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THE LIBRETTO OF CAVALLERIA RUSTICANA, POETIC RENDITION OF GIOVANNI VEGA’S STORY
Abstract
The libretto of Cavalleria rusticana, the well-known opera by Pietro Mascagni, was written by Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti and Guido Menasci, who reduced to melodrama a play by Giovanni Verga, in its turn a dramatization of a short-story with the same title he had previously written. Our investigation focuses on the libretto as a literary text to be analysed in comparison with its prose sources. We propose an in-depth analysis of the similarities and differences between the libretto and the play, in an attempt to understand the reasons for the changes operated by the two librettists. The necessities of the melodramatic genre and their non-Sicilian origin lead to a diverse comprehension and interpretation of Verga’s ideas, freely transposed into the libretto. The achievements of the two librettists are not to be ignored, especially if taking into account they were the first in Italy to propose an unconventional subject inspired from the real life of the petty people. Despite the criticism against some of their solutions, we could notice that their choices concerning the literary style, the language, the construction of the characters led to a new perspective and convey a more universal meaning that has assured the success of the opera in time.
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