautioned him
that "Macb e t h mustn't die like Edgardo, Gennaro, etc."
scene, he said,
The
" h a s to be treated in a new w a y . " 15
When he responded to Barbieri-Nini's request for a bel
canto cantabile modeled on the type in Donizetti's Fausta,
Verdi firmly told her that if she understood the role of
Lady Macbeth at all, she would realize that that kind of
cantabile would betray the drama and would be tantamount to
" o p e n warfare on good sense."
For Verdi,
been a "profanation to alter so great,
original a character"
it would have
so energetic,
so
of that " g r e a t English tragedian."
Moreover, when Barbieri-Nini asked Verdi to remove the
letter scene, he again refused to acquiesce to her request,
saying that " t h e drama is built upon i t . " He reiterated
most emphatically, perhaps to rouse her from continually
thinking of his opera in traditional terms, that in Macbeth,
he was attempting something dramatically new.
14
15
Verdi to Varesi. 30 January 1847. Ibid., 36.
Verdi to Varesi. 4 February 1847. Ibid., 41.
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130
I believe I told you already that this is a drama
that has nothing in common with the others, and we
must all make every effort to render it in the
most original way possible. Furthermore, I believe
that it is high time to abandon the ususal for­
mulas and procedures and I think that by doing so
one could make much more of i t ....16
Acutely conscious of his innovations, Verdi stressed
time and again to singers,
librettists,
and impressarios
that with Macbeth he was attempting a new kind of opera, one
with closer relationships between words and music than had
ever been attempted before. As an example of this fusion,
Verdi cited the sleepwalking scene, and as his detailed,
keenly felt instructions to his singers show, Shakespeare's
text was of utmost importance to him. Every nuance, every
dramatic gesture, every vocal effect was to serve Shake­
speare's dramatic intentions.
The notes are simple and created with the action
in mind, especially in the sleepwalking scene,
which, so far as the dramatic situation is
concerned, is one of the most sublime theatrical
creations. Bear in mind that every note has a
meaning, and that it is absolutely essential to
express it both with the voice and with the
acting....you can make an effect with it, even if
it lacks one of those flowing melodies, which are
found everywhere and which are all alike.17
Continuing his effort to remain true to the dramatic
spirit of Shakespeare's play, Verdi later instructed Cammarano, who was preparing a production of Macbeth in Naples in
1848, to tell Tadolini, his soprano, that instead of " s i n g ­
16
17
Verdi to Barbieri-Nini. 31 January 1847. Ibid., 39.
Ibid., 40.
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131
ing to perfection,"
she was " n o t to sing at all." Tado-
lini was a " fine-looking lady," Verdi ackowledged, but he
wanted Lady Macbeth to look " u g l y and evil." Although she
had a "marvelous voice,
clear, limpid and powerful,"
preferred a voice that would be "harsh,
low."
he
choked, and h o l ­
Verdi also told Cammarano how he wanted the first-act
duet and the sleepwalking scene,
pieces in the opera,"
the " t w o most important
to be played:
They must be acted out and declaimed with a very
hollow and veiled voice; otherwise they won't be
able to make any effect.18
Twenty years later, Verdi would recall this sleepwalking
scene when reacting to French reviews of his Don Carlos.
So in the final analysis, I'm a near-perfect W a g ­
nerian. But if the critics had paid a bit more a t ­
tention, they would have seen that the same goals
are to be found in the final trio of Ernani, [and]
in the sleepwalking scene in Macbeth... .X9
There can be little doubt, then,
in the light of his call
for new kinds of arias, unusual " non-singing, "
syncratic orchestration,
and idio­
that Verdi was attempting to adapt
the genere fantastico to the framework of Italian opera even
if it required the reshaping of accepted operatic norms.
Basevi, who concluded a study of Verdi's Macbeth just a
few years after its first performance, was aware of the for­
mal problems Verdi had encountered in setting Macbeth. Com-
18 Verdi to Cammarano. 23 November 1848. Ibid., 67.
19 Verdi to Escudier. 1 April 1867. Abbiati, III, 131-32. Sourcebook,
note, 40-41.
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132
menting on the supernatural aspects of the opera, he wrote,
...the fantastic genre, of transalpine birth and
character, requires music appropriate to its
nature, and so, the Italian composer must abandon
the beaten paths which he knows well to venture
into a labyrinth in which the Northern genius may
safely wander without becoming lost.20
Not all commentators, however, were as willing as Basevi to
accept the plunge into ne w waters that the genere fantastico
required of Italian composers. The poet Giusti, whose co m ­
ments underscored precisely how strange the supernatural
world of Macbeth appeared to its first viewers,
stated that
in this opera, Verdi did not succeed in capturing that
"chord of pain"
which " f i n d s the greatest resonance in
our s o u l ." 21
In choosing Shakespeare's Macbeth, Verdi first deviated
from tradition by using subject matter that was foreign to
the Italian operatic stage. The composer then faced the
problem of setting his unique material within the restric­
tions demanded by nineteenth-century Italian operatic c o n ­
ventions. Writing as late as 1841, only six years before
Macbeth's first performance, Ritorni succinctly described
the
" b eaten paths" Verdi would have to abandon:
[arias] are
of jewelry,
recitative.
along which
like gems joined together in a piece
and the metal which joins them is the
This can be considered as the path
the action progresses; the cantabile
20 Abramo Basevi, Macbeth, from Studio sulle opere di Giueeppe Verdi,
tr. Edward Schneider. Ibid., 421.
21 Giusti to Verdi. 19 March 1847. Ibid., 56.
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133
is the place where it stops and dwells upon a p e r ­
oration of the passions...They are by nature such
different things that one must be careful not to
dress the one in the attributes of the other, and
to ensure that a clear line separates them.22
Ritorni described here the so-called Rossinian operatic
scene that was well established when Verdi composed Macbeth.
Rossini and his contemporaries, by constantly inventing ways
to circumvent formal restrictions, had deviated from their
predecessors of the previous century, and with increasing
frequency began placing musical movements at any point in a
scene rather than at the end of it. This practice, while
succeeding in adding variety to traditional forms, also e x ­
panded them so that the cantabile came to dominate a di s ­
proportionately large part of the overall operatic design.
At the same time, the recitative, the part that moved the
action, dwindled appreciably. It was therefore no longer
possible for the action to be advanced by means of a refined
and extended dialogue, as it had been in classical opera
seria. Consequently, librettists of the early nineteenth
century were given as their primary task the invention of
dramatic situations which would provide composers with an
opportunity for creating music of "passionate and flaming
emotion."
Only in this way, Bellini said, could composers
succeed in their "difficult art that must draw tears
through singing.''
22 Carlo Ritorni, Ammaeetramenti alia conposizione di ogni poema e
d'ogni opera apartenente alia tnusica (Milan: 1841) I, par. XLVI. Cited
by Kimbell, 65.
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134
For this purpose, the Rossinian model, developed during
the composer's Neapolitan period (1815-22), served extremely
well because it allowed for a series of extended scenes that
focused on a single dramatic event in varied but predeter­
mined ways. The result was a reliable formula, dramatically
effective, and eminently appealing to the the taste of the
Italian opera-goer. A typical scene, for example, might
begin with the exposition of a dramatic mood or issue. This
would be followed by a meditation or consideration of the
issue by one of the characters. After this consideration,
new forces, either external
(stage action) or internal (re­
flective monologue) would be introduced, leading in turn to
some kind of decision in the mind of the protagonist. R e ­
gardless of their origin, these forces brought matters to a
crucial point, and the original mood or issue would be
transformed, creating a turning place for the plot. The
drama would move, for instance, from introspection to overt
action, or from anticipation to fulfillment.
In technical operatic terms, during a typical Rossinian
scena, the orchestral introduction, or the recitativo, or a
combination of the two established a dramatic mood. The
cantabile allowed for meditating over the dramatic
situation. During the tempo di mezzo that followed, a
transition of moods would be accomplished either subtly or
violently, depending upon the dramatic needs of the moment.
Finally, the result of the transition would be translated
into action in the brilliant concluding aria, the cabaletta.
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135
An expanded, more complex design might have consisted of the
following: l) introduzione, starting with a choral movement
and possibly including an episode with a secondary charac­
ter; 2) primo uomo makes his entrance (the prima donna's e n ­
trance is reserved for second act or scene); 3) the
principal sings a declamatory recitativo followed by a slow
aria, usually ending with a cadenza; 4) more chorus, at
times in dialogue with principal; 5) the principal advances
to the footlights to sing a cabaletta punctuated by choral
comment; 6) orchestral postlude, usually covered by
applause. With slight modifications the preceding design was
sometimes called a rondo-finale and was used to bring down
the curtain.
Regardless of the restrictive nature of this formula,
it took hold and remained an enduring model for composers
simply because it was highly effective. Its structure a l ­
lowed sufficient room for modifications whenever the dr a ­
matic situation required them. Ritorni therefore might have
exaggerated when he complained that Italian opera suffered
from " boring uniformity.''23 This is not to say, however,
that the Rossinian model ever strayed far from its basic
design, but it was nevertheless flexible enough to permit
some degree of variation for dramatic effect. The introduc­
tion, for example, could be executed by chorus alone or by
chorus and a subsidiary character whose appearance could
23
Ritorni, I. Par. LIX. Kimbell, 70.
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136
accelerate the action considerably. The important point is
that the forms of opera in early nineteenth-century Italy
endured not because they presented dramatic events through
schematic patterns but because the patterns themselves were
largely suited to their task.
Moreover, certain external influences, chiefly the d e ­
mands of principal singers and the expectations of their
fawning audiences acted to keep the formula from changing.
The Rossinian design more than adequately met the demands of
leading singers, who, after the prescribed choral introduc­
tion made an initial appearance and displayed the full range
of their skill and artistry. While they might have been o c ­
casionally willing to forego a second-act rondo for dramatic
reasons, they were never willing to give up their cavatina.
Singers wielded formidable power and influence over com­
posers in accordance with the expectations of Italian opera
audiences, who, depending on what they heard, delighted in
applauding or disapproving their favorite vocalists.
When he worked on Macbeth, Verdi, who eventually estab­
lished authority over all matters pertaining to the p r o ­
duction of his operas, remained sensitive to his singers and
the demands he placed upon them. Writing to Varesi,
for e x ­
ample, Verdi said he thought the range of the cabaletta he
was writing for him would be suitable but that it might
contain a few uncomfortable notes. If this were the case,
Verdi urged Varesi to let him know immediately so that he
could make the appropriate changes before he orchestrated
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137
the passage.24
Verdi showed the same deference to Barbieri-Nini as
well. Admitting that her first cabaletta might require her
to sing a bit low for her range, Verdi explained that he was
seeking a " d a r k and mysterious"
effect. Moreover, he told
her that if her command of trills were not secure, he would
gladly remove them from the second-act finale where she must
sing a drinking-song full of ''appoggiature, grupetti, and
morden t i . " 25 He went even further in soliciting her opinion
of his music when he later sent her two versions of the
drinking-song and said,
" t e l l me which suits you better."
And again, referring to the closing of an aria that ends
with a chromatic scale in pianissimo, he said,
"...if this
proves difficult for you, let me k n o w . " 26
Traditional operatic forms, singers1 influence, and au ­
dience expectations comprised the challenges Verdi had to
meet when he created Macbeth, and it is quite clear from his
correspondence with those involved in the first production
of the opera that his intention from the outset was to
create something new for the Italian stage. The innovations
apparent in Macbeth are not the fortuitous result of a cre­
ative mind that, simply by force of its originality, breaks
24 ''Sono persuaso che la tessitura ti va bene, ma forse ti potrebbe
essere gualche nota, qualche passo inccmmodo e scrivimi priraa che io
istromenti." Verdi to VareBi. c. 23-30 January 1847. Sourcebook, 36.
25 "...questo va detto leggero, brillante, con tutte le appoggiature,
gruppetti e mordenti, ecc. Io non ricordo bene se Ella fa facilmente il
trillo: io l ’ho messo, ma nel caso k subito levato." Verdi to BarbieriNini. 2 January 1847. Ibid., 29.
26 Verdi to Barbieri-Nini. 7 January 1847. Ibid., 40.
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138
new ground without thinking. To bring Shakespeare to the
Italian opera house, Verdi was keenly aware that he not only
had to break from restrictive operatic forms and conven­
tional vocal styles but also from textual standards. The
extent to which he succeeded and how he adapted the text of
Shakespeare's play as he received it from Rusconi will be
shown in the following chapters.
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139
CHAPTER VI
Verdi's Dramaturgy and the Macbeth Libretto:
"Inventing the Tr u t h "
The work of Antonio Conti, Paolo Rolli, Giuseppe Baretti, and the early translators of Shakespeare form part of
the literary context that brought Shakespeare's Macbeth to
Verdi's hands. Now it is time to look at what Verdi himself
did with Shakespeare while working within the framework of
nineteenth-century Italian opera. In this and the following
chapter I present the entire text of Verdi's 1847 libretto
alongside corresponding passages from the Italian transla­
tion the composer consulted most frequently. When comparing
the libretto with Rusconi's work in this way, it becomes
readily apparent that Verdi remained uncommonly faithful to
Rusconi's text. Moreover, this kind of scene-by-scene com­
parison also reveals the composer's uncanny gift for being
able to pluck a single appropriate word from the midst of
Rusconi's often prolix and convoluted prose.
M y source for Verdi's 1847 libretto is V e r d i ’s 'Mac­
beth': A Sourcebook. Although Rusconi's prose translation
was first published in 1838, I use as my source the third
edition, published by Pomba at Turin in 1852. Throughout the
following pages, whenever two columns of text appear t o ­
gether,
the left column contains Verdi's libretto, the right
column, Rusconi's translation. The dots in square brackets
represent genuine ellipses, but dots without brackets,
though appearing here and there throughout the libretto and
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140
Rusconi's work, do not represent omissions. They seem to be
nothing more than typographical idiosyncrasies.
While it may seem strange to analyze Verdi's Macbeth
from only a textual point of view, it is clear from the com­
poser' s involvement with the creation of the libretto, his
concern for his singers' ability to provide what he consid­
ered an appropriate dramatic thrust to their roles, and his
supervision of every facet of the opera's production,
that
Verdi composed his music only after he had shaped the over­
all dramatic design of his opera through his libretto.
After drafting the entire scenario for Macbeth, Verdi
sent it to Piave for versification, at the same time making
quite evident the kind of language he had in mind for Shake­
speare's play, which he called " u n a delle piu grandi creazioni u m a n e . " 1 Indicating that his scenario was clear,
unconventional, simple and short, Verdi urged Piave to
strive for brevity and concision in his lines and to avoid
even a single useless word. On several occasions Verdi felt
compelled to take Piave to task for the sin of prolixity. In
one especially urgent plea, Verdi even peremptorily used
capital letters to urge his librettist:
MIND TO USE FEW WORDS —
FEW WORDS —
"ALWAYS KEEP IN
FEW BUT SIGNIFI­
C A N T . " 2 These exhortations from the composer for " b r e v i t a "
and " p o c b e parole"
sounded a recurrent theme. Moreover, as
additional instructions to Piave indicate, Verdi envisioned
1
2
Verdi to Piave. 4 September 1846. Sourcebook, 8.
Verdi to Piave. 22 September 1846. Ibid., 10.
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141
two distinct levels of diction for the language of his li­
bretto. Emphasizing that each word must count, Verdi a p ­
pealed to Piave for a " linguaggio sublime, "
except for the
witches choruses, where he wanted verses that were
" trivial!, ma stravaganti ed originali.'' The text of the
opera's opening scenes reflect Verdi's intentions:
Libretto
Act I, i
Rusconi
Bosco. Tre Crocchi d i Streghe
appariscono un dopo l'altro fra
tuoni e lampi
I.
II.
III.
I.
II.
III.
Che faceste? Dite su!
Ho sgozzato un verro
E tu?
M'e frullata nel pensier
La moglier d'un nocchier;
A1 dim on la mi caccio...
Ma lo sposo che salpo
Col suo legno affoghero.
U n rovajo io ti dard...
I marosi io levero...
Pe le secche io lo trarro.
Un bosco. Accompagnate dal
rombo del tuono entrano le
Streghe.
I.
II.
III.
IV.
(odesi un tamburo)
Tut.
Act I, iii
U n tamburo! Che sara?
Vien M acbetto. Eccolo qua!
Ove sei tu stata, sorella?
A d offrire in olocausto u n cinghiale.
Sorella, e dove tu?
Dalla moglie d'un pescatore, che
aveva il grembiule pieno di noccioli, e canticchiando le rodeva
[...] Dammene, diss'io. A ld ia volo la strega, rispose.— Ma suo
marito salpo per Aleppo, e
m onta il Tigri. Io'l seguiro; io
con piu lieve vela in breve gli
saro sopra, e faro della sua barca
un topo senza coda. [...]
(s'ode un tamburo)
III.
II tamburo, il tam buro; e
Macbeth che viene a questa
volta.
Tut.
tre cerchi a te, tre per me, tre
altri ancora per completare
l'incanto.
(si confondono insieme e
intrecciano una ridda)
f...]
Le sorelle vagabonde
Van per l'aria, van sull'onde,
Sanno un circolo intrecciar
Che comprende e terra, e mar.
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142
Verdi was not pleased with the first verses Piave wrote
for the witches' chorus, since in his view they lacked the
unconventional and idiosyncratic tone for which he was
searching. Yet, Verdi was not able to describe exactly how
the verses should be written. He told Piave to experiment
and somehow to find a way of writing "poesia bizzarra. "
Verdi did suggest, however,
that the verses might convey a
sense of the grotesque if they were written in "versi
tronchi," a form the final version eventually took.
Accented on the last syllable, these verses distort the
natural sound of an Italian poetic line, where the accent
falls more naturally on the penultimate syllable.
Verdi's representation of the witches, while creating
problems for Italian audiences unaccustomed to supernatural
elements, captured the spirit of a long Shakespearean tradi­
tion that extended as far back as Elizabethan England. Both
Davenant and Garrick often emphasized the visual,
spectac­
ular possibilities of Shakespeare's witches. Davenant in
particular never hesitated to debase the play, presenting
Macbeth as an extravaganza that invariably included a number
of scenes given over entirely to what Pepys had called
1*divertissements. " 3
Because of the demands for textual concision imposed by
the operatic medium, Verdi's witches can do little more than
merely hint at the tale of the sailor's wife
(M'e frullata
3 Jonas Barish, "Madness, Hallucinations, and Sleepwalking.'1
Sourcebook, 149-55.
