Dissertation

Verdi:

An Icon of Italian Nationalism

Karen McCabe

TSM Senior Sophister Italian 2014

Contents

Introduction ............................................................................................................................................ 1

Opera in Italy: The Political and Social Context ...................................................................................... 2

Romantic Ideology and the Themes of 19th-Century Italian Opera ........................................................ 9

Verdi’s Operas and the debate that surrounds his legacy .................................................................... 14

Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................. 27

Bibliography .......................................................................................................................................... 29

1

Introduction

Giuseppe Verdi died in Milan on 27 January 1901. In his will he asked to be buried in a simple

ceremony “without music or singing”1 on the grounds of the Casa di Risposo per Musicisti, a home

for retired musicians that he had founded. However, construction of the home had not been finished

at the time of his death and so he was temporarily buried elsewhere. He was later reburied when it

was completed and, somewhat against his wishes, the ceremony was a huge public event. A choir

sang “Va, Pensiero”, the chorus from his opera Nabucco. Balconies along the streets were adorned

with black drapes, representatives from all over Italy marched in the procession and two-hundred-

thousand people lined the streets singing his music. They mourned not just the loss of a great Italian

composer but, most of all, the loss of an icon of their nation.

Today Verdi is still known in Italy and abroad as the bard of the Risorgimento. Mussolini

publically promoted Verdi’s music during his regime and organised elaborate celebrations for the

40th anniversary of Verdi’s death in 1941.2 More recently “Va, Pensiero” was used as the ‘Padanian

hymn’ of the Lega Nord, the northern Italy separatist group.3

I want to investigate how Verdi’s music came to be associated with the Italian nationalist

movement and when he was given the title of ‘vate’ of the Risorgmento. There is much debate over

whether he was intentionally trying to inspire a national consciousness within his audience. Many

articles written on the topic deal with the question of whether he was seen as a revolutionary figure

in contemporary times or whether it was an idea that was constructed in hindsight. To answer these

questions, I believe it is necessary to look first at the times in which he lived and worked. It was a

period of great change. Nationalism was spreading across Europe sparked off by the French

Revolution and Romanticism was reforming literature and the arts. I will examine the political

aspects of some of his operas that have come to be seen as Risorgimento operas, mainly Nabucco, I

Lombardi alla prima crociata, La Battaglia di Legnano and Don Carlos. I will also outline the debate

among scholars and discuss some of the main questions that surround his status as an Italian icon.

My aim in doing so is to determine the timing and the extent of the influence Verdi may have

had on the Italian nationalist movement; whether his music did in fact inspire the public to fight for

independence or whether it is simply a myth created in the late 19th Century after the unification.

1 Cited in George Whitney Martin, ‘Verdi, Politics, and “Va, Pensiero”: The Scholars Squabble’, Opera Quarterly,

No.1, Vol. 21, Jan 1, 2005, 109-132 (p. 110). 2 Carolyn Abbate and Roger Parker, A History of Opera, The Last Four Hundred Years (Allen Lane: Penguin,

2012), p. 247. 3 Abbate and Parker, A History of Opera, p. 247.

2

Opera in Italy: The Political and Social Context

In order to determine how much of an influence Verdi had on Italian nationalism, we must first

consider the historical and political context in which he was living and working. Great artists can

express an era or time in history through their work. George Martin believes that the work will not

just influence the culture of the time, but that the culture and the time will also have an effect on

the artist. 4 Martin points out that nationalist sentiment was not found solely in one of Verdi’s

operas, but occurred again and again throughout his career, shaping the culture of the era.5

The 19th century saw a massive rise in nationalistic feeling throughout Europe that had been

sparked by the French Revolution. Most of Verdi’s life was spent under foreign rule and he was

greatly influenced by the nationalist movement. His works came to be seen by many as the voice of

the Risorgimento. Born on 10 October 1813, Verdi grew up in Busseto in Parma. At this time most of

