FRANCESCA DA RIMINI OPERA

by Riccardo Zandonai

1902. From the Francesca da Rimini was acted for the first time at Rome, by Eleonora Duse and her company, on December 9, 1901. Has there, since Hernani, been such a battle over a play in verse? The performance lasted five hours, and many of the speeches were inaudible on account of the noise in the theatre. Since then the play has been freely cut, it has been acted with the greatest success in the chief cities of Italy, and has raised more discussion than any play in verse of this century. The translation which follows has been made from the unabridged text. The play is written in blank verse, but blank verse so varied as to be almost a kind of vers libre. This form of blank verse is not new in Italian. It is to be found in the pastoral tragedies of the Renaissance in Tasso's Aminta, in Guarino's Pastor Fido. We need only open Leopardi to see almost exactly the same structure of verse.

Genres: Music, Italian Literature

Paperback

First published January 1, 1901

Reviews

[Two Readers in Love · Rating 5 out of 5]

"The music of early–20th-century Italian composer Francesco Zandonai has largely been forgotten—with the exception of this expansive 1914 opera based on an episode from Dante’s Inferno. The melodramatic plot concerns an affair between the title character and the handsome brother of a cruel and disfigured warlord, to whom she is betrothed. Their dalliance leads to the predictable violent and tragic end, but not before Zandonai makes his case for increased recognition with a surfeit of sumptuous, luxuriously orchestrated music." - MetOpera.org

[Hafl · Rating 3 out of 5]

This would've been better if that asshole Dante hadn't spoiled it for me.