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143
nel pensier) . Nevertheless, there is a felicitous touch here
in their use of the word,
" nocchier, "
since Rusconi's
" pescatore" would simply have been too cumbesome with its
four syllables. Leoni had used "marina j o "
in his version,
which, while closer in meaning to Shakespeare's " sailor"
than Rusconi's " pescatore,"
still comprises four syl­
lables. Not only is " n o c c h i e r " more concise and metrically
correct with two syllables, it also points to Macbeth in his
future role as helmsman of the state. In this way it m i r ­
rors, probably fortuitously,
the witch's oblique prediction
of Macbeth's fate in Shakespeare's text (I, iii. 19-26).
Moreover,
the repetitive accents that fall on the last syl­
lable of each line reflect the "bizarre language"
that
Verdi implored Piave to create when writing for the witches.
This sing-song pattern also faithfully reflects an inherent
playfullness of Shakespeare's witches ( " and munch'd, and
munch'd, and munch'd;"
" I 'll do, I'll do, and I'll do")
There is further evidence in this opening scene that Piave
consulted Leoni's translation,
" cinghiale, "
for instead of Rusconi's
the libretto reads " verro,"
the word Leoni
used for Shakespeare's " s w i n e . "
Verdi numbers his scenes, according to Italian tradi­
tion, by the number of characters who appear on stage. When
Macbeth and Banquo appear, the libretto therefore carries
the indication " s c e n e i i "
even though it is a continuation
of Shakespeare's third scene:
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144
Libretto
Mac
Ban
Mac
Ban
Mac
I.
II.
III.
Act I, ii
G iom o non vidi mai si fiero, e
bello!
Ne tanto glorioso!
(s'awede delle Streghe) Oh, chi
saranno Costor?
Chi siete voi? Di questo
m ondo,
O d'altra regione?
Dirvi donne vorrei, ma lo mi
vieta
Quella sordida barba.
O r via parlate!
Salve, O Macbetto, di Glamis
Sire!
Salve, O Macbetto, di Caudor
Sire!
Salve, O Macbetto, di Scozia Re!
(.Macbeth trema)
(a Macbeth)
Trem ar vi fanno cosi lieti auguri?
(alle Streghe)
Favellate a me me pur, se non v'e
scuro,
Creature fantastiche, il futuro.
I.
Salve!
II.
Salve!
III.
Salve!
I.
M en sarai di M acbetto e pur
maggiore!
II.
N on quanto lui, ma piu di lui
felice!
III.
N on Re, ma di M onarchi
genitore!
T ut
M acbetto e Banco vivano!
Banco e Macbetto vivano!
(spariscono)
Mac Venir!...Saranno i figli tuoi
sovrani.
Ban E tu pria di loro.
A2
Accenti arcani!
Rusconi
Mac
Ban
Act I, iii
N on vidi mai giom o si fiero, e in
un si bello. [...]
Ma che veggo io?...Chi son
costoro che ne riguardano con
piglio minaccioso [...] Ola siete
voi creature di questo globo?
ben vorrei credervi donne; ma le
sordide barbe che vi deturpano
le gote non mel consentono.
I.
II.
III.
Salve, Macbeth! salve o Thane di
Glamis!
Salve, Macbeth! salve, o Thane
di Cawdor!
Salve, M acbeth, che in breve
sarai re!
[.••]
Ban
Ban
Nobile signore, perche tremate?
I-..]
I.
II.
III.
IV.
Mac
Ban
Se realmente potete leggere nei
decreti deU'awenire, e scemere
nel germe delle vicissitudini
umane quelle che debbono
prosperare e quelle che debbono
invanire, parlate anche a me [...]
Sarai minore d i Macbeth, e in un
di lui piu grande!
N on quanto lui felice, ma m olto
piu felice di lui!
Creerai re senza esserlo. Vivano
Macbeth e Banquo!
Banquo, B anquo e Macbeth!
(le Streghe scompariscono)
I tuoi figli sederanno sul trono
del re!
Tu re sarai fatto!
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145
Although the witches deliver their prophecies with
close conformity to the original text, we can note slight,
but telling,
instances of dramatic compression. For example,
for the third prophecy, where Rusconi write,
" Salve
Macbeth,
che in breve sarai re, " the libretto reads,
"Salve,
0 Macbetto, di Scozia ReI"
announcing Macbeth's
elevation to the throne as a fait accompli. Moreover, a
clear indication of two levels of diction is apparent in the
witches' speech when we compare, for example,
" A l dimon la
mi caccid/ Ma lo sposo che salpo" with the feigned author­
ity of " M e n sarai di Macbetto e pur maggiore!/ Non quanto
lui, ma piu di lui felice!/ Non Re, ma di Monarchi genitore!"
After the announcement by Ross and Angus of the Thane
of Cawdor's condemnation and demise, Macbeth and Banquo are
left to ponder the significance of these events. A dramat­
ically affecting duettino,
( " D u e vaticini compiuti or
s o n o " ) follows that reflects the sentiments of Shake­
speare 's
Two truths are told,
As happy prologues to the swelling act
Of the imperial theme.
Libretto
Act I, iii
Messaged del Re. I precedenti
Mes
Mac
Mes
Pro Macbetto! II tuo signore
Sir t'elesse di Caudore.
Ma quel Sire ancor vi regge!
No! percosso dalle legge
Sotto il ceppo egli spiro.
Rusconi
Act I, iii
entrano Rosse e Angus
Ross [...] il re...voile ti salutassimo
Thane di Cawdor. Sia dunque, o
nobile Thane; poiche chi mai piu
di te m erito un tal titolo. [...]
Ban Dio! puo il vero dunque uscire
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146
Mac
(Ah, l'infem o il ver parlo!)
Mac
Ban
Mes
(frase)
Due vaticini compiuti or sono...
Mi si prom ette dal terzo un
trono...
Ma perche sento rizzarsi il
crine?
Pensier di sangue, d'onde sei
nato?...
Alla corona che m'offre il fato
La m an rapace non alzero.
{fra se)
Oh, come s'empie Spirto d'infem o
Nella speranza d'un regio
soglio!
M a spesso l'empio Spirto
d'infem o
Parla, e c'inganna, veraci detti
Su quell'abisso che ci scavo.
(Perche si freddo n'udi
Macbetto?
Perche l'aspetto—non sereno?)
( Tutti partono )
ancora dall'infemo?
II Thane di Cawdor vive, e vive
di lieta vita [...]
Gia due vaticini compiuti,
due...e un tezo [...] perche mi si
dirizzano i capelli sulla testa?
[...] se la fortuna vuol farmi re,
che essa mi coroni...ma io n on le
m overo incontro; io non faro un
passo.
I-]
Ban
Spesso, per condum e al precipizio, i figli delle tenebre ci allettano con qualche verita [...]
M irate in qual meditazione e
assorto il mio compagno!
(partono)
With this duettino Verdi, in a subtle way, strikes out
on a new path that serves the dramatic demands of his text
rather than the formal requirements of Italian opera. Co n ­
vention required a cavatina at this point. Instead, Verdi
cast these lines in a duet known as the "dissimilar"
type,
a form that allows two singers to express contrasting moods
or thoughts at the same time.4 Macbeth,
in the opera as well
as the play, engages in a meditative monologue, which Verdi
has marked " f r a se, sottovoce, quasi con ispavento." Simi­
larly, Banquo, although he sings a duet with Macbeth, is
4 A detailed musical analysis of this duet can be found in Budden,
vol., I, 283-4.
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147
also speaking to himself,
for Verdi wrote " f r a s e "
at the
beginning of each vocal part. Verdi has captured the sense
of the Shakespearean scene by a faithful depiction of the
play's essential action, the meditative introspection of the
two protagonists as they ponder their fate in the light of
the w i t c h e s ' prophecies. Because music can present more than
one voice, we get a feeling of simultaneity of thought, an
effect that spoken drama is incapable of achieving. Unlike
the play, however, Verdi, responding to operatic convention,
brings the witches back for a final fast-paced chorus (S ' a l lontarono) .
Libretto
Act I, iv
Rusconi
Le Streghe (ritomano )
S'allontarono! — N'accozzeremo
Q uando di fulmini — lo scroscio udrem o.
S'allontarono — fuggiam!
...s'attenda
Le sorti a compiere — nella
Tregenda.
M acbetto rieder — vedrem cola.
E il nostro oracolo — gli
parlera.
(partono)
(There is no equivalent
for this scene in
either Shakespeare or
R usconi.)
Although there is no parallel for the witches' return
in Shakespeare,
a dramatic justification for their reappear­
ance can be found, since they seem to have returned to revel
over the results their malicious forecasting has produced in
the mind of Macbeth.
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148
Lady Macbeth's entrance in Verdi's Act I, scene v is
unprecedented in Italian opera, for she enters, not singing
but reading a letter,
in exact conformity to Shakespeare's
play.
Libretto
Act I, v
Rusconi
Lady Macbeth,
Ieggendo una Jettera
LM
“Nel di della vittoria io le
incontrai...
Stupito io n’ero per le udite
cose;
Q uando i Nunzi del Re mi
salutaro
Sir di Caudore, vaticinio uscito
Dalle veggenti stesse
Che predissero un serio al capo
mio.
Racchiudi in cor questo segreto.
A ddio.”
Ambizioso spirto
T u sei Macbetto...alia grandezza
aneli,
M a sarai tu malvaggio?
Pien d i misfatti e il calle
Della potenza, e mai per lui che
il piede
D ubitoso vi pone e retrocede!
Vieni! t'affretta! accendere
V o quel tuo freddo core!
L'audace impresa a compiere
Io ti daro valore;
Di Scozia a te prom ettono
Le profetesse il trono...
Che tardi? accetta il dono
Ascendevi a regnar.
Act X, v
Entra Lady Macbeth
Ieggendo una lettera
LM
“...Esse mi fecero incontro il
giom o stesso della mia vittoria
[...]
vennero nunzii regi che mi
salutarono Thane di Cawdor
[...]
Rachiudi questo segreto nel
cuore. A ddio.”
...ascenderai in breve all'altezza
predetta. [...] io temo il tuo
carattere, tro p p o inform ato alle
umane debolezza, per estimarti
atto ad im prendere la piu breve
via. [...] II camm ino degli onori e
tu tto lubrico di delitti. f...]
Vieni, affrettati; io tendo le
braccia; fra queste braccia
attingnerai le forze necessarie
all'impresa che un trono ti
prom ette e che i messageri di
un'altra natura vennero ad
annuziare.
Through what can only have been serendipitous coinci­
dence, Verdi found that with this scene he could work within
the restrictions of operatic conventions while still remain-
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149
ing faithful to Shakespeare's drama. In both play and opera,
for example, Lady Macbeth makes her entrance reading a let­
ter, a common device in dramatic literature, but apparently
unheard of in Italian opera. The letter is from Macbeth
telling her of the witches' prophiecies. She is of course
determined to see Macbeth crowned king, but because she
fears her husband needs to be prodded into action, she
addresses him from afar and,
in the play,
says,
" H i e thee
hither,/ That I may pour my spirits in thine ear,/ and
chastise with the valor of my tongue/ All that impedes thee
from the golden round."
In the opera, these words are re ­
flected by the andantino,
" Vieni t'afretta."
In terms of
the prevailing Rossinian model described in the previous
chapter, this would be equivalent to the consideration of
the dramatic issue raised in the recitative, here repre­
sented by Lady Macbeth's reading the letter describing the
prophecies of the witches.
In the play, when Lady Macbeth finishes contemplating
her course of action, a messenger enters to announce the
arrival of Duncan, and Verdi,
faithful to text and at the
same time to formal design, uses the appearance of the
messenger to lead Lady Macbeth into her cabaletta-.
Libretto
Act I, vi
Rusconi
Entra un domestico
Un servo, e la precedente
Ser
LM
A1 cader della sera il Re qui
giunge.
Che di? M acbetto e seco?
Act I, v
Ser
LM
II re passera in questo castello la
prossima notte.
La tua notizia e insensato.
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150
Ser
LM
Ei l'accompagna.
La nuova, o donna, e certa.
Trovi accoglienza, quale u n Re si
merta.
Libretto
Macbeth non e egli seco? O r se
tu il vero dicessi, non m'avTebbe
egli ammonita perche mi apprestassi ad una tanta accoglienza?
[...] vero e che il nostro signor
viene questa volta [...]
Ordina allora ai famigli di star
pronti.
(il domestico esce)
Rusconi
Act I, vii
Act I, v
Lady Macbeth, sola.
LM
LM
Duncano sara qui?...qui? qui la
notte?
O r tutti sorgete,—m inistri
infemali,
Che al sangue incorate— spingete i mortali!
T u notte ne aw olgi—di tenebra immota;
Qual petto percota—non
vegga il pugnal.
[...] l'arrivo di Duncano. [...]
Venite ora, venite tutti, o spirti
d’infemo, che incorate aH'omicidio i mortali [...]
E tu, notte fatale, cadi, e
awiluppane col piu denso fumo
d'infemo, affinche il mio
pugnale non vegga la ferita che
sta per infliggere [...]
Moreover, Verdi heightens the significance of the text
here by interspersing, amid the usual trills and ornaments
of Lady Macbeth's cabaletta, brief pianissimi passages
marked " s o t t o voce." The words that Lady Macbeth sings in
these indiosyncratic passages,
tenebra immota,"
" tu notte ne a w o l g i di
reflect the references in the original
text to " t h i c k night"
and "dunnest smoke of hell."
The
change in the protagonist's outlook initiated by means of
external forces— the messenger's announcement of the arrival
of the king— likewise adapts readily to the Rossinian model.
Specifically, then, Lady Macbeth moves from quiet assessment
of her husband's ambition,
fearing its insufficient
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151
strength, to a course of action, her exhortation of Macbeth
to murder Duncan. The main point here is that Verdi did not
need to deviate from convention in order to fit this part of
Shakespeare's drama to the Italian operatic stage. There was
a fortunate, but no doubt fortuitous, correspondence between
the structure of Shakespeare's scene and the conventions of
nineteenth-century o p era.
In Act I, scene iii of the libretto, Macbeth enters and
speaks to Lady Macbeth. While the ensuing dialogue between
Macbeth and Lady Macbeth is brief in the original,
it is a
masterpiece of concision in the libretto:
Libretto
Act I, viii
Rusconi
Macbeth, e la precedente
Mac
LM
Mac
LM
Mac
LM
Mac
LM
Mac
LM
Mac
LM
Mac
LM
O h donna mia!
Caudor?
Fra poco il Re vedrai...
Ripartira?
Dom ani.
Mai non ci rechi il sole un tal
domani.
Che parli?
E non intendi?
Intendo, intendo!
O r bene.7...
E se fallisse il colpo?
N o n fa llira ...setu n o n trem i.
(lieti suoni che poco a poco si
accostano)
II Re!
Lieto or lo vieni ad incontrar
con me.
(partono)
Act I,
v
entra Macbeth
LM
Mac
LM
Mac
LM
Illustre Glamis, degno Cawdor!
[...] Duncano verra qui questa
notte.
E quando ne partira egli?
Dimani...
A h non mai, non mai splendera
il sole su questo dimani!
[...]
Mac
LM
Se l'impresa ci fallisse...
Fallirei?...non tremate, e cio sara
im possible.
With a few judiciously chosen verbal strokes, Verdi seizes
on the line " Mai non ci rechi il sole un tal domani, "
ef-
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152
ficiently revealing Duncan's fate. Moreover, when Lady
Macbeth tells Macbeth that their enterprise " n o n fallira se
tu non tremi," we have two of the essential plot elements
clearly and quickly exhibited— Duncan's murder and the theme
of Macbeth's wavering resolve that must be buttressed by
Lady Macbeth.
Verdi's handling of Duncan and the music that
accompanies his arrival in scene ix has been harshly criti­
cized.
Libretto
Act I, ix
(Musica villereccia, la quale
avanzandosi a poco a poco
annuncia Varrivo del Re. Egli
trapassa accompagnato da
Banco, Macduff, Malcolm,
Macbeth, Lady Macbeth, e
seguito.)
Rusconi
Act I, vi
(Entrano Duncano, Malcolm,
Donalbano, Banquo, Lenox,
Macduff, Rosse, Angus, e
seguaci al suono di campestri
comamuse, propizianti Varrivo
del re.)
True, the seemingly light-hearted 6/8 march that sounds
throughout this brief scene invokes the atmosphere of the
music-hall, but its function, as Budden argues,5 is more
purely scenic than substantially musical. Moreover, Verdi
assigns no lines to Duncan, who enters and is welcomed by
Macbeth and Lady Macbeth. Verdi goes no further than this
dumb-show to introduce the doomed monarch. There is good
operatic reason for Verdi's treating Duncan's tole in this
way. For Verdi to have given him lines would have required
an aria with its concomitant recitative, thereby raising
5
Budden, 286.
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153
Duncan to the rank of semi-principal, equal to Macduff and
Banquo. Verdi would hardly be making economical use of his
forces, especially since he had to eliminate Duncan long
before the first act ends. Moreover,
if one thinks of the
dumb-show in Hamlet, V e rdi’s presentation of Duncan through
pantomime is in keeping with Shakespearean tradition.
Verdi skips over Macbeth's ruminating about the enor­
mity of the deed he is about to commit ( " I f it were done—
when 'tis done— then 'twere well/ it were done quickly")
and sustains the dramatic flow of his opera by going immedi­
ately to the moment preceding Duncan's assassination. After
a brief exchange with his servant (scene x ) , Macbeth sees
the fateful dagger hovering before his eyes (scene x i ) :
Libretto
Act I, x
N otte
Macbeth, e un servo
Mac
Sappia la sposa mia, che pronta
appena
La mia tazza nottum a,
V o che un tocco di squilla a me
lo aw isi.
{il servo parte)
Libretto
Act I, xi
Rusconi
Act II, i
{Macbeth, al suo domestico )
Mac A w erti la tua signora, che
apprestata che m'abbia la mia
bevanda della sera, voglia
farmene istrutto con uno squillo
di campana [...]
{il domestico esce con la torcia)
Rusconi
Act II, i
Macbeth, solo
Mac Mi si affacia un pugnale?! L'else a
me volta?
Se larva non sei tu ch'io ti
brandisca...
Mi sfuggi...eppur ti veggo! A me
precorri
Sul confuso cammin che nella
mente
Mac E egli un pugnale quel che mi
veggo dinanzi coll'elsa rivolta
verso la mia mano?...Ch'io
t'afferri, se il sei; vieni...Ma tu
mi sfuggi; e nondimeno sempre
innanzi mi ti mostri. Fatale
immagine, perche n o n sei tu
sensibile al tatto, come alia vista?
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154
Mac
Di seguir disegnava! ...O rrendo
imago!...
Solco sanguigno la tua lama
irriga!...
Ma nulla esiste ancora...Il sol
cruento
Mio pensier le da form a, e come
vera
Mi presenta alio sguardo una
chimera.
Sulla meta del m ondo
O r m orta e la natura: or
1'assassino,
Come fantasma per l'om bre si
striscia,
O r consuman le streghe i lor
misteri,
Immobil terra! a passi miei sta
muta...
(un toccco di squillo)
N on udirlo, Duncano! E squillo
etem o
Che nel cielo ti chiama, o
nell'infemo.
(Entra nelle stanze del Re)
Mac
o saresti invece solo una larva
della mente, un immagine falsa
creata dalla inorridita fantasia?
...Ah! ma io ti veggo [...] T u mi
precedi nella via ch'era mia
mente intraprendere [...] e
sull'aguzza tua lama io discemo
una riga di sangue [...] Ma nulla
realmente esiste [...]
O ra per la meta del mondo la
natura par m orta, e sogni funesti
turbano il riposo degli uomini.
I...]
O ra innanzi alia pallida Ecate
celebransi i misteri delle Streghe;
e l'ora e questa in cui 1'assassino
livido si sveglia ai ruggiti del
lupo [...]
(s'ode Io squillo della campana)
O h Duncano! non udirlo questo
squillo ferale, che funebre
t'apella nel regno degli estinti.
(esce)
The dagger scene and the formal duet between Macbeth
and Lady Macbeth that follows represent an innovation in
Italian opera, since Verdi holds off the expected duet,
sustaining the suspense of the original drama by inserting a
brief dialogue between Lady Macbeth and her husband:
Libretto
Act I, xii
Lady Macbeth
Regna il sonno su tu tti...O h qual
lamento!
Risponde il gufo al suo lugubre
addio!
Mac (di dentro) Chi v'ha?
LM
Che ei fosse letargo
uscito
Pria del colpo mortal?
LM
Rusconi
LM
Act II, ii
Lady Macbeth
Ah! fu il gufo, sinistro
messaggiero della notte, che
intuono il suo piu tetro addio
[...]
Mac
LM
(dal d i dentro) Chi e la?...parla!
Oime! sveglati si fossero pria che
com piuto il delitto?
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155
As usual,
it is during the recitativi that Verdi
remains close to Rusconi's text. Rusconi’s " g u f o "
is
faithfully reproduced, while his " p r i a che compiuto il
delitto"
is reflected in " p r i a del colpo mortale." After
Macbeth's " T u t t o e finito,"
annoncing Duncan's murder,
Verdi finally leads us to the duet, which he marked with
these instructions:
" t u t t o questo duetto dovra essere detto
dai cantanti sottovoce e cupa, ad eccezzione d'alcune frasi,
in cui vi sara marcato 'a voce spiegata.’"
Libretto
Act I, xiii
Rusconi
Act II, ii
La Precedente, Macbeth
(stravolto con un pugnale in
mano)
Mac
LM
Mac
LM
Mac
LM
Mac
T utto e finito!
Fatale mia donna! un m orm ore
Com’io, n on intendesti?
Del gufo udii lo stridere...
Teste che mai dicesti?
Di! nella stanza attigua
Chi dorme?
II real figlio...
(guardandosi le mani)
O vista, o vista orribile!
Stom a da questo il ciglio...
Nel sonno udii che oravano
I Cortigiani, e Dio
Sempre ne assista, ei dissero;
Amen d ir volli anch'io,
Ma la parola indocile
Gelo su'labbri miei.
Follia!
Perche ripetere
Quell"amen non potei?
Follia, follia che sperdono
I primi rai dei de.
Allor questa voce m'intesi nel
petto:
Mac
H o com piuto il delitto!...N on
intendesti alcun rumore? [...]
LM
Intesi l'ululo del gufo...il
m orm orio degli insetti [...]
Chi dorme, dimmi, nella
seconda stanza?
Donalbano.
(guardando le sue mani
insanguinate) V ista tremenda
fatale! [...]
si svegliarono cosi entrambi, e
mi fermai per ascoltarli; ma
detto alcune preghiere,
tom arono ad addorm entarsi. [...]
U no grido: Dio ne assista.
Amen , rispose l'altro [...] io
potei mai dir Amen [...]
potete voi tanto a lungo
intrattenervi in tale follie? [...]
Ma perche non pote io
proferirlo quellVImen [...]
N on e intal guisa che debbonsi
risguardare codeste azioni, altri-
Mac
LM
Mac
LM
Mac
LM
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156
Mac
Avrai per guanciali sol vepri, o
Macbetto!
II sonno per sempre, Glamis,
uccidesti!
N on v'e che vigilia, Caudore
per te!
LM
Mac
menti ci farebbero insanire. [...]
E mi parve d'intendere una voce
che mi gridasse: “Tu non
dormirai, Macbeth, [...] N on
uccidere il sonno, il sonno
dell'innocente [...] tu uccidesti il
sonno.”
Viewed within a larger formal context, the recitative of the
dagger scene flows, according to convention, into the duet
for the two principal singers, ending in the prescribed
cabaletta, but the vocal conventions and typical r l t o m e l l i
are absent, so that the action can proceed almost
uninterruptedly. Moreover, Verdi's delay of the principal
duet heightens our sense of Macbeth's terror before he
enters Duncan's quarters to murder him (scene x i i ) . The
Rossinian model, with its three individual parts, has been
transformed into an enlarged seamless unit capable
of
projecting a larger segment of continuous action. Verdi's
libretto can in fact be read as a highly condensed but
extremely faithful representation of Shakespeare's dramatic
narrative fro Act I, scene xi to Banco's line,
" E morto
assassinato 11 Re Duncano,'' in scene xix.
Moreover,
this kind of libretto writing is noteworthy
because it deviates from the the cliche-packed standards of
Italian opera. Consequently, Verdi's libretto carries the
full thrust of Shakespeare's dramatic intent with lines that
reflect similar imagery and metric design. An especially
graphic example of this can be found in the closing lines of
Macbeth's dagger speech,
" N o n udirlo, Duncano! E squillo
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157
eterno? Che nel cielo ti chiama, o n e l l 'inferno.'• Disre­
garding the prolixity of Rusconi's rendering, Verdi
literally echoed Shakespeare's "H e a r it not, Duncan;
for it
is a knell/ That summons thee to Heaven, or to H e l l . " Gone
too, as a comparison will easily show, are the usual eightline emotional outbursts of romantic love. With grating
verses that reveal the tortured mental state of
Shakespeare's protagonist, Verdi creates a scene where the
essential drama alone dominates both text and music.
Verdi continues to emphasize Macbeth's psychic demoral­
ization and feelings of guilt, and, as in the play, Lady
Macbeth must return the daggers to the murdered king's cham­
bers.
Libretto
LM
Mac
LM
Mac
Act I, xiii
Ma dimmi, n o n parti d ’udire?
Sei vano, O M acbetto, ma
privo d'ardire:
Glamis, a mezz'opra vacilli,
t'arresti,
Fanciul vanitoso, Caudore, tu
se'.
Vendetta, tuonarm i com'Angeli
d'ira,
U dro di Duncano le sante
virtu.
(Quell'anima trema, combatte,
delira...
Chi mai lo direbbe l'invito che
fu!)
II pugnale la riportate...
Le sue guardie insanguinate...
Che l'accusa in lor ricada.
Io cola...non posso entrar!
Rusconi
Act II, ii
[...]
LM
A h Macbeth! il tuo coraggio ti
abbandono a meta della via [...]
LM
Riportate quindi i pugnali nelle
stanze ove devono restare [...]
Macc
Io non rientro piu mai in quella
stanza!
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158
LM
Dammi il ferro. (strappa dalle
mani di Macbeth il pugnale, ed
entra nelle stanze del Re.)
LM
Porgi a me dunque i pugnali.
Here again Verdi's close adherence to Rusconi's text is
striking, especially Lady Macbeth's observation that Macbeth
has abandoned their deed midway through its execution. R u s ­
coni's " i l tuo coraggio ti abbandond a meta della via"
comes " a mezz'opra vacilli,
Verdian concision,
be­
t ' a r r e s t i And with typical
" Riportate quindi i pugnali neele stanze
ove devono restare’' is rendered as " J 1 pugnale la ripor­
tate. "
In the brief scenes that follow, Verdi concentrates on
Macbeth's fright and feelings of guilt by using Shake­
speare's devices and imagery, including the knock at the
castle door, and the washing of blood from Macbeth's hands:
Libretto
Act I, xiv
Rusconi
Act II, ii
Macbeth, solo
(Bussano forte alia porta del
Castello)
Mac
Mi spavento! (siguarda le mam)
O questa mano...
N on potrebbe l’Oceano
Queste mani a m e lavar!
Libretto
Mac
Act I, xv
L'Oceano intero potra egli levar
questo sangue, e cancellarene
l'impronta?
Rusconi
Act II, ii
Lady Macbeth, e il precedente
LM
Mac
Ve! Le mani ho lorde, anch'io.
Poco spruzzo, e m onde son.
L'opra anch'essa andra in
obblio...
(battono d i nuovo)
O di tu? raddoppia il suon!
LM
Mira; le mie mani rossegiano
come le tue [...]
LM
Ma odi; i colpi raddoppiano {...]
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159
LM
Mac
Vieni altrove! ogni sospetto
Rimoviam dall'uccisor
T om a in te! fa cor, M acbetto,
N on ti vinca un vil tim or.
Deh, potessi il mio delitto
Dalla mente cancellar!
Deh, sapessi, o Re trafitto,
L'alto sonno a te spezzar!
{Macbeth e trascinato via da
Lady)
LM
Mac
Vieni; entriamo nelle nostre
camere, e corichiamoci, che una
veglia si protratta non inducesse
sospetti. [...] non; lasciarti si
vilmente vincere da inutili
rim orsi [...]
Primache conoscere il mio
delitto, vorrei per ogni
conoscenza dell'esser mio... [...]
(escono)
Macduff and Banco arrive:
Libretto
Act X, xvi
Rusconi
Macduff, e Banco
Med
Act II, iii
M acduff
Di svegliarlo per tem po il Re
m’impose;
E di gia tarda e l'ora.
Qui m’attendete, o Banco (entra
nelle stanze del Re.)
M ed
Mi commise di chiamarlo assai
per tempo, e l'ora e innoltrata.
While Macduff goes to wake Duncan, Banco, in a formal
aria, invokes Shakespeare's grotesque imagery, citing w a i l ­
ing voices of death,
Libretto
tragic omens, and trembling earth:
Act I, xvii
Rusconi
Banco, solo
Ban
O h qual orrenda notte!
Per l'aer cieco lamentose voci,
Voci s'udian di m orte...
Gemea cupo l'augel de'tristi
auguri,
E si senti della terra il trem ore.
Act II, iii
Lenox
Len
La scorsa notte si parve invero
ben tempestosa. [...] per l'aria
voci lamentevoli, orrendi gridi di
m orte [...] L'ucello dei sinistri
presagi ha gemuto per lungo
tem po [...1 che la terra abbia
tremato.
Following the discovery of Duncan's body, a scene of
confusion erupts. Banquo cries out,
Others come running, while shouting,
" Che avenne m a i ?"
" Correte, correte!...
delitto! o delitto! o tradimento!" While these exclamations
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160
sound like the stuff of a typical Italian opera libretto,
they are in fact rooted in Shakespeare's text.6
Libretto
Act I, xviii
Rusconi
Act II, iii
Macduff, e Banco
Med
Ban
Med
Orrore! orrore! orrore!
Che avenne mai?
La dentro
Contemplate voi stesso...io dir
nol posso!...
Correte!...ola!...tutti correte!
tutti! (Banco entra nella sala del
Re.)
O delitto! o delitto! o tradimento!
Med O h orrore! orrore! orrore!
Mac Che mai e accuduto?
[...]
M ed Venite, entrate nelle sue stanze, e
ivi contemplate cosa agghiaccera
di terrore! [...]
o h delitto! infame tradimento!
Banco brings an end to the turmoil when he announces that
" B morto assassinato il Re Du ncano!" Operatic conventions
intervene at this point to halt the frenzied action. The
entire cast, in a typical operatic finale, expresses its
revulsion at what has occurred,
and calls upon the forces of
God and nature to avenge the horrible crime, bringing the
act to a close.
Libretto
Act I, xix
Rusconi
Act II, iii
Macbeth, Lady Macbeth,
Malcolm, Macduff, Banco,
Dama d i Lady, Servi
Qual subito scompiglio!
O noi perduti!
Che fu? parlate! che segni di
strano?
E m orto assassinato il Re
Duncano!
(Stupore universal)
6
Qual e il motivo? [...] Perche si
im prow iso strepito?...parlate,
parlate.
[...]
il nostro buon re e morto
assassinato!
See Shakespeare's Macbeth, Act II, iii, 62.
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161
T ut
Schiudi, infem o la bocca, ed
inghiotti
Nel tu o grembo l'intero creato;
Sull'ignoto assassinato esecrato
Le tue fiamme discendano, o
ciel,
O gran Dio, che ne'cuori penetri,
Te ne assisti, in te solo
fidiamo,
Da te lume, consiglio
cerchiamo
A squarciar delle tenebre il vel!
L'ira tua formidabile e pronta
Colga l'empio, o fatal punitor.
E vi stampa sul volto
l'im pronta
Che stampasti sul primo
uccisor.
(There is no precise
parallel for this text
in either Shakespeare
or Rusconi.)
FINE DELL'ATTO PRIM O
Since Verdi would hardly have expected the resources of
Italian opera to be able to present the entire text of
Shakespeare's play, his primary task, obviously, was to
eliminate certain scenes while refracting a coherent drama
that he had to present through the prism of nineteenth-cen­
tury conventions. The first act of Macbeth can therefore
stand as a model of once aspect of Verdi's dramaturgy —
his
selection of essential dramatic material and its restructur­
ing into large dramatic units, which could then be presented
through the formal operatic media of chorus, recitativi,
cavatine, and duettini. In this way, Verdi was able to pack
into the first act of Macbeth the action from two full acts
of Shakespeare. Verdi's first-act libretto thus represents a
tightl integrated drama in itself that can be parsed into
five major units:
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162
1. a) the witches' prophecies; b) promotion of
Macbeth to Thane of Cawdor; c) thoughts of Macbeth
and Banquo about meaning of prophecies;
2. a) Lady Macbeth's reading of letter that
informs her of witches' prophecies; b) her doubts
about Macbeth's ability to do what is necessary to
ascend to throne; c) announcement of Duncan's
imminent arrival; d) invocation of infernal
spirits;
3. a) return hme of Macbeth and plan to
assassinate Duncan b) wavering of Macbeth's
resolve, prodding by Lady Macbeth; c) arrival of
Duncan (dumb-show)
4. a) vision of dagger; b) murder of Duncan (off­
stage) c) guilt of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth
(''bloody hands'')
5. a) discovery of assassination, and scene of
turmoil; b) invoking of supernatural powers to
avenge Duncan's death.
This schematic outline does not mean to imply that Verdi
gave equal musical value to each event. The opera's formal
numbers were inherently determined by operatic convention
and assigned to the principal vocal roles. The outline,
however, does demonstrate precisely which aspects of
Shakespeare's drama Verdi deemed essential for his opera.
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163
CHAPTER VII
The Macbeth Libretto:
A Continuation
In addition to condensing the action of Shakespeare's
play, Verdi also worked at creating more dynamically active
scenes within each of his dramatic units. To do this, he
needed a more concise language for his libretto. A clear
illustration of this can be seen at the beginning of the
second act, one of the most troublesome passages for Verdi.
Libretto
Act II, i
Rusconi
Macbeth, pensoso, seguito da
Lady Macbeth
LM
Mac
LM
Mac
LM
Mac
LM
Perche mi sfuggi, e fiso
LM
Ti veggo ognora in un pensier
profondo?
II fatto e irreparabile! Veraci
Parlar le Maliarde, e Re tu sei,
II figlio di Duncan, per
l'im prow isa
Sua fuga in Inghilterra,
Parricida fu detto, e vuoto il
soglio
A te lascio
Ma le spirtali donne
Banco padre di Regi han
profetato...
Mac
D unque i suoi fxgli regneran?
D uncano
Per costor sara spento?
Egli, e suo figlio
V ivono e ver...
Ma vita
LM
Imm ortale non hanno...
Ah, si, non 1'hanno!
Forz'e she scorra un altro
sangue, O donna!
Dove? Quando?
Act III, ii
Lady Macbeth
(entra Macbeth)
O h sposo mio, perche ora mi
sfuggi? [...] profondato sempre
ne'foschi pensieri [...]
All'irrevocabile, e inutil cosa
pensare; il fatto n o n muta.
[...]
T u ben sai che Banquo e Fleance
ono ancor vivi.
[...]
Ma la natura non li creo immortali. [...]
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164
Mac
LM
Mac
A1 venir di questa notte. LM
Im m oto sarai tu nel tuo disegno?
Banco! l'etemita, t'apre il tuo
regno, {paneprecipitoso )
U n nuovo deliito?
[...]
On October 25, 1846, Verdi wrote to Piave:
At the beginning of the second act, arrange it so
that in her soliloquy Lady [sic] does not write
the letter about the murder of Banquo. I don't
like having her writing a letter in the hall;
instead it can be done just as well with a few
words without her having to write a letter.
"Banco and his son live...but Nature did not
create them immortal... Oh Macbeth... a new
crime...Enterprises begun, etc.1
As can readily be seen, the linesVerdi quotes in his
letter come directly from Rusconi. Verdi has added only the
exclamation,
" O h Macbet." The soliloquy Verdi mentions is
from an earlier version of this scene where his intention
was
to have Lady Macbeth appear alone
rative
that summarizes prvious action
additional dramatic development,
in an extended
nar­
and introduces
an
the murder of Banquo. Here
is the scene as first envisioned by Verdi:
ATTO SECONDO
Sala come nella acena V dell'atto 1°
Scena i
Lady, (eola)
Fur le streghe veraci, e re tu sei
Macbetto! II figlio di Duncano fuggendo
Dalla Scozia in Bretagna
1 Nel Macbet al principio del secondo f& che Lady nel soliloquio non
scriva la lettera a Macbet sull'uccisione di Banco — non mi piace farle
scrivere una lettera in quell'atrio, d'altronde con poche parole si pud
fare egualmente senza far scrivere la lettera. 'Banco e b u o figlio
vivono...ma la natura non li cred immortali...Oh Macbet...Un nuovo
delitto!...Le impress cominciate ecc. ecc.'" Verdi to Piave, 25 October
1846. Sourcebook, 12. Francesco Degrada has made a detailed study of the
successive versions of the libretto. See "Observations on the Genesis
of Verdi's 'Macbeth.'" Sourcebook, 156-73. I have relied on thiB essay
for the earlier versions of the libretto and their translations.
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165
Parricida fOi detto, e vuoto il soglio
A te lascid: ma le spirtali donne
Banco padre di regi han profetato...
Dunque i suoi figli regneran?...Duncano
Per costor sarS spento?...Egli e suo figlio
Vivono 6 ver, ma vita
Di tempera immortal non han sortita.
Pria che il tetro angel notturno
Fugga al raggio mattutino
II pugnal dell'assassino
Novo sangue ha da versar.
Tra misfatti ha fin l'impresa
Se un misfatto a lei fd culla
0 Macbetto il Berto & nulla
Se pu& in capo vacillar.
Translation:
[The witches spoke true, and thou art king,
Macbeth! The son of Duncan, fleeing
From Scotland into Britain
Was declared a parricide, and left the throne
Empty for you: but the demonic women
Predicted Banquo the sire of kings...
So will his children reign?...Will it be for him
That Duncan was slain? He and his son
Live, 'tis true, but life
Of immortal mettle was not allotted them.
Before the dark nocturnal angel
Flees the morning ray.
The assassin's dagger
Has new blood to shed.
An enterprise is brought to conclusion by misdeeds
If in a misdeed it was cradled,
0 Macbeth, the crown is nothing
If on the brow it is insecure.]
True, Lady Macbeth's lines here impart sufficient i n ­
formation about Shakespeare's plot and the murder of Banquo,
but the scene and text are typical of nineteenth-century
Italian opera, including the two formal concluding q u a t ­
rains. At this stage, the composer was far from reproducing
the dramatic impact of the origianl. No doubt Verdi thought
long and hard about this scene,
for a few days later, he
again wrote to Piave about it. Obviously, reponding to a
need for concision, Verdi was quite willing to forego the
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166
formal quatrain announcing Banquo's murder.
In the Lady's first scene in Act II have her say
just one simple sentence alluding to the murder of
Banquo... " O h Macbeth, another crime is n e e d e d ! " 2
A month later, still not satisfied, Verdi wrote once
again to Piave, and after stating that " I n this Macbet,
the
more one thinks about it, the more one finds ways to improve
i t , " 3 he outlined a detailed text for this scene that
included not only Lady Macbeth but also Macbeth himself;
they engage in a dialogue wherein Lady Macbeth informs her
husband that another crime is needed. Because it provides us
with a clear insight into an important aspect of Verdi's
dramaturgy,
I am again including a translation. An
interesting characteristic of this version is that Verdi,
unlike Shakespeare, makes Lady Macbeth responsible for
initiating the murder of Banquo:
Act
II, scene i
Lady 4
Perchi ora mi fuggi?...
PerchS sempre assorto in tristi pensieri?...
Inutile 6 sempre pensare a ll'irrevocabile.
Ora sei Re, come ti predissero le streghe.
II figlio di Duncano fuggendo in Brettagna
Parricida fu detto e vuoto il soglio
2 "Nella prima scena di Lady del 2° atto non farle dire che una
semplice frase indicante l'uccisione di Banco... " O h Macbet 6 necessario
un altro delitto!” Verdi to Piave. 29 October 1846. Sourcebook, 13.
3 Verdi to Piave. 3 December 1846. Ibid., 18-20.
4 Inconsistencies frequently ocurred in Verdi's transcriptions of
Shakespeare's proper names into Italian. Duncan, Banquo, and Fleance are
consistently rendered as Duncano, Banco,and Fleanzio. The others retain
their English names on the title page, but occasionally Verdi and Piave
added an " o ” in the text of the libretto, resulting in " Macbetto”
and " Macduffo.” Lady Macbeth, in Verdi's correspondence and in the
printed Bcore, is indicated by "Lady.” In earlier sketches, we also
find " L e d y . ”
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167
A te lascid.
Macbeth
Ma le spitali donne
Banco padre di regi han profetato.
Dunque i euoi figli regneran...Duncano
Per costor sard spento?...
Lady
Egli e suo figlio
Vivono, ma la nature non li cred immortali.
Macbeth
Cid mi conforta; ei non sono immortali.
Lady
Quindi se un altro delitto?...
Macbeth
On altro delitto?...
Lady
§ necessario...
Macbeth
Quando?
Lady
Appena annotti!...
Macbeth (finge)
Un nuovo delitto!!!...
Lady
Ebbene?. ..
Macbeth
£ deciso!...
Banco fra pochi istanti
Per te comincia etemitd. (parte)
Scena ii
Lady
S'allarghi ora il core alia speranza che potremo alfine regnar sicuri sul trono.
Tra misfatti ha fin l'impresa
Se un misfatto a lei fu culla
La regal corona d un nulla
Se pud in capo vacillar!...
Translation:5
Act XI, scene i
{Macbeth, followed b y Lady)
Lady
Why do you flee m e ? ...
Why always rapt in sad thoughts?...
No use to think on what cannot be called back.
You are King now, as the witches foretold.
The son of Duncan, fleeing into Britain,
Was declared a parricide and left the throne
Vacant for you.
Macbeth
5
This English translation is from the Sourcebook, 18-19.
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168
But the demonic women
Predicted Banquo the sire of kings.
So will his children reign?.. .Will it be for them
That Duncan was slain?...
Lady
He and his son
Live, but nature did not make them immortal.
Macbeth
That comforts me: they're not immortal.
Lady
So if a second crime....?
Macbeth
A second crime...?
Lady
It is needed...
Macbeth
When?
Lady
This very evening.
Macbeth (feigns)
A new crime!!!...
Lady
Well?...
Macbeth
'Tie decided!...
Banquo, ere long
Eternity begins for thee, {exit)
Scene ii
Lady (alone)
My heart overflows at the hope that at last
we can reign secure on the throne.
An enterprise is brought to
conclusion by misdeeds
If in a misdeed it was cradled,
The royal crown is nothing
If on the brow it is insecure!...
Verdi also told Piave he did not want this scene to be
metrically regular. The scene must be played out in recitativo, with lines that are "strong and concise,
manner of Alfieri."
in the
In the scene where Lady Macbeth remains
alone, Verdi said, the two quatrains are appropriatem but in
dialogue with Macbeth, they cannot be used. Verdi told Piave
that " t h e first one in particular must be changed; so i n ­
stead of an adagio I *11 write an Allegro which will be even
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169
b e t t e r . " 6 Verdi's comment clearly reveals the extent to
which the kind of music he wrote depended upon the demands
of his text. Piave responded to Verdi's request this way:
ATTO SECONDO
Sceaa i
(Macbeth concentrato aeguito da Ledy)
Ledy
Mac
Ledy
Mac
Ledy
Mac
Ledy
Mac
Ledy
Mac
Ledy
Mac
PerchS mi £uggi e fiso
Ti veggo ognora in un pensier profondo?
II £ato d irreparabile!!. Veraci
Parlar le maliarde, e re tu sei.
Il figlio di Duncano per l'iraprowisa
Sua fuga in Inghilterra
Parracida fu detto, e vuoto il soglio
A te lascid.
Ma le spirtaii donne
Banco padre di regi han pro£etato:
Dunque i suoi figli regneran?...Duncano
Per costor sard spento?
Egli e suo figlio
Vivono d ver. Ma vita
Iiranortal non han.
Cid mi conforta.
Scorrere un altro sangue...
Un altro sangue?
T 1d forza!
E quando?
A1 venir della notte.
Necessario & pur troppo!
Or che disegni?
Banco! L ' etemitd t'apre i suoi regni!
Translation:7
Lady
Mac
Why do flee me, and why do I
Ever see yourapt in deep thought?
The deed is irreparable. The sorceresses
Spoke true, and you are king.
The son of Duncan by reason of his Budden
Flight into England
Was declared a parricide, and left the throne
Vacant for you.
But the demonic women
Predicted Banquo the sire of kings.
6 "...la prima specialmente bisogna cambiarla, cosi invece d'un adagio
fard un allegro che sard meglio." Verdi to Piave. 3 December 1846.
Sourcebook, 19.
7 Degrada. Sourcebook, 162.
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170
Lady
Mac
Lady
Mac
Lady
Mac
Lady
Mac
Lady
Mac
So will his children reign?.. .Will it be for them
That Duncan was slain?
He and his son
Live, 'tis true, but do not have
Life immortal.
That comforts me
Another lifeblood must flow...
Another lifeblood?
You have no choice!
And when?
When night falls.
Alas, it is necessary!
Now what do you intend?
Banquo! Eternity opens its realm to you!
Verdi remained dissatisfied with various parts
libretto,
of the
and finally felt complelled to call upon his
friend, the poet Andrea Maffei,
to make changes in Piave's
work.8 As a result, this passage that gave both Verdi and
Piave such trouble
returns
was
changed by Maffei in a way that
to Macbeth the
initiative for Banquo's murder,
although Lady Macbeth continues to be a willing accomplice.
Lady
Mac
Lady
Mac
Lady
Mac
Lady
Mac
Egli e suo figlio
Vivono 6 v e r ...
Ma vita
Immortale non hanno... 6 d'uqpo, o donna
Che scorra un'altro sangue!
Un altro sangue?
3 forza!
E quando?
A1 venir della notte.
Immoto sarai tu nel tuo disegno?
Banco! L ' e t e m i t d t'apre il suo regno.
Translation:
Lady
Mac
Lady
He and his son
Live 'tis true...
but do not have
Life immortal!...It is necessary, oh woman,
That another lifeblood flow.
Another lifeblood?
8 For a detailed analysis of Maffei's emendations to the Macbeth
libretto, see Francesco Degrada, The 'Scala' Macbeth Libretto: A Genetic
Edition.Sourcebook, 306-38.
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171
Mac
Lady
Mac
Lady
Mac
It is necessary!
And when?
When night falls.
Will you be immovable in your plan?
Banquo! Eternity opens its realm to you!
Still unsatisfied, Verdi himself made one more tellng
correction to Maffei*s revision:
Mac
Lady
Mac
Lady
Mac
Lady
Mac
Immortale non hanno...
Ah si non 1 1hanno!...
Forza & che scorra un altro sangue o donna!
Dove e quando?
A1 venir di questa notte.
Immoto sarai tu nel tuo disegno?
Banco! L'eternit& t'apre il suo regno!
Translation:
Lady
Mac
Lady
Mac
Lady
He and his son
Live 'tis true...
But do not have
Life immortal.
Ah yes, they do not hve that.
It is necessary that another lifeblood flow, oh woman!
Where? And when?
When night falls.
Verdi's role in the final transformation of what began as a
static,
out
conventional scene
the degree to which
of Italian opera not only points
he controlled thecreation of his
libretto, but also his willingness to discard convention in
favor of more highly charged emotional scenes.
Moreover, Verdi's final version of this troublesome
scene, which now includes rapid verbal exchanges and ominous
questions, heightens rather than merely recreates the orig­
inal. In Shakespeare, Macbeth had already issued orders to
his assassins to murder Banquo before confronting Lady M a c ­
beth with the news that Banquo must die. To her question,
"What's to be done?"
he answers,
" B e innocent of the
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172
knowledge, dearest chuck,/ Till thou applaud the deed." Bycomparison, Verdi's scene creates a dynamic tension not
found in the original.
In Lady Macbeth's aria that follows, Verdi again moved
away from Rusconi's text by creating a conventional number:
Libretto
Act II, ii
Lady, sola
Trionfai! securi alfine
Premerem di Scozia il trono
O r disfido il lampo, il tuono
Le sue basi a rovesciar.
T re misfatti ha l'opra il fine
Se un misfatto le fu culla,
La regal corona e nulla
Se pud in capo vacillar!
Before presenting the banquet scene, Verdi must of
course deal with the murder of Banquo. The murderers in this
brief scene are anonymous, an operatic necessity that Verdi
undoubtedly uses to prepare for the chorus of shadowy assas­
sins that appears later in the act:
Libretto
Act II, iii
Rusconi
Parco. In lontananza il Castelio
di Macbeth. Coro d i Sicari.
I.
II.
I.
II.
I.
II.
Chi v'impose unirvi a noi?
Fu M acbetto.
Ed a che fare?
D obbiam Banco trucidar.
Q uando?.. .dove?...
Insiem con voi.
Act III, iii
Un parco che mostra in
lontananza il palazzo di
Macbeth. Tre satelliti di
Macbeth arrivano.
I.
III.
Ma chi disse di unirti a noi?
Macbeth.
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173
II.
Tut.
C on sue figlio qui verra.
Rimanete...or bene sia.
Sparve il sol!...la notte o r regni
Scellerata—insanguinata.
Cieca notet, afretta e spegni
Ogni lume in terra, e in ciel.
L'ora e presso!...or n'occultiamo
Nel silenzio lo aspettiamo
Trema, Banco!—nel tuo fianco
Sta la punta del coltel!
I.
Mac
Rimanti adunque con noi.
(Macbeth's words from
the previous scene.)
Vieni, cieca n o tte e scellerata [...]
e coll'invisibile insanguinata
mano spegni il gran luce
delTuniverso [...]
In a small but unusual act of backtracking Verdi has
used text from a previous scene in Rusconi to find words for
his libretto here. As this side-by-side comparison has
shown, Verdi almost invariably proceeded in direct linear
fashion with unprecedented fidelity to the original text.
As the murderers hide, Banquo and Fleance enter.
Fleance merely walks on; there is no text associated with
his role. Banquo, on the other hand, sings a formal romanza.
Although no parallel text can be found in Rusconi, the scene
recalls Shakespeare's II, i and III, i.
Libretto
Act II, iv
Banco, Fleanzio
Ban
Rusconi
Act III, iii
(Banco al di dentro)
Studia il passo, o mio
figlio... usciam da queste
Tenebre...un senso in petto
Pien di tristo presagio e di
sospetto.
Come dal ciel precipita
L'om bra piu sempre oscura!
In notte ugual trafissero
D uncano il mio signor.
Mille affannose immagini
M 'annunciano sventura,
E il mio pensiero ingombrano
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174
Ban
Di larve e di te rro r:^
(si perdono nel parco)
(voce di Banco entro la scena)
Oime! ...Fuggi, mio figlio! ...o
tradimento!...
(Fleanzio attraversa la scena
inseguito da un Sicario)
Ban
O h tradimento! Fuggi, Fleance;
fuggi, fuggi...
The next scene finds Lady Macbeth and Macbeth playing
host to the nobles of Scotland. The setting is magnificent
operatic fare, presenting Verdi with an opportunity not only
for writing a rousing brindisi but also for displaying w o n ­
derfully theatrical effects when Banquo's ghost appears.
Libretto
Act I, v
Rusconi
Magnifica sala. Mensa imban dita. Macbeth, Lady Macbeth,
Dama di Lady Macbeth, Dame.
C or
Mac
C or
LM
Mac
LM
C or
LM
Salve, O Re!
Voi pure salvete,
Nobilissimi Signori
Salve, o donna!
Ricevete
La merce de’vostri onori.
Prenda ciascun l'orrevole
Seggio al suo grado eretto.
Pago son'io d'accogliere
Tali ospiti a banchetto.
La mia consorte assidasi
Nel trono a lei sortito
Ma pria le piaccia un brindisi
Sciogliere a vostr'onor.
Al tuo reale invito
Son pronta, o mio Signor.
E tu n'udrai rispondere
Come ci detta il cor.
Act III, iv
Una sala del regio palazzo .
Banchetto imbandito. Entra
Macbeth, Lady Macbeth, Rosse,
Lenox, Lordi e seguaci.
Mac
Q uanto a noi, privi di seggio
fisso, scorrerem o fra i convitati
colla modestia che conviene
all'ospite che li riceve. La regina
poi s'assida sul trono d'onore, e
s'apparecchi a portare un brindisi all salute di tutta la nobile
brigata.
Si colmi il calice
Di vino eletto,
Nasca il diletto
M uoja il dolor.
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175
LM
C or
Da noi s'involino
Gli odj, e gli sdegni,
Folleggi, e regni
Qui solo amor.
Giustiam il balsamo
D'ogni ferita
Che nova la vita
Ridona al cor.
Cacciam le torbide
Cure dal petto
Nasca il diletto
M uoja il dolor.
All through the preparation of the Macbeth libretto,
Verdi signalled the beginning of his abandonment of rela­
tively static scenes in favor of more dynamic, emotionally
packed, to use Verdi's word,
" posizioni."
While it is
impossible to know precisely what Verdi meant by that word,
I take it in the sense of "juxtapositions." Verdi's drama­
turgy often includes scenes or texts that are ordinary and
conventional, but the composer endows them with an intense
dramatic power merely by how he " p o s i t i o n s "
them in
relation to one another. For example, in his discussion of
Verdi's Macbeth, Basevi said that Lady Macbeth's brindisi is
"somewhat trivial."
If Basevi meant that the brindisi,
considered alone, does not rise above the commonplace, he
was correct in his evaluation,
since it is clearly cast both
musically and textually in the mold of typical drinking
songs that abounded in Italian opera at the time.
Shakespeare provided no verbatim equivalent for it,
although it is strongly suggested by Macbeth's " B e large in
mirth; anon we'll drink a measure/ The table round"
(III,
iv, 11-12). Verdi no doubt took Rusconi's lines as his
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176
reason for inserting a brindisi at this point.9 Regardless
of its source, Lady Macbeth's brindisi never strays beyond
formal operatic conventions. The triviality of which Basevi
spoke is evident, I believe,
in the regularity of its four
quatrains of unwavering meter (6/5/5/4) and routine rhyme
scheme (abbc) . There is, moreover, nothing remarkable in the
sentiments expressed by the words themselves. We have the
usual call to fill the cup:
Si colmi il calice
Di vino eletto
followed by a typical invocation of merriment:
Muoia il dolor
Verdi's brindisi, then, is a set piece that could readily
have been extracted from its operatic context and presented
as a separate number. Ricordi did in fact publish it under
the title "Conv i t o e Brindisi nel Finale II - Si colmi il
calice,”
in a piano-vocal arrangement by Verdi's friend and
pupil, Emanuele Muzio.
Only when the brindisi is considered within the context
of scenes v, vi, and vii,
can Verdi's dramatic flair be
fully appreciated. The brindisi, played against the
treachery that unfolds before and after Lady Macbeth sings
it, becomes emotionally and psychologically charged in ways
that heighten the dramatic intensity of the opera, bringing
it closer to the spirit of Shakespeare's tragedy. For
9
See Rusconi cited above, Act III, iv.
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177
example, during the merriment of the brindisi,
an assassin
arrives to make his report to Macbeth:
Libretto
Act II, vi
Rusconi
Act III, iv
I precedent!. Un Sicario si
affaccia ad un uscio laterale.
Macbeth gli fa presso.
Mac
Sic
Mac
Sic
Mac
Sic
Mac
Sic
Tu di sangue hai brutto il volto.
E di Banco.
II ver ascolto?
Si.
Ma il figlio?
Ne sfuggi!
Cielo! e Banco?
Egli mori.
{Macbeth fa cenno al Sicario, che
parte)
Mac
Sat
V'e sangue rappreso sul volto.
Sangue di Banquo.
U]
Mac
Sat
Riusci ben il colpo?
Real Signore, Fleance ci sfuggi.
[..J
{II satellite esce)
Before the required repetition of the brindisi, Verdi
brings in Banquo1s g h o s t :
Libretto
Act II, vii
Rusconi
Act III, iv
I precedenti meno il Sicario
Che ti scosta, o Re m io sposo,
Dalla gioia del banchetto?...
Banco falla! II valoroso
Chiuderebbe il serto eletto
A quant'aw i di piu degno
Neli'intero nostro Regno.
Venir disse, e ci manco
In sua vece io sedero.
{Macbeth fa per sedere. Lo Spettro di Banco, veduto solo da lui,
ne occupa il posto.)
(atterrito) Di voi chi cio fece?
Che parli?
N on dirm i,
Non dirmi ch'io fossi!...le
ciocche cruente...N on scuotermi
incontro...
LM
Mac
Tut
Mac
Mio real signore, a che non
dividete voi pure la gioia del
banchetto?
Macbeth va per sedersi, e vede
l'ombra di Banquo al suo posto,
invisibile per tutti; fuorche per
lui; s'arresta spaventato) Chi di
voi fe' cio?
M achedunque?
Oh! n on dire che foss'io l'autore...non iscuotere cosi le insanguinate chiome, affisandomi...
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178
(Sorgono) M acbetto e soffrente!
Partiamo...
LM
Restate! Gli e m orbo fugace...
(piano a Macbeth) E un uom o
voi siete?
Lo sono e Mac
audace
S'io guardo tal cosa che al demone istesso
Porrebbe spavento...la...la...nol
rawisi?
{alio spett.) O h poi che le
chiome scrollar t'e concesso,
Favella! il sepolcro puo render
gli uccisi?
{l'ombra sparisce)
(piano a Macbeth) Voi siete
LM
demente!
Quest'occhi l'han visto...
(forte) Sedete, o mio sposo;
Ogni ospite e tristo.
Svegliate la gioja!
Ciascun mi
Mac
perdoni
II brindisi lieto di nuovo risoni,
Ne Banco obbliate, che lungi
e tuttor.
That Verdi is setting out on
seen by a comparison with the
l'accesso non durera che un
istante. (a Macbeth in disparte)
Macbeth, siete voi un uomo?
Si...e un uomo ben intrepido,
poiche oso contem plare un
oggetto che atterrirebbe Satana
stessa. [...]
Oh! te ne prego, guarda da quel
lato...la...la...vedi tu? (alia larva)
se ti e concesso di scrollare il
capo [...] dimmi...se i sepolcri
possono rendem e quelli che
seppelliamo...
(l'ombra scompare)
Ah! interamente preso adunque
voi siete dalla follia? [...] Mio
nobile sposo, i vostri amici vi
aspettano. [...]
Ah! dimenticava...[...] O ra
portiam o un brindisi alia salute
di tutti. [...]
anew path here
can be
Act IIfinale of Alzira,
composed only two years before Macbeth. Verdi had opened a
similar festive scene with a chorus, a common device at the
time. The typical finale allowed for a number of dramati­
cally determined variations that could be structured in
several contrasting movements. Starting in many cases with a
brief parlante section, where the plot was advanced by sing­
ers declaiming the text against an orchestral melody,
the
scene often led to a multiple soliloquy of complex partwriting, known as a largo concertato. This often included a
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179
canon, led b y one singer with the others entering at the end
of the first stanza. After the final cadence, the action was
resumed with a return to the music of the first section,
which, with its renewed energy and brilliance, contrasted
sharply with the dramatically static largo concertato, and
in a rush of growing exuberance, brought down the curtain.
The pattern here was characteristaically in four movements,
alternating " k i n e t i c "
scenes, in which the action ad­
vanced, with " s t a t i c "
scenes,
in which characters com­
mented on the action that had taken place in the preceding
"kinetic"
section.
In the banquet scene of Macbeth, however, Verdi did
retain some of the traditional features of the typical
finale,
since it begins with a " k i n e t i c , "
that is,
dramatically active scene. Following convention, this then
leads to a static scene where the characters voice their
reactions to what has just transpired. But Verdi does not
follow through here with the expected stretta. Consequently,
there is no second " k i n e t i c "
movement. Undoubtedly, Verdi
felt that a conventional stretta would have been
dramatically inappropriate after two appearances of Banquo's
ghost.
At one stage in the preparation of the Macbeth
libretto, Verdi, as he had when he first considered Lady
Macbeth's appearance alone at the beginning of Act II, was
obviously thinking along tradtitional lines, for he wanted
to open the banquet scene with the ususal device, a chorus
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180
to these words:
viva al felice Macbet
Viva l'amato re
A lui onore e gloria
A lui coraggio e fe!
Verdi realized that apart from the dramatically inert
scene that would have been created by the chorus alone, the
banality and metric regualrity of the text would have
provided little textual and dramatic contrast with Lady
Macbeth's brindisi. In the final version, Verdi replaced the
chorus with text declained as parlante by Macbeth and Lady
Macbeth while the orchestra provided melodic and harmonic
underpinnings. The result is a lively interplay that shows
the psychological distance betweeen the two protagonists and
their guests
(chorus). Once Lady Macbeth's mental isolation
is disclosed, the contrast with the formal brindisi that
follows is increased, and the literal meaning of Lady
Macbeth's language begins therefore to ring with ironic
hollowness and falsity. Before she sings the brindisi's
second refrain, Banquo's ghost appears, Macbeth is visibly
shaken, and from this alone, Lady Macbeth can surmise that
Banquo is dead. The second rendition of the brindisi has
therefore been transformed into a contemptuous and cynical
outrage to the memory of a murdered friend:
Si colmi il calce
Di vino eletto,
Nasca il diletto
M uoia il dolor
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181
LM
Cor
Da noi s'involino
Gli odj, e gli sdegni
Folleggi, e regni
Qui solo amor.
Giustiamo il balsamo
D'ogni ferita
Che nova la vita
Ridona al cor.
Vuotiam per I'inclito
Banco i bicchieri!
Fior de'Guerrieri
Di Scozia onor.
(riappare lo spettro)
Va, spirto d'abisso!...Spalanca
una fossa,
O terra, e l'ingoja... Fiammeggian quel'ossa!
Quel sangue fum ante mi
sbalza nel volto!
Quel guardo a me volto—trafiggemi il cor!
Sventura terrore!
(l'ombra d i Banquo appare d i
nuovo)
Lungi da me, spirto
fatale!...togliti a'miei occhi...e tu
spalancati, o terra, e l'inghiotti
nelle tue voragini! Quelle ossa
gia fiammeggiano...quel sangue
gia mi si aw enta nel volto...m i
dilaniano il cuore. f...] Vieni, ...
frontami sotto la form a
deU'indomito orso, del feroce
rinoceronte, della tigre d'Ircania
In essence, the banquet scene of Verdi's Macbeth is
related to the conventional finale form, but it departs
radically from typical four-part structure and divides into
two larger units. Verdi's increased use of parlante in this
scene and the complex structure of its first section are
indications that the composer,
far from trying to fit
Shakespeare's play into the mold of Italain opera, has in
fact generated a new form of his own.
For example, the
brindisi ends not with general merry­
making, but with Macbeth's struggle to rid himself of the
vision of Banquo's ghost, while the chorus expresses wonder
at what they have witnessed:
Mac
Quant'altri, io p u r oso
Diventa p u r tigre, lion
minaccioso
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182
Mac
LM
Mac
LM
Mac
Tut
M 'abbranca...M acbetto trem ar
n o n vedrai,
Conocer potrai—s'io provi
tim or...
Ma fuggi!...deh fuggi fantasma
tremendo!
Il'ombra sparisce)
La vita riprendo!
{piano a Mac.) Vergogna, Signor!
Sangue a me quell'ombra chiede
E l'avra, l'avra, lo giuro!
II velame del futuro
Aile Streghe io squarciero.
(a Mac.) Spirto imbelle! II tuo
spavento
Vane larve t'ha creato.
II delitto e consumato;
Chi mori to m a r non puo.
(fra se) Biechi arcani!.. .s'abbandoni
Q uesta terra; o r ch'ella e retta
Da una mano maledetta
V iber solo il reo vi puo.
Biechi arcani! sgomentato
Da fantasmi egli ha parlato!
U no speco di ladroni
Q uesta terra divento.
Mac
Ma fuggi ora, fuggi dai miei
occhi, larva terribile, visione
infemale. (larva svanisce)
io ridivengo uomo.
Mac
Sangue egli chiede, e l'avra; il
sangue, dicono, chiama sangue.
[...] Dimani, si, dimani andro
innanzi alle tre Furie, e le forzero
a rivelarmi tu tto cio che nel
aw enire mi aspetta.
FINE DELL’A TT O SECONDO
Verdi demonstrated bril]liant dramatic ingenuity when he
infused new meaning into a conventional brindisi by thrust­
ing it twice amid the selling dramatic tension generated by
the appearance of Banquo's ghost and Macbeth's psychic col­
lapse. For this reason, when examing the language of Verdi's
libretto, we should think not only in literal textual terms
but also in terms of Verdi's operatic dramaturgy. For just
as words take their meaning from context, Verdi's scenic
juxtapositions, the "p o s i z i o n i "
that form part and parcel
of his musico-dramatic language, often create dramatic
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183
significance that overrides the banality of the text.
As his innovations suggest, Verdi was able to carry
forward the reforms of his predecessors largely because he
viewed each of his operas not as a collection of stylized
formulas but as a separate and individual drama. No Italian
composer had approached texts with a stronger determination
to bring them to the operatic stage, to the extent that
conventions allowed, with more fidelity. For this reason,
Verdi's contimual search for an economical but dramatically
charged language is inextricably linked to the formal inno­
vations he wrought in Macbeth.
The main point here is that Verdi's first encounter
with a text by Shakespeare determined and influenced his
dramaturgy not only for his opera Macbeth but also his
future work, for we find similar extended scenes in the
introduzioni of Rigoletto and La Traviata the Act III finale
of Aroldo, and the Act III finale of Un Ballo in maschera.10
The third act of Verdi's Macbeth is given over entirely
to Macbeth's encounter with the witches and the visions they
conjure. For this reason, the act, although marked with
three scene divisions,
forms a single taut dramatic unit,
replete with stage machinery, theatrical lighting effects
and dance. Moreover,
the intial incantations of the witches
are full of the strange language Verdi had insisted upon for
his witches:
10 John Knowles, " T h e Banquet Scene form Verdi'e ’Macbeth': An
Experiment in Large-Scale Form." Sourcebook, 284-92.
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184
Libretto
I.
II.
III.
T ut
I.
II.
Act III, i
Un oscura Cavema: nel mezzo
una Caldaja che bolle. Yuon e
lampi.
Streghe
Tre volte miagola la gatta in
collera,
Tre volte l'uppupa lamenta ed
ulula,
Tre volte l'istrisce guaisce al
vento.
Questo e il mom ento.
Su via! sollecite giriam la
pentola,
Mesciamvi in circolo possenti
instingoli;
Sirocchie, all'opra! L'acqua gia
fuma
Crepita, e spuma.
T u rospo venefico
Che suggi l'acconito,
T u vepre, tu radica
Sbarbata al crepuscolo,
Va, cuoci e gorgoglia
Nel vaso infernal.
T u lingua di vipera
T u pelo di nottola,
T u sangue di scimmia,
T u dente di bottolo,
Va, bolli e t'aw oltola
Nel brodo infernal.
Rusconi's " gatto-tigre"
RuBConi
Act IV, i
Un 'oscura cavema; nel mezzo
una caldaja che bolle, Tuona.
(Entrano le tre Streghe)
I.
Tre volte il gatto-tigre ha
miagolato.
[...]
III.
ci dice: E tempo, e tempo.
[...]
[...] il pelo d'una nottola [...]
la caldaja col sangue di scimmia
[...] denti di lupo [...]
brilli il fuoco, a la caldaja bolle
[...]
has been tamed to " l a
gatta." More important, though, we find a number of lines
that are not in Rusconi. They appear to have been chosen
primarily for their sound. For example,
Tre volte l'upupa lamenta ed ulula,
Tre volte l'istrisce guaisce al vento.
Verdi and his librettist seem to have taken a number of
ingredients for the witches' brew directly form Rusconi— il
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185
pelo d'una nottola; sangue di scimmia. Some have undergone
slight transformations. For example, Rusconi's xxnaso d'un
Turco," and " fegato di un empio Ebreo"
tartaro" and " c o r d'un eretico."
become xx labbro di
Other ingredients appear
only in the libretto— " r o s p o venefico; vepre; radica."
Re­
gardless of origin, when mixed together in the ominous
witches' cauldron, all bubble as forebodingly as Shake­
speare's " e y e of newt, and toe of frog."
III.
Tut.
T u dito d'un pargolo
Strozzato nel nascere,
T u labbro di tartaro,
T u cor d ’un eretico,
Va dentro, e consolida
La polta infemale
{danzano intom o)
E voi Spirti
Negri e candidi,
Rossi e ceruli,
Rimescete!
Voi che mescere
Ben sapete
Rimescete!
Rimescete!
[...] naso d'un Turco [...]
fegato di un empio Ebreo [...]
(eseguiscono il cammando
d'Ecate, cantando d o che segue)
Spirti neri e bianchi, spirti
azzurri e grigi, fondete, fondete,
fondete, voi che mescolar sapete.
As the dance comes to an end, Macbeth makes his
entrance, and when he asks about what they are doing, the
witches answer with a literal rendering from Rusconi,
" Un
opra senza nome."
Libretto
Rusconi
Act III, ii
{entra Macbeth)
Macbeth, Je precedenti.
Mac
.Str
Mac
Che fate voi misteriose donne?
U n'opra senza nome.
Per quest'opra infemale io vi
scongiuro!
Act IV, i
Mac
T ut
Mac
[...] nere e misteriose Streghe [...]
che state facendo?
LJn'opra senza nome.
Io vi scongiuro per quell'arte che
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186
Mac
Str
Mac
Str
Mac
StT
Mac
Str
Str
Ch'io sappia il mio destin, se
cielo, e terra
Dovessero innovar l'antica
guerra.
Dalle incognite Posse udir lo
vuoi
Cui m inistre obbediamo,
o w e r da noi?
Evocatele pur, se del futuro
Mi possono chiarir l'enigma
oscuro.
Dalle basse, a dall'alte dimore,
Spirti erranti, salite, scendete!
(scoppia un fulmine, e sorge da
terra un capo coperto d ’elmo)
Dimmi o spirto...
T h a letto nel core;
Taci, e n'odi le voci segrete.
(A pparizione)
O M acbetto! M acbetto! Macbetto!
Da Macduffo ti guarda
prudente.
T u m'afforzi l'intero sospetto!
Solo un m otto... (sparisce)
Richieste non vuole
Ecco un'altro di lui piu possente.
( Tuono: apparisce un fanciullo
insanguinato)
Taci, e n'odi le occulte parole.
Mac
professate, di rispondermi; e sia
qual voglia il mezzo per cui potrete arrivare a conoscere i
segreti del mio destino f...]
Mac
Evocateli, ne son lieto [...]
Tut
Avanti, avanti spiriti dell'alte e
im e regioni; apparite, apparite, e
riem pite con amore i vostri
uffici.
Mac
I.
Ignoto spirito, dimmi...
Ei conosce i tuoi pensieri; odilo,
e ristati dalle dimande.
(La apparizione con voce di
tuono) Macbeth! Macbeth!
Macbeth! guardati da Macduff!
(ricade in terra)
Mac
I.
{...] un istante odimi
Desisti dall'inchiesta, o rivolgila
a p iu potente visione. {...]
(un colpo d i tuono, e con esso
l'apparizione d'un fanciullo
insanguinato)
As can readily be seen from these side-by-side
comparisons of Verdi's libretto and the translation from
which he worked,
the composer remains equally close to
Shakespeare's drama and Rusconi's text as the witches
continue to conjure their visions for Macbeth:
(Apparizione)
O M acbetto! M acbetto!
Macbetto!
Esser pu oi sanguinario, feroce
Apparizione: Macbeth! Mac­
beth! Macbeth! Sii sanguinario,
intrepido [...] niun mortale
p artorito di donna pud nuocere
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187
Mac
Mac
Mac
Str
Mac
I.
II.
III.
T ut
Mac
Nessun nato da donna ti nuoce
(sparisce)
La tua vita, Macduffo perdono...
No!...morrai! sul regale mio
petto
Doppio usbergo sara la tua
morte.
( Tuoni e lampi: sorge un
fanciullo coronato che porta
un'arboscelld)
Ma che aw isa quel lampo,
quel tuono?
U n fanciullo con serto del Re!
Taci, ed odi.
(Apparizione) Sta d'anima forte
Glorioso invincibile sarai
Fin che il bosco d i Bima vedrai
Rawiarsi e venir contra te.
(sparisce)
Lieto augurio! Per magica possa
Selva alcuna fin o r n o n fu
mossa.
\
O r mi dite! Salire a m io soglio
La progenie di Banco dovra?
N on cercarlo!
Lo voglio! Lo voglio!
O su voi la mia spada cadra.
(La caldaja cala sotterra)
La caldaja e scomparsa?
perche?
(Suono sotterraneo d i
comamusa.)
Qual concento! Parlate! Che
v'e?
Apparite!
Apparite!
Apparite!
Poi qual nebbia di nuovo sparite
(O tto Re passano uno dopo
1'altro. Da ultimo viene Banco
con uno specchio in mano.)
(al primd)
Fuggi, o regal fantasima,
Che Banco a me rammenti!
La tua corona e folgore,
Gli occhi mi fai roventi!
a Macbeth, (scompare)
Mac
Vivi, dunque, Macduff [...] Ma
no; mi sia la tua m orte duplice
guarentigia di sicurezza f...]
Mac
Qual nuovo fantasima e questo,
che sorge come figlio di re f...]?
Mac
Tut
Mac
I.
II.
III.
Mac
(Fantasima) Sii intrepido e feroce
come un lione, Macbeth [...] tu
non sarai vinto che quando la
vasta selva di Bimam ti si fara
incontro [...] (svanisce)
Dolce predizione! ineffabile
felicita!
[...] ditem i se la stirpe di Banquo
regnera u n di in questo regno.
N on ricercame di piu.
Rispondetemi; Io esige [...]
(la caldaia magica viene
inghiottita dalla terra)
Ma perche e scomparsa quella
caldaia [...]
Guarda!
Guarda!
Guarda!
(otto re compariscono in fila, e
passano uno dietro 1'altro;
l'ultimo d'essi, Banquo, ha uno
specchio magico in mano)
(al primd)
Tu rasomigli troppo all'ombra di
Banquo [...] la corona che cingi
m'intenebra la vista [...]
u
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188
Mac
Mac
Str
Mac
Str
{al secondo)
Via, spaventoso immagine,
Che il crin di bende hai cinto!
Ed altri ancor ne sorgono?...
Mac
U n terzo?...un quarto?...un
quinto?
O mio terro r .’...dell'ultimo
Splende uno speglio in mano,
E nuovi Re attergano
D entro al cristallo arcano...
E Banco!...ahi vista orribile!
Ridendo a me gli addita?
M uori fatal progenie!...{trae
la spada, s'awenta agli spettri,
p o i si arretra)
Ah! che no n hai tu vita!
{alle Streghe)
Vivran costor?
Vivranno.
O me perduto!
(perde i sensi)
Ei svenne!... Aerei spirti,
Ridonate la mente al Re svenuto!
{Scendono gli spirti, e mentre
Str
danzano intom o a Macbeth, le
Streghe cantano il seguente)
{agli altri)
Ma un terzo, un quarto, un
quinto [...]
[..J
O rrenda vista! [...] e Banquo [...]
e mi addita i suoi disendenti!
[-.]
{Macbeth, colpito d'orrore, cade
privo d i sens/) [...]
M entre che faro uscir dall'aere i
soavi concenti, danzategli
intom o, e ritom ategli la smarrita
energia. {una musica deliziosa
incomincia, al suono d i cui le
streghe danzano intom o a
Macbeth, e poscia scompaiono)
In addition to Verdi's close adherence to the drama
throughou this entire encounter between Macbeth and the
witches, we find another striking example of the composer's
dramaturgy exemplified by his compact, dramatically charged
language. For example, at one stage in the preparation of
the libretto, a part of the exchange between Macbeth and the
witches read this way:
Mac:
{alle streghe)
Vivran costor? Ditelo
Str:
Sara come hai veduto!
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189
But in the final version we find:
Macbeth:
Vivran costor?
Le Streghe:
Vivranno!
Macbeth:
Oh me perduto!
True, the first version was part of a series of q u a t ­
rains set in settenario meter, which means the change could
have been the consequence of having to switch from versi
lirici to recitativo at this point. Nevertheless, once the
change to recitativo was decided, Verdi could still have
retained the text of the first version by simply using a
couplet set in recitativo. Instead, the entire exchange is
delivered in the final rendering by a single taut endecasillabo that travels from the utterances of Macbeth, to the
witches, then back again to Macbeth. As Macbeth listens in
horror, the witches convey to him the calamitous news —
Banquo1s offspring will live— by means of a single word.
Realizing all is lost, Macbeth, unlike Shakespeare's
character in the play,
faints. Verdi of course is following
Rusconi here. While Macbeth lies senseless, aerial spirits
dance around him:
Libretto
Act III, iii
Coro
Ondine, e Silfidi
Dall'ali candide
Su quella pallida
Fronte spirale,
Rusconi
(There are no
equivalent lines in
either Shakespeare or
Rusconi for the words
accompanying the dance
of the spirits.)
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190
Tessete in vortice
Carole armoniche,
E sensi, ed anima
Gli confortate.
{Spiriti e Streghe spariscono)
The act comes to an end with a brief scene that finds
Macbeth regaining his senses and swearing vengeance on
Macduff and his family:
Libretto
Act III, iv
Rusconi
Act IV, iii
Macbeth (riviene)
Mac
Ove son'io?.. .fuggiro!.. .O h sia
ne'secoli
Maledetta quest'ora in
sempitemo!
Vola il tem po, o M acbetto, e il
tuo potere
Dei per opre affermar, non per
chimere.
Vada in fiamme, e in polve
cada
L'alta rocca di Macduffo!
Figli, sposa a fil di spada;
Scorra il sangue a me fatal.
L'ira mia, la mia vendetta
Per la Scozia si diffonda,
Come fiera in cor m'abbonda
Come l'anima mi assal.
Mac
Ove son esse? [...] tutto svani?...
Oh! possa quest'ora funesta
esser maledettta per tutta
l'etemita?
[...]
[...] ad assalire il castello di
Macduff, per passarvi a fil di
spada consorte e figli, [...]
Vendetta, vendetta! [...]
FINE DELL’A TTO TERZO
At the opening of the fourth act, we are once more in
th eworld of Italian opera, as the chorus sings about an
oppressed country. The reference of course is to Scotland
under Macbeth's rule, but we cannot ignore the implications
of the text for Italy on the verge of the uprisings of 1848.
Again, because th chorus here is a formal operatic piece,
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191
Verdi's text only vaguely reflects what we find in Rusconi:
Libretto
Act IV, i
Rusconi
Luogo deserto ai Confini della
Scozia, e dell'Inghilterra. In
distanza la foresta d i Bimam.
Cor
Patria oppressa! il dolce nome
No, di madre aver nonpuoi,
O r che tutta a'figli tuoi
Sei conversa in un avel!
D'orfanelli, e di piangenti
Chi lo sposo, e chi la prole
Al venir di nuovo Sole
S'alza un grido e fere il Ciel,
A quel grido il Ciel risponde
Quasi viglia impietosito
Propagar per l'infinito,
Patria oppressa, il tu o dolor.
Suona a m orto ognor la squilla,
Ma nessuno audace e tanto
Che p u r doni un vano pianto
A chi sofffe, ed a chi muor.
Act IV, iii
Inghilterra — Una stanza del
regio palazzo.
M df
Perisci, perisci, sciagurata patria;
e tu, o tirannia, raffermati sulle
tue fondamenta, e la virtu non
osi reprim ere i tuoi furori.
[...]
At the conclusion of the chorus, Macduff enters t sing
an affecting romanza, lamenting the loss of his children:
M df
O figli, o figli miei! da quel
tiranno
Tutti uccisi voi foste, e insiem
con voi
La madre sventurata!...e fra gli
artigli
Di quel tigre io lascai la madre, e
i figli?
O h, la patem a mano
N on vi fu scudo, o cari,
Dai perfidi sicari
Che a m orte vi ferir!
E me fuggiasco, occulto
Voi chiamavate in vano
Coll'ultimo singulto
Coll'ultimo respir.
Trammi al tiranno in faccia
Signore! e s'ei mi sfugge
M df
O h la mia sposa!...i figli miei!
Sconsigliato Macduff, tu fosti
cagione della loro morte;
l'im prow iso tuo bando segno la
loro sentenza.
[•••]
Ma, o giusto Cielo, [...] pommi
di fronte al mio abborito nemico; pomm i alia distanza della
mia spada dal suo cuore; e s'ei
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192
M df
Possa a colui le braccia
Del tuo perdono aprir.
M df
mi sfugge, tu pure allora gli
perdona,
Malcolm arrives, leading the English troops. He joins
Macduff in a stirring duet that is reinforced by the chorus.
Thus far, Verdi is staying close to the norms of nineteenthcentury Italian opera.
Libretto
Act IV, ii
Rusconi
A lsuono d i tamburo entra
Malcolm conducendo m olti
soldati inglesi.
Mai
Cor
Mai
M df
Mai
Tut
Dove siam?
La foresta di Bimamo.
Svelga ognuno, e porti un
ramo,
Che lo asconda, innanzi a se.
(a Mdf) Ti conforti la vendetta.
N on l'avro!.. .di fig'i e privo!
C hi non odia il suol nativo
Prenda l'armi, e segua me.
(Malcolm e Macduffimpugnano
le spade)
La patria tradita
Piangendo ne invita!
Fratelli! gli oppressi
Corriam a salvar.
Gia l'ira divina
Sull'empio ruina;
Gli orribili eccessi
L’Etem o stancar.
Act V, iv
La selva d i Bimam.
Con tamburi e bandiere entrano
Malcolm, il vecchio Seward, suo
figlio, Macduff, Menteth, Cathness, Angus, Lenox, Rosse, e
soldati.
Sew
M en
Mai
Sew
[...] Qual e codesta selva?
II bosco di Bimam.
Ogni soldato ne sfrondi un
ramuscello, e lo porti solievato
dinanzi a sO.
[...]
I tempi si aw icinano, in cui
debbono fissarsi le nostre sorti.
A queste, e siano qual si
vogliano, andiam o fidenti
incontro, e rinunciando alle vane
speculazioni apprestiamoci alle
opere.
(escono)
with a change to a room in Macbeth's castle, we come to
one of Verdi's most affecting innovations, Lady Macbeth’s
sleepwalking scene. Like most of Verdi's innovations in
Macbeth, the scene is laid out on an unusually large scale.
Although there are two scene divisions indicated in the
libretto, the scene remains the same throughout:
Libretto
Act IV, iii
Rusconi
Act V, i
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193
Scena nel Castello d i Macbeth,
come nell'Atto Primo
Notte.
Medico e Dama d i Lady Mac'
beth.
Dunsinane — Camera nel
castello.
(Entra un Medico con una Dama
della Regina)
Med
Med
Dam
Med
Dam
Vegliamo invan due notti.
In questa apparira.
D i che parlava
Nel suo sonno?
Ridirlo
N on debbo ad uom che viva...
Eccola!...
Libretto
Act V, iv
Lady Macbeth, e precedents
Son gia due notti che veglio con
voi, ne posso ancora intraw edere la verita del vostro
racconto. [...] Ma ditemi; in
questo sonno ambulante, oltre
alle azioni di cui mi parlaste,
l'avete mai udita proferire alcuna
parola? [...]
Dam N on le confiderd ne a voi ne ad
alcun altro [...]
Rusconi
Act V, i
(Entra Lady Macbeth sonnam bula con una torcia in mano)
Med
U n lume
Recasi in man?
Dam
La lampada che sempre
Si tiene a canto al letto.
Med
O h come gli occhi
Spalanca!
Dam
E pur non vede.
Med Perche sfrega la man?
Dam
Lavarsi crede!
LM
Una macchia qui tuttora...
Via, ti dico, o maledetta!...
Una...due...gli e questa l'ora!
Tremi tu?...non osi entrar?
U n guerrier cosi codardo?
O h vergognaL.orsu
t'affretta!...
Chi poteva in quel vegliardo
Tan to sangue immaginar?
Med Che parlo?
LM
Di Fiffe il
Sire
Sposo e padre or o r non era?...
Che n'awenne?...e mai pulire
Dam Queste mani io n on sapro?...
LM
O h terror!...
Di sangue um ano
Med Dove ha trovato quella torcia?
Dam Accanto al suo letto, awegnache
tenga sempre il lume la notte.
Med Guardate come spalanca gli
occhi!
Dam Si, ma dorm e.
Med Che fa ora? perche si stroppica le
mani? [...]
Dam [...] par creda lavarsi [...]
Ma la macchia v"e sempre! [...]
LM
Cancellati, esecrabile macchia...
cancellati, dico! U na...due...due
ore...e tem po di agire. [...] Oh!
via, M acbeth, via! un guerriero
aver timore? [...]
Pero chi avrebbe creduto che il
dannato vecchio avesse tanto
sangue nelle vene?
Med Com prendete cio?
LM 11 Thane di Fife aveva una
moglie; dov'e ora?...Ma queste
mani n o n diveranno dunque piu
terse? [...] Q uest'odore di sangue
per tu tto mi segue...! piu eletti
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194
LM
Med
LM
Med
LM
Dam
Sa qui sempre...Arabia intera
Rimondar si piccol mano
Coi suoi balsami n on puo.
Oime!...
Geme?
I panni
indossa
Della notte...or via ti
abbratta!...
Banco e spento, e dalla fossa
Chi m ori non surse ancor.
Questo a presso?...
A letto, a letto...
Sfar n o n puoi la cosa fatta...
Batte alcuno!...andiam,
Macbetto,
N on t’accusi il tuo pallor.
Ah, di lei, pieta, Signor!
LM
M ed
LM
M ed
LM
M ed
profum i dell'Arabia non
varanno a render tersa questa
piccola mano. (geme con ansia)
Oh! Oh! Oh!
Qual sospiro e mai questo! [...]
Indossa la tunica nottum a [...]
Banquo e sepolito, e non uscira
dal suo avello.
E questo ancora?
A letto, a letto;
battono alia porta. [...] il fatto
irreparabile...
a letto, a letto. (esce Lady Macbeth)
O Dio, Dio, abbiate pieta di tu tti
Mad scenes were featured in Italian opera long before
Verdi's Macbeth, but they required the soprano to exhibit
the full range of vocal pyrotechnics before collapsing in a
heap behind the footlights. By contrast, Verdi's mad scene
departs from traditin by concluding not with a cabaletta,
but by trailing off into a whisper.
After Lady Macbeth departs, the scene changes to a room
in Dunsinane Castle where Macbeth sits pondering his fate
and the prophecies delivered by the witches. From an o f f ­
stage shout, we learn of Lady Macbeth's death, which is
confirmed by the brief report of a messenger in scene six.
Libretto
Act IV, v
RuBconi
Sala nel Castello. Macbeth.
Mac
Perfidi! All'Angolo contra me
v'unite!
Le potenze presaghe han
profetato
Act V, iii
Dunsinane — Una stanza d el
castello.
Mac
N on ho nulla da temere [...] Gli
spiriti aerei, che presentano ogni
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195
Mac
Mac
“ Esserpuoi sanguinario, feroce,
Messun nato d i dama ti nuoce.”
N o, non temo di voi, ne del
fanciullo
Che vi conduce! Raffermar sul
trono
Q uesto assalto mi debbe,
O sbalzarmi per sem pre...Eppur
la vita
Sento nelle mie fibre inardita!
Pieta, rispetto, amore,
Conforto ai di cadenti
N on spargeran d'un fiore
La tua canuta eta.
Ne sul tuo regio sasso
Sperar soavi accendi:
Sol la bestemmia, ahi lasso!
La nenia tua sara.
(Grida in temo) Ella e morta!
Qual gemito?
Mac
sventura, dissero: Macbeth, non
temer nulla d'uomo partorito di
femmina.
[-]
[...] le armi; rivestimi delle mie
ami. O trono, ti possiedo; ne ti
perdero finche mi rimanga la
vita.
The action proceeds quickly throughout the next three
brief scenes. Malcolm orders his troops to discard the
branches they carried during their advance on Macbeth's
castle; Macbeth and Macduff fight; Macbeth taunts his oppo­
nent with references to his invincibility; and finally,
Macbeth, realizing he is doomed,
Libretto
Rusconi
Act IV, vi
Dama della Regina, e Macbeth
Dam
Mac
E m orta
La Regina!...
(pensoso) La vita!.. .che importa?...
£ il racconto d'un povero idiota;
V ento e suono che nulla dinota!
Dama parte)
falls wounded:
Sey
Mac
Act V, v
II castello d i Dunsinane.
Macbeth, Seyton, e soldati in
armi.
Signore, la regina e morta. [...]
[...] la vita altro non e che [...]
una favola narrata da un idiota
con enfasi di gesti e di suoni, e
che alia fine non significa nulla.
[-]
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196
Libretto
Act IV, vii
Rusconi
Coro d i Guerrieri, e Macbeth
Cor
Mac
C or
Mac
C or
Sire! ah Sire!
Che fu?,..quali
nuove?
La foresta di Bima si muove!
(attonito ) M'hai deluso presagio
infemale!...
Qui l'usbergo, la spada, il
pugnale!
Prodi all'armi! La morte, o la
gloria.
D unque all'armi! si, o morte, o
vittoria.
(Suono intero di trombe. Intanto
la scena si muta, e presenta una
vasta pianura. II fondo e occupato da soldati inglesi, i quali
lentemente si avansano, portando ciascheduno una fronda
innansi a se.)
Libretto
Avt V, v
(Entra un corriere)
Mac
C or
Mac
Mac
Act IV, viii
Qual cosa rechi?
[...] girai a caso gli occhi dal lato
di Bimam, e vidi [...] tutta la
selva in moto.
Vil menzognero!
[...]
All'armi, all'armi; suonino a
storm o le campane [...]
Rusconi
Act V, vi
Malcolm, Macduff, e Soldati
Mai
Via le fronde, e mano all'armi!
Mi seguite! (Mai. Mdf., e Sob
dati partono)
(Grida d i dentro) All'armi!
all'armi!
(di dentro odesi il fragora della
battaglia.)
Libretto
Mai
Act IV, ix
Fermiamoci qui; e voi — soldati,
gittate quei rami e mostratevi
quali veramente siete.
Rusconi
Act V, vii
Macbet, incalzato da Macduff.
M df
Mac
T h o giunto alfin, camefice
De'figli miei!
Fatato
Son'io! non puoi traffigermi,
T u d'una donna nato.
M df
Mac
Volgiti, m ostro d'infemo, e mi
guarda. [...]
Son vani i toui forzi [.,.] la mia
vita e difesa da potenze
soprannaturale [...]
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197
M df
Mac
Nato io non son, ma tolto
Fui dal m atem o sen.
M isero me! che ascolto!
Ah! tu mi resti almen!
(brandendo la spada)
(combattono, Macbeth cade)
M df
ti insegni che M acduff fu
strappato col ferro dal fianco
m atem o assai prim a del termine
a cio fissato da natura.
Bowing to convention, Verdi assigns Macbeth a closing
death scene. At ts conclusion,
the act comes to a close with
the crowd hailing Malcolm as their new ruler:
Libretto
Act IV, x
Rusconi
Act V, vii
I precedent!. Malcolm, seguito
da soldati inglesi, i quali
trascinano dietro prigionieri
quelli d i Macbeth.
Mai
V ittoria!.. .ove s'e fitto
L'usurpator?
M df (accenando Macbeth) Trafitto!
Mac (alzandosi a stento da terra)
Mai per me che m’affidai
Ne' presagi dell'inferno!...
T utto il sangue ch'io versai
G rida in faccia dell'Etemo!...
Sulla ffonte ... maledetta ...
Sfolgoro ... la tua vendetta!...
M uojo...al Cielo...al m ondo in
ira,
Vii corona!.,.e sol per te!
(muore)
M df Scozia afflitta, ormai respira!
T ut
O r M alcolmo e il nostro Re.
M df
II m ondo e libero infine di
questo m ostro {...]
(Since Macbeth is slain
off stage in the play,
there is no parallel
passage in Rusconi for
Ma c b e t h 1s death scene.)
M df
Viva il re di Scozia!
Not too long before Verdi wrote his Macbeth libretto, a
number of events had taken place in literary circles that
were to have a significant impact in shaping Verdi's concept
of Shakespeare. For example, August Wilhelm Schlegel, one of
the chief forces in the dissemination of knowledge about
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198
Shakespeare in Europe after the turn of the century, began
delivering a series of lectures at Vienna in 1808. His Vorlesungen uber dramatische Kunst vnd Literatur, were p u b ­
lished between 1809 and 1811,
subsequently appearing in
Italy, translated by Giovanni Gherardini,
in 1817. Shortly
thereafter, readers of Michele Leoni's Italian translations
of Shakespeare found Gherardini's translations of Schlegel1s
commentaries attached as prefaces to the plays. In 1838, the
publisher of Carlo Rusconi's translations of Shakespeare's
complete works continued the practice of using Schlegel's
commentaries as introductory essays.
Verdi unquestionably knew Schlegel's essay on Macbeth,
since it had been appended to the play in Rusconi's transla­
tion, Verdi's principal source for his opera, in his essay,
Schlegel discussed at some length the role of the witches.
They represented, he said, not "infernal divinities" but
"ignoble and vulgar instruments of hel l . " He then criti­
cized " a German p o et"
for having transformed them into " a
mixture of fates, furies, and enchantresses."
Schlegel's
reference was to Schiller, whose version of macbeth cast
Shakespeare's play as a tragedy of fate. We might therefore
consider Schlegel as a a significant influence on Verdi's
concept of Macbeth, since, as Verdi's libretto shows, the
composer seems to have followed his views. He clearly
avoided casting as a pawn of fate who struggles to assert
his free will against the forces of a ruling destiny.
Instead, Verdi's opera, like Shakespeare's drama, can be
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199
seen as a morality play in which guilt-ridden protagonists
struggle against the merciless jibes of unappeasable con­
science.
Moreover, when Verdi instructed Piave to use a " s u b ­
lime diction, except for the witches choruses," he was
undoubtedly echoing Schlegel's observation that Shakespeare
had "created for them a particular language"
to be a collection of formulae."
that "se e m s
In an Italian version of
Schlegel's essay that Verdi authorized to be included with
an edition of his opera's libretto in 1848, we read,
"the
witches speak like women of the lowest classes.. .but when
they address Macbeth, they assume a loftier t o n e . " 11 Of
their prophecies, Schlegel said that they have the "obscure
brevity, the majestic solemnity of oracles, such as ever
spread terror among mortals."
Focusing on Shakespeare's
power to excite terror, Schlegel called the murder of Duncan
a "monstrous crime," and then listed as the most striking
scenes of the play:
" t h e murder of Duncan; the phantom d a g ­
ger that hovers before the eyes of Macbeth; the vision of
Banquo at the feast; the nocturnal entry of Lady Macbeth
while walking in her s l e e p . " 12
Verdi's opera bears striking parallels with Schlegel's
critical views,
for not only did the composer give a p romi­
11 " L e streghe parlan tra loro a guisa di donne volgari; e tali hanno
ad essere: ma il loro tuono s 'innalza quando 1' indirrizzano a Mac­
betto.'' From the version included with Leoni's Macbeth transaltion,
1820.
12 My source for Schlegel's essay is John Black's English translation,
revised by A. J. W. Morrison. London, 1846. Sourcebook, 346-8.
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200
nent role to the witches, he also fashioned the key scenes
of his opera in accordance with the scenes Schlegel had e n u ­
merated. Furthermore,
it is in these scenes that Verdi
departed most radically from operatic conventions. As this
study of Verdi's Macbeth libretto shows, the composer's
operatic dramaturgy was shaped by a libretto that had been
influenced by contemporary translations and literary atti­
tudes toward Shakespeare. To serve the dramatic requirements
of a poet he admired, Verdi had readily abandoned well-worn
paths, preferring a good recitativo to measured lyrics that
were mediocre, and when the text demanded, willingly d i s ­
carded rhyme and meter to serve the action.13
13 Verdi himself said as much. "Preferisco un buon recitativo che
delle strofe liriche raediocri." Pascolato, 81. Also, "...quando
l'azione lo domanda, abbandonerei subito ritmo, rima, strofa; farei dei
versi sciolti per poter dire chiaro e netto tutto quello che l'azione
esige." F. Torrefranca, ” Verdi contra Verdi (appunti p er una eeegesi
verdiana." Rassegna contemporanea. VI (1913): 368. Cited by Goldin.
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201
CHAPTER VIII
Critical Reaction to Verdi's Macbeth:
Concluding Remarks
At the time of the first performance of Verdi's M a c ­
beth, reviewers customarily provided their readers with plot
synopses and detailed descriptions of the audience's reac­
tion to what they were hearing for the first time. Most
critics concurred that Verdi had been well received for his
music, and one commentator even reported that at the second
performance " t h e public passed from the restraint of the
first night to a furor of p l a u d i t s , " 1 and the composer had
to be "es c o r t e d to the doors of his hotel by a cheering
swarm of Florence's finest y o u t h . " 2
Furthermore,
there was
almost unanimous agreement that the sections of the opera
that had drawn the most enthusiasm from the audience were
the opening witches' chorus, the Act I duet, and the Act II
assassins' chorus. Verdi was to leave these sections
untouched when he revised his score for its Paris production
in 1865.
When it came to the question of the opera's libretto,
however,
Piave took the brunt of the critics'
scorn and
derision. Piave, one reviewer said outright, had not done
justice to the composer of Macbeth, and since the librettist
had never written anything of merit previously,
there was no
1 From "Recenti Notizie di Firenze: Macbeth," which reported on local
musical events. Dated March 16, 1847, it appeared in the Gazzetta
musicale di Milano. Sourcebook, 375-6
2 Montazio. Rivista di Firenze, March 17, 1847. Rpt. Gazzetta musicale
di Milano, March 21st edition. Sourcebook, 376.
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202
reason to expect anything respectable in this libretto.
Moreover,
to avoid accusing the composer of " b a d taste and
poor judgment,"
the writer said he refused to believe r e ­
ports that Verdi had been especially fond of this particular
libretto. Focusing upon the witches and the world of Verdi's
" gener e fantastico,"
composer:
he concluded by counseling the
" W e r e it possible to offer advice when not bidden
to do so, I should tell the fortunate maestro not to pick
any more fantastic subjects.... " 3
Another reviewer, Alessandro Gagliardi, hailed Verdi as
the successor to Rossini, Bellini, and Donizetti, but was
extremely vituperative with Piave.
tell y o u , "
he wrote,
" I must first of all
" t hat in all the time that horrible
librettos have been heard in Italy (and that is a long time
indeed), none I know has been worse than Macbeth.’,A He
found the dramatic structure of Macbeth " d e p l o r a b l e "
said he could not imagine more "ridiculous p o e t r y "
and
than
what Piave had written for this opera. He expressed surprise
that such " b a l d e r d a s h "
as the Macbeth libretto could
appear in an Italian city that prided itself on " t h e best
preserved literary tradition, a city where the language is
still generally respected." When he described the opera's
plot, Gagliardi said that the librettist had " m o r e or less
3 The article, signed "D. J.," appeared in Antonio Calvi's
Ricoglitore and was printed in Bazar of Milan, March 24, 1847.
Sourcebook, 374.
4 Alessandro Gagliardi, Revue et Gazette Muaicale, March 28, 1847.
Sourcebook, 376-79.
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203
followed Shakespeare's play without changes." Gagliardi was
astute enough, however, to notice that Verdi had taken
advantage of the demands of Shakespeare's text to fashion
" a new style and even a new manner."
In contrast with what
some of the other critics had said about the opera's recep­
tion, Gagliardi closed his article, implying that Macbeth
had been only a partial success with the audience. He noted
that the first two acts had been favorably received but that
the public had been " i c y "
toward the last two. He then
hinted that certain arrangements had been made, presumably
on the part of the impressario,
to have the last two acts,
which Gagliardi said he had found boring, vigorously
applauded. After attacking the deficiencies of the libretto,
he concluded by asking rhetorically,
"What could a maestro,
even one of the highest merit, extract from the poem of M a c ­
beth? *'
There may be some truth to Gagliardi's claim that the
audience had found parts of the opera unintelligible and had
reacted coolly to them. The tenor varesi had also noted the
audience's bewilderment when he wrote that although " t h e
Maestro" had been called on the stage more than twenty-four
times and three numbers had to be repeated, the work
"wasn't completely understood,
as we had foreseen."5 v a ­
resi was sufficiently astute to understand the uniqueness of
Verdi's latest opera, and recognized that the composer's
5
Varesi to Ranzanici. 17 March 1847. Sourcebook, 54.
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204
" n e w style,"
as he called it, had been necessitated by the
fantastical nature of Shakespeare's tragedy. He pronounced
as numbers of " t r u e genius"
introduction,
the witches' chorus in the
the duet for Macbeth and Lady Macbeth during
the assassination of the king, and the sleepwalking scene.
in a letter to Verdi, the poet Giusti also remarked on
the audience's confusion and joined the critics in their
objections to the " ge n e r e fantastico.•' Giusti told Verdi
that " t h e excellence of certain things is not grasped at
once," and added that the more the opera will be performed,
the more it would be "understood and enjoyed." Giusti,
like the critics,
felt that the " g e n e r e fantastico"
be­
longed to foreign cultures and strongly objected to Verdi's
having made use of it. Consequently, he vigorously coun­
selled the composer by saying,
" I would like all Italians
of genius to contract a full marriage with Italian art, and
to shun fair siren songs of foreign liaisons."6 One commen­
tator bluntly called the opera " u n a vera p o r c h e r i a , " 1 but
by far, the most scathing attack on Piave came from Montazio, whose article entitled,
"Macbeth: Profanation in Four
Acts b y F. M. Piave, •’ clearly announced the tone of what
was to follow. Using terms of gross ridicule, Montazio made
clear that he was "setting out to bone the baroque carcass
of the Balaam's ass brought forth by the fecund mind of
Piave." About the trappings of the Verdi's genere fantas-
6
7
Giusti to Verdi. 19 March 1847. Sourcebook, 56.
Abbiati I, 687. Cited by Budden, I, 274.
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205
tico, Montazio wrote
... I consider the fantastic element with all its
witches, apparitions, soothsayings, sabbaths,
wires, trap doors, Bengal lights, phantasms,
gnomes, sylphs, undines, etc., etc., to be incom­
patible with out times, our habits, our ways, our
audiences, our theaters, and most of all our
theatrical machinists.8
Montazio continued by accusing Piave of making “ every
pathetic situation ridiculous," parodying “ every maxim,"
embellishing “ every exaggeration,"
and “ mutilating
whatever might serve as accessory, context, explanation,
excuse,
to the principal scenes of the Shakespearean
drama." 9
In an extended discussion of Verdi's Macbeth that
appeared in six installments in Ricordi's Gazzetta musicale
di Milano between April 11 and June 2, 1847, L. P. Casamorata wrote with keen perception about Verdi's music in ways
that have validity even today, but he expressed grave m i s ­
givings about the composer's choice of the genere fantas­
tico. Casamorata thought the supernatural world could
properly be used to stimulate interest, make abstractions
visible, or provide variety, and to achieve those ends, one
could borrow from all sorts of “ theologies and mytholo­
gies."
Nevertheless,
Casamorata said that Verdi's use of
the supernatural
has wholly failed: for what effective variety
8 Montazio, "Macbeth: Profanation in Four Acts b y P. M. Piave."
Rivista di Firenze, March 27, 1847. Sourcebook, 381.
9 Ibid., 383.
La
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206
could be expected from fleeing the horrible real­
ity of the characters of Macbeth and his wife only
to plunge into the midst of the disgusting fantasy
of those lurid, bearded witches?10
At first glance, the invective hurled at Piave might
seem justified,
for we know Verdi was ultimately dissatis­
fied with Piave's work on the Macbeth libretto. The com­
poser's constant displeasure over the libretto's progress
sounds a constant refrain throughout his correspondence with
Piave during the preparation of the opera, and it is widely
known that at the last moment the composer called upon his
friend, the poet Andrei Maffei,
for extensive emendations.
Verdi candidly wrote to Piave to tell him of Maffei's con­
tribution to the libretto.
"Saint Andrew [Maffei] came to
your aid and mine. Especially to mine, because--if I must be
frank with y o u —
I couldn't have put [your verses]
to
music.11
Among all the heated statements Verdi directed to his
librettist during the writing of Macbeth, the one that has
probably done the most to reinforce the belief that the
composer had been thoroughly displeased with Piave's work
appears in a letter dated February 14, 1847:
I 'm glad y o u 've understtod the matter about your
verses. I assure you that I wouldn't want your
drama for all the gold in the world.12
Verdi's letter, first published in Abbiati's well-known
10 Sourcebook, 387-95.
11 Verdi to Piave. 21 January 1847. Sourcebook, 34.
12 " S o n o contento che tu abbi capito la cosa pel suo verso. T'assicuro
ch'io non vorrei il tuo dramma per tutto l'oro del mondo.” Sourcebook,
41.
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207
work on Verdi,
is puzzling on several counts. First of all,
it seems unduly harsh, almost cruel even, if taken at face
value. While it is true Verdi never hesitated to vent his
fury at Piave, a feeling of warm friendship and mutual r e ­
spect nevertheless prevails throughout their correspondence.
Considering their cordial affability,
it seems highly u n ­
likely that Verdi would ever have said to his friend and
collaborator of many years that he would not want his drama
" f o r all the gold in the world."
Verdi,
in fact, often used humor and good-natured
cajoling to prod his lagging librettist, and he was never
averse to engating in a fiar amount of off-color raillery
when doing so. As an example of Verdi's coarse but playfully
disparaging tone we have only to look at a letter that has
come to light only fairly recently. The letter, as far as I
know, has never been published in English. It clearly r e ­
veals the level of intimate and amiability that these men
shared, particularly during their collaboration on Macbeth:
My dear Mona, you're taking your time with this Macbethl!.. .You should know, then, my Signor Mona of the Mona,
that I can't wait any longer because I've finished the
first act just moments ago and I don't want to lose time
because of you. Signor Mona of the Mona Moniasimo-Send me the second act right away and get to work
right away on the third. Understand? As for the matter of
the prima donna, I don't want to worry about it or slow down
on account of it. Even if she turns out to be the devil, it
won't matter--If I don't find someone to my liking. I'll
have your balls cut off, Signor Mona, and you will sing Lady
Macbet! What a lovely sight!13
13 " M i o bel Mona te la prendi comoda con questo Macbetl!.. .Sappia
addumque mio Sig.r Mona dei Mona che io non posso aspettare che a
momenti ho finito il primo atto e che non voglio perder tempo per lui
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208
Undoubtedly, then, Verdi and Piave enjoyed a cordial
and, at times, colorful rapport, and despite the unfavorable
reception of the Macbeth libretto, Verdi went on to
collaborate on six more operas:
II Corsaro, Stiffelio,
Rigoletto, La Traviata, Simone Boccanegra (1857), and La
Forza del destino. The judgment of Florence's critics that
Verdi had been ill-served by his librettist must not have
been shared by the composer nor was it borne out by subse­
quent events,
since the extent and quality of the work that
followed Macbeth indicate that Piave was indeed capable of
adequately serving the composer. Given their many years of
friendship and professional collaboration beyond Macbeth,
what then should we make of Verdi's remark that he did not
want Piave's drama for " a l l the gold in the world?"
Recent studies have revealed that Abbiati, who compiled
Verdi's correspondence, was often careless in transcribing
many of the letters. He regularly committed errors of
omission, transcription, and dating that were serious enough
to cause confusion and erroneous conclusions.14 A corrected
transcription of the passage in question reads as follows:
i
Sono contento che tu abbi capito la cosa pel suo
verso. T'assicuro ch'io non vorrei il tuo danno
Sig.r Mona dei Mona Moniesimo-- Mandami subito il secondo atto e studia
subito per il terzo! Hai capito? In quanto alia prima donna non voglio
crucciarmene n€ tagliarmene via percid. Sia anche il diavolo non
m'imports--Se non trovo una a modo mio faccio tagliar i coglioni a te
Sior Mona e tu farai da Lady Macbeti Che bella figura!" Piave was born
on Murano, near Venice. *M on a' is a Venetian dialect word for puddendum.
Evan Baker, "Lettere di Giuseppe Verdi a Francesco Maria Piave 18431865. (Parma: Istituto di studi verdiani, 1986-7) 153.
14 Baker, 136
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209
per tutto l'oro del mondo.
[I am glad you've understood the matter of your
verses. I assure you that I wouldn't want your
harm for all the gold in the world.]
The substitution of 'danno,' harm or damage, for 'dramma'
diametrically reverses Verdi's meaning. The composer wrote
the letter after Maffei had made his corrections, and Verdi,
rather than berating Piave, is reassuring him that in spite
of theneed to
harm
alter parts
of the libretto, he wanted no
or damage to come to P i ave1s professional reputation.
Piave had already established himself as a librettist with
his collaboration on two earlier Verdi operas, E m a n i and I
due Foscari.
Furthermore,
that Verdi had sufficient confidence in
Piave's abilities and none in the assessment of the critics
was clearly revealed in a letter to Tito Ricordi, his friend
and publisher. Years after Macbeth's first performance,
Verdi wrote,
...a libretto need only bear the name of this poor
devil [Piave] for the poetry to be judged bad,
even before reading it... .Since I found things to
criticize in the [Macbeth] versification, I asked
Maffei, with the consent of Piave himself, to go
over those lines and rewrite entirely the witches'
chorus from Act III, as well as the sleepwalking
scene. Well, would you believe it? Although the
libretto did not bear the poet's name, it was
believed to be by Piave, and the said chorus and
sleepwalking scene were treated the worst and even
held up to ridicule!! Perhaps those two pieces can
be done better, but as they stand, they're none­
theless Maffei's lines, and the chorus in particu­
lar has a lot of character. So, there's public
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210
opinion for you!15
Verdi's point is well taken since the critics were
either completely unaware that the libretto had been
revised, or, if they had heard reports of revisions, had no
way of determining precisely who had written which lines.
For this reason alone, the critics would not have been able
to render a fair assessment of Piave's work
Moreover, most critics, particularly Montazio, who had
been especially derisive, displayed little knowledge of
Shakespeare's text. For example, Montazio mocked the sound
of drums that accompanies Macbeth's initial entrance, not
realizing that it occurs in Shakespeare's play. And M a c ­
beth's phrase,
" S o fair and foul," which in the Italian
libretto appears as,
" s i fiero, e bello"
(so fierce and
beautiful), also received its share of criticism at M o n ­
tazio' s hands, but this, too, is close to Shakespeare's
text. Montazio also derided the opening speech of the
witches by saying,
"Those dames are kind enough to inform
us that they have just slaughtered a pig, proof that the
sabbath doings of witches are more innocuous than is
commonly believed, except to members of the porcine
15 " M a basta che un libretto porti il nome di questo povero diavolo
perch€ la poesia venga giudicata cattiva, anche prima di leggerla....
Come io trovai a ridire su questa verseggiatura, pregai a Maffei, col
consenso dello stesso Piave, di ripassare quei versi, e di rifarmi di
peso, il Coro delle Btreghe Atto III, ed il Sonnairibuliamo. Ebbene, lo
crederai! quantunque il libretto non portasee il nome del poeta, ma creduto di Piave, il citato Coro, ed il Sonnambuliamo furono i piQ maltrattati, e messi anche in ridicolo! ! Forse si pud in quei due pezzi far
meglio, ma tali e quali come esistono son sempre versi di Maffei, ed il
Coro specialmente ha molto carattere. Cosi 6: ecco l'opinione pubblica!!
Verdi to Ricordi. 11 April 1857. Sourcebook, 69.
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211
w o r l d . " 16 Montazio is, of course, commenting on the l i ­
bretto's Che faceste? dite su!"
" H o sgozzato un verro,"
not realizing that it credibly conveys the sense of the
English,
"Where hast thou been, sister?"
"Killing
swine." Montazio also harshly criticizes the sleepwalking
scene without knowing that Maffei had written the lines for
it and that it closely reflects Shakespeare's text.
Montazio was not the only critic who scoffed at
cer­
tain lines of the libretto thinking that Piave had written
them. Calvi, for example, unwittingly fell into the same
trap, although he apparently had some inkling that hands
other than Piave's had shaped the libretto. According to
rumor, Calvi said, the verses " w e r e the product of a noted
professor
[Maffei], the elegant translator of many fine
works of l i t e rature."17
Where Montazio had been bitingly sarcastic, Calvi at
times slipped into trivial quibbling. In Shakespeare's play,
for example, when Macbeth is informed that he is the new
Thane of Cawdor, he expresses surprise and inquires about
the fate of the present thane. Angus informs him that the
former thane is suspected of treason and has been placed
under arrest (I, iii). in the opera, a messenger tells
Macbeth about his change of fortune, and when asked about
whether the former thane is still alive, the messenger
replies,
16
17
"JVo/ percosso dalla legge/ Sotto il ceppo egli
Montazio, Sourcebook, 382.
Calvi, Sourcebook, 32.
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212
spird."
(No! stricken by the law/ Under the block he
expired). Calvi mockingly trivializes these lines by saying,
"Perhaps they should have said on the block, unless, to
kill that Thane of Cawdor,
the block was dropped on his
head, as one might do with an ox.''18 Like Montazio, who was
unaware that Maffei had written the sleepwalking scene,
Calvi did not realize that Maffei had emended these lines as
well. But what is more to the point, Piave, instead of
" s o t t o il ceppo," had written "sul patibolo”
(on the
scaffold), which is more straightforward and suitable for
its context.
Another attack on the libretto's poetry was made by
Casamorata, who had attended the first performance of
Verdi's opera, but did not write his article until three
months later. Casamorata noted that the opera contained
"cuts"
and "amplifications"
that had resulted in
"gigantic incongruities." As for Piave's text, he said
that " t h e literal translation of the English Euripides'
elocution, which by turns is concise, verbose,
imaginative,
severe, etc., etc., has resulted in blithering n o n s e n s e . " 19
Given the intensity of the critical condemnation heaped
upon the libretto,
the critics' tenuous knowledge of Shake­
speare, and their ignorance of Maffei's contribution,
a
deeper issue, I believe, accounts for the unfavorable reac­
tion of the Florentine critics. It was not merely a question
18
19
ibid.
Casamorata, Sourcebook,
387.
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213
of whether or not Piave had served the composer well with
felicitous versification,
correct diction, or appropriate
subject matter. The critics, after all, had been able to
react favorably to Verdi's musical and formal innovations,
including spoken lines, new kinds of arias, unusual singing
techniques, and peculiar orchestration, all of which were
necessary for a faithful adaptation of Shakespeare to the
operatic stage, but the comments expressed by the critics in
their evaluation of the libretto show clearly that they were
responding to literary rather than to musical issues, echo­
ing the heated controversies about Shakespeare that had been
sparked by Madame de Stael's essay of 1816.
While well intentioned, Madame de Stael exhibited a
certain naivete in her exhortation. For some time before her
article appeared in Italy, Italian men of letters, as this
study has attempted to show, had already been sounding the
same refrain. Ever since Antonio Conti traveled to England
in 1715, Italian writers were calling for the study of for­
eign works and advocating a cultural rapprochement with the
rest of Europe. Ideas similar to Madame de Stael's had been
espoused not only by Conti but also most vigorously by Paolo
Rolli and Giuseppe Baretti. It is difficult therefore to
explain precisely why Madame de Stall’s essay sparked such
violent reaction, but one thing is clear. The response came
from two opposing camps. There were those who believed
Italians should reach out to foreign works as a way of
joining the European literary community,
thereby acknowl-
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214
edging the universality of the arts, and those whose na­
tional pride dictated that progress should be achieved
solely by following time-honored paths.
As the nineteenth century progressed, indeed, by the
time of the first perfomance of Verdi's Macbeth, the purely
literary base of the dispute became clouded after other
issues— nationalism, social reform, morality— had crept into
the debates. Nevertheless,
sides had been clearly drawn
between classicists and romanticists. Acerbi left little
doubt about how sharply these alliances had been drawn when
he wrote,
A kind of literary schism has recently arisen in
Europe, and it divides literature into two parts,
the classical and the romantic.™
Although these terms lacked specificity, they neverthe­
less served as convenient labels for identifying opposing
factions that responded to Madame de Stael's essay. For this
reason, as late as 1816, one writer could state that Shake­
speare's tragedies could not please Italians because he
“ could not obey the rules which he had not learnt owing to
his lack of education." The English poet never realized
that “ a tragedy ought to be serious and dignified
throughout. " 21
Although the stridency of the literary debate had
subsided by the time of the first performance of Verdi's
20 Giuseppe Acerbi, "Romantica." Biblioteca italiana. January 1818.
Rpt. Discuseioni e polemlcbe eul Romanticiamo, 247.
21 Ernies Visconti, "Idee elementari sulla poeeia Romantica."
Biblioteca italiana. February, 1819. Cited by Collison-Morley, 119.
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215
Macbeth,
factional differences still persisted and explains,
I believe,
the invective the Macbeth libretto drew from the
Florentine critics. Montazio,
for example, whose comments on
the opera's libretto had been especially biting, certainly
wrote from a biased perspective when he tauntingly remarked
that Shakespeare, unknowingly, had been made the champion of
Romanticism.22 Unable to be entirely objective because of
his anti-romantic stance, Montazio failed to notice that the
opera's bizarre verses, written especially at V e r d i ’s
behest,
came remarkably close to the spirit of Shakespeare's
text, instead of attempting to determine objectively whether
or not the Macbeth libretto convincingly captured the tone
of Shakespeare's drama, the critics of Florence, a city with
the best preserved literary tradition, merely took a
doctrinaire view from the perspective of a long-standing
literary debate. The question they addressed, as this study
has attempted to show, was an enduring one— the place of
Shakespeare on the contemporary literary scene. In 1847,
Verdi carried the debate into the Italian opera house.
22
Sourcebook, 381.
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216
Works Cited
Abbiati, F.
Giuseppe Verdi. 4 vols.
Milan:
1959.
Baker, Evan.
"Lettere di Giuseppe Verdi a Francesco Maria
Piave. 1843-1865. Documenti della Frederick R. Koch
Foundation Collection e della M a r y Flagler Cary
Collection presso la Pierpont Morgan Librazy di Ne w
York." Studi verdiani. 4 (1988): 136-66.
Baretti, Giuseppe.
"Discours sur Shakespeare et sur
Monsieur de Voltaire. •' Opere.
Ed. Franco Fido.
Milan: Rizzoli, 1967.
La frusta letteraria.
Bari: Laterza, 1932.
Ed. Luigi Piccioni. 2 vols.
Barish, Joseph.
" Madness, Hallucination, and Sleep­
walking.”
Verdi's 'Macbeth': A Sourcebook. Eds.
David Rosen and Andrew Porter. New York: Norton, 1984.
49-55.
Basevi, Abramo.
"Macbeth.” Studio sulle opere di
Giuseppe Verdi.
Verdi's 'Macbeth': A Sourcebook. Eds.
David Rosen and Andrew Porter. New York: Norton, 1984.
421-25.
Berchet, Giovanni.
" Lettera semiseria di Grisostomo al
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Binni, Walter.
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Busch, Hans, ed.
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Calcaterra, Carlo, ed.
I manifesti romantici.
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Cappelletti, Vincenzo, et al., eds. Dizionario biografico
degli italiani.
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Carcano, Giulio. Opere complete di Giulio Carcano. 2nd
edition, Milan: 1896.
Carini, isadore.
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di Giuseppe Verdi. Milan: 1913.
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I copialettere
La Prima tragedia di Antonio Conti.
Collison-Morley, Lacy.
Baretti and His Friends.
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Conti, Antonio.
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Cesare. Milan: 1824.
Prose e poesie, II.
Versioni poetiche.
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Crino, Anna Maria.
Le traduzioni di Shakespeare in Italia
nel Settecento.
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Letteratura, 1950.
Degrada, Frances. " Observations on the Genesis of Verdi's
'Macbeth.'''
Verdi's 'Macbeth': A Sourcebook. Eds.
David Rosen and Andrew Porter. New York: Norton, 1984.
156-73.
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" The 'Scala' fl&cbeth Libretto: A Genetic Edition."
Verdi's 'Macbeth': A Sourcebook. Eds. David Rosen and
Andrew Porter. New York: Norton, 1984. 306-38.
Di Breme, Ludovico.
xx I n t o m o a l l ’ingiustizia di alcun
giudizi letterari italiani."
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99-142.
Dorris, George E. Paolo Rolli and the Italian Circle in
London 1715-1744.
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Foscolo, Ugo.
" Italian Periodic Literature."
Cesare Foligno.
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Opere. Ed.
Opere. Ed. Franco Gavazzeni. 2 vols. Milan:
Ricciardi, 1981.
Gatti, Hilary.
" Shakespeare nei teatri milanesi dell'ottocento." Biblioteca di studi inglesi. 12 Bari:
Adriatica Editrice, 1968.
Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von. Aus Meinem Leber: Dichtung
und Wahrheit. Goethe's Werke, IX. Hamburg: 1955.
Goldin, Daniela.
" I J 'Macbeth' verdiano: genesi e linguaggio di un libretto."
Analecta Musicologica, 19
(1979): 334-72.
Graf, Arturo.
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nel secolo XVIII.
Torino: Ermanno Loescher, 1911.
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Selections from
Johnson on Shakespeare. Ed. Bertrand H. Bronson with
Jean M. O'Meara.
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Knowles, John.
xxThe Banquet Scene from Verdi's 'Macbeth':
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" Preface to Macbetto: Ballo mimico in
cinque atti. "
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359-61.
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Medici, Mario and Marcello Conati, eds.
Carteggio Verdi Boito.
Parma: Istituto di studi verdiani, 1978.
Metastasio, Pietro.
Tutte le opere. Ed. Bruno Brunelli. 5
vols. Milan: Mondadori, 1954.
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'' 'Macbeth': Profanation in Four Acts b y F. M.
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Mutterle, Anco Mar 2 io. Discussioni e polemiche sul Romanticismo.
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" Ritual Scenes in Verdi's Operas." The
Signified and the Signifier. The Hague: Nijhoff,
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" Schiller e la genesi del 'Macbeth' verdiano."
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Pascolato, A.
" 'Re Lear' e 'Un ballo in maschera':
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' " L a v o r a r fantasmi’: L'arte poetica di
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221
Verdi, Giuseppe.
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Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
222
Appendix A
The following is from the Preface to Antonio
Conti's tragedy, Cesare, published at Faenza in 1726.
Conti's reference to Shakespeare (Sasper) is considered
the first in Italy.
Poco dopo il Duca di Bukingano mi diedi a leggere
due Tragedie che aveva fatte; il Cesare, il Bruto, che
propriamente non sono, che il Cesare del Sasper diviso in
due. Sasper e il Com elio degl'inglesi, ma molto piu
irregolare del Com elio, sebbene al pari di lui pregno di
grandi idee, e di nobili sentimenti. Ristringendomi qui a
parlare del suo Cesare, il Sasper lo fa morire al terzo atto; il
rimanente della Tragedia e occupato dall' aringa di Marcantonio al Popolo, indi dalle guerre e dalla morte di Cassio e
di Bruto. Puo maggiormente violarsi l'unita del tempo,
dell'azione, e del luogo? Ma gl'Inglesi disprezzarono sino al
Catonele regole d'Aristotile per la ragione, che la Tragedia e
fatta per piacere, e che ottima ella e allora che piace;
contenesse ella cento azioni diverse, e trasportasse
personaggi dall' Europe nell'Asia, e finissero vecchi, ove
cominciarono fanciulli. Cosi pensava cred'io la maggior
parte degli'Italiani dell 1600 guasti dalle Commedie
Spagnuole; e mi maraviglio, come in quel secolo niuno si sia
awisato di tradurre in Italiano le Commedie e Tragedie
Inglesi, colme d'accidenti come le Spagnuole, ma certamente
con carratteri piu naturali e leggiadri. L'ltalia avrebbe se non
imparata tutta la storia de i Re d'Inghilterra, che da' loro
poeti e stata posta sul teatro, ogni vita di Re dando materia
ad una tragedia.
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223
Appendix B
Paolo Rolli's translation of Hamlet's soliloquy, the first
Italian translation of Shakespeare.
Essere o no, la Questione &questa:
Qual nella mente e forte piu? Soffrire
Colpi e Saette d'oltraggiosa Sorte;
O prender L'Armi contra un m ar d'Affanni,
E dar loro, opporsi, a un tratto il fine?
Morir! Dormire: Altro non &. Nel Sonno,
Dicon, che fine avr& il Cordoglio, e mille,
Retaggio della Came, altre Sciagure:
Consumazion, d'avida Brama oggetto!
Morir! Dormir! Dormir? forse sognare! Ah
Qui £ 1'introppo ! Ch£ in quel Sonno di Morte
Quai sogni possan venir poi che avremo
Scossa alia fin questa mortale Spoglia;
Sospendon l'Alma. Ecco il Riflesso ond'anno
Nostre calamity si lunga Vita.
Altrimenti, Chi mai soffrir le atroci
Del suo tempo vorria Sferzate e Scherni,
Torti d'Opressione, O nte d'Orgoglio,
Fiere Agonie di disprezzato Amore,
Leggi indugiate, Autorita insolente,
E quei che il Merto paziente oppresso
Aspri riceve dal Demerto Oltraggi;
Quando ei dar si potesse alta Q uiete
Con la punta d'un Ago? E chi la grave
Soma portar vorria; Chi sotto a stanca
Vita, gemer, sudar; senza il T errore
Di spaventevol Cosa appo la M orte?
Quelle contrade incognite dal cui
Confine mai Viaggiator non torna,
La Volonta sgomentano e ci fanno
Piuttosto i Mali sostener presenti;
Che sciorre ad altri sconosciuti al volo.
Coscienza Cosi di tu tti Noi
Tanti Codardi far cosi '1 nativo
Suo robusto Color Risoluzione
Smarrisce in pensierosa Pallidezza:
E le imprese di grande Auge e M omento,
Arrestate da un tal Riguardo; svolgono
Lor Corrente, e d'Azzion [sic] perdono il nome.
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224
Appendix C
A reproduction of the frontispiece of Giuseppe Baretti's
Dlscours sur Shakespeare et sur Monsieur Voltaire
DISCOURS
SUR
SHAKESPEARE
ET SUR
MONSIEUR DE VOLTAIRE
PAR
JOSEPH
BARETTI
Secretaire pour la Correspondence etrangere de
R
oyal e
B
1'Ac a d e m i e
rittanique
II y a des Erreurs qu'il faut refuter serieusement; des Absurdites dont il faut rire; et des M ensonges qu'il faut repousser
avec force.
Vo l t a i r e
A LONDRES,
Chez J. N o u R s e ,
Librairie du ROI ,
E ta PARIS,
Chez D u r a n d neveu,
MDCCLXXVII
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
225
Appendix D
List of characters and names of singers at the first performance of
Verdi's Macbeth at Florence's Teatro della Pergola in 1847.
PERSONAGGI
DUNCANO, Re di Scozia
N.N.
MACBETH (
BANCO ( Generali dell'esercito del Re Duncano
Sig. Felice Varesi.
Sig. Niccola Benedetti.
LADY MACBETH, m oglie di M acbeth
Sig. Marianna Barbieri-Nini.
Cantante di Camera di S. A. I. e R. Granduca di Toscana, e
Cantante di Camera, e Capella di S. M. l'Archiduchessa e
Duchessa di Parma.
DAMA d i L ady Macbeth
Sig. Faustina Piombanti.
MACDUFF, nobile Scozzese Signore d i Fiff
Sig. Angelo Brunacci.
MALCOLM, figlio d i D uncano
Sig. Francesco Rossi.
FLEANZIO, figlio di Banco
N.N.
Domestico d i Macbeth
N.N.
Medico
Sig. Giuseppe RomaneHi.
Sicaro
Sig. Giuseppe Bertini.
Tre A pparizioni
L'Om bra di Banco
COR1, E COMPARSE DI
Streghe, M essaged d el Re, N obili e Profughi
Scozzesi, Sicarj, Soldati Inglesi, Spiriti Aerei.
La scena e in Iscozia e massimamente al Castello di Macbeth
Sulprincipio dell'Atto quarto e tra il confine di Scozia, e d'Inghilterra
La Musica e di GIUSEPPE VERDI
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226
Matthew Ruggiero joined the Boston Symphony Orchestra
as assistant principal bassoonist in 1961 and was appointed
principal bassoonist of the Boston Pops Orchestra in 1974.
He toured the USSR in 1967 as a member of the BSO Chamber
Players, with whom he later recorded an album of Stravin­
sky's chamber music.
He has also recorded Mozart's Grand
Partita under the direction of Marcel Moyse.
Born in Philadelphia, Mr. Ruggiero was graduated from
the Curtis Institute of Music in 1957 after having studied
with Ferdinand Del Negro, Sol Schoenbach, and Marcel Tabuteau.
Before joining the BSO, he was a member of the N a ­
tional Symphony in Washington, D.C. and participated regu­
larly at the Marlboro Music Festival in Vermont, under the
directorship of Rudolf Serkin.
Mr. Ruggiero holds degrees from Harvard University in
Liberal Arts, English literature, and Italian literature.
In 1989, he retired from his orchestral duties after twentyeight years of service to enter a doctoral program at Boston
University where he earned his PhD in comparative studies in
literature and the arts as a Fellow and University Scholar.
He is a member of the faculty at Boston University's School
of Music and the New England Conservatory.
He also teaches
courses in interdisciplinary studies at Clark University.
Each summer since 1990, Mr. Ruggiero has travelled to Asia
to help train members of the Asian Youth Orchestra.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.