Italy was under the rule of Napoleon, while the Kingdom of Naples was ruled by Joseph Bonaparte,

the elder brother of Napoleon, and then later by Napoleon’s brother-in-law, Marshal Murat.6

However, by 1812 the Napoleonic regime was weakening. The Russian campaign had been a failure

and then came the Battle of Leipzig in the autumn of 1813 where Napoleon was defeated for the

first time. Some Italians were already envisioning independence but they had no plan to overthrow

the French.7 In April 1814 the Austrians invaded Northern Italy and brought about the end of

Napoleonic Italy. The Italian peninsula was divided by the Congress of Vienna into many statelets

that would largely be ruled by foreign European powers, the most dominant in northern Italy being

Austria. The old pre-Napoleon ways of ruling were restored. Lombardy and the Veneto were given to

the Austrians, Piedmont to the Savoys, Naples to the Bourbons; the Pope was restored as ruler of

central Italy, and Tuscany and Modena were given to Austrian Archdukes to govern.8 In Lombardy

and the Veneto, the Austrian authorities ruled lightly, continuing the liberal rule of the Napoleonic

regime. Kimbell notes that the passion for liberty that Napoleon had fostered also remained. Italians

seemed to have forgotten the massacres of Napoleon and remembered only the enthusiasm for

liberty that his regime encouraged. The memory of his idealistic rule inspired nationalist feeling

throughout the Risorgimento.9

4 George Martin, Aspects of Verdi (London: Robson Books, 1988), p. 3.

5 Martin, Aspects of Verdi, p. 10

6 David R. B. Kimbell, Verdi in the Age of Italian Romanticism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981), p.

3. 7 Giuliano Procacci, History of the Italian People, trans. by Anthony Paul (London: Penguin, 1991), p. 270.

8 Kimbell, p. 4.

9 Kimbell, p. 4.

3

Although Verdi was born in Parma, he was educated in Milan and lived there for the first ten

years of his career. Between the Restoration and the 1848 revolutions, the Kingdom of Lombardy-

Venetia, is thought to have been the most justly administrated state and the people there to have

been very happy. Anti-Austrian feeling was not widely felt, therefore it would have had to have been

created by the leaders of the revolution. Milan was the administrative capital of the Italian provinces

under Austrian rule and the city prospered both economically and artistically.

At this time the different regions and cities of the Italian peninsula had very little in common

politically, although their shared cultural heritage was quite strong. In order for a group of states to

assert themselves as a nation they must be able to justify it by having something in common, a

collective identity. This could be a shared history, culture or language. In Nations and Nationalism

Ernest Gellner gives two definitions for what constitutes a nation:

1. Two men are of the same nation if and only if they share the same culture, where culture in

turn means a system of ideas and signs and associations and ways of behaving and

communicating.

2. Two men are of the same nation if and only if they recognise each other as belonging to the

same nation. Nations are the artefacts of men’s convictions and loyalties and solidarities. A

mere category of persons become a nation if and when the members of the category firmly

recognise certain mutual rights and duties to each other as fellows of this kind which turns

them into a nation, and not the other shared attributes, whatever they might be, which

separate that category from non-members.10

History can be re-written so as to stress national ties and similarities, while differences are

played down. Gellner explains that nationalism uses “the pre-existing, historically inherited

proliferation of cultures or cultural wealth, though it uses them very selectively, and it most often

transforms them radically”.11 It was very possible for the Italians to create this necessary common

culture even when previously they had had very little uniting them politically. Italian nationalists

concentrated on the peninsula’s ancient history when it was united under the Romans. Mazzini

insisted that if Italy was to be united, Rome must be the capital, as it had been in ancient and

medieval times, emphasising Italy’s grand shared past.

The term Risorgimento or ‘resurgence’ implies that the creation of the Italian nation had its

foundations in the ancient times of the Roman Empire. Nationalists envisioned this nation as united

10

Ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism (Oxford: Blackwell Publishing Ltd., 2006), p. 6. 11

Gellner, p. 55.

4

in culture, language and politics. The peninsula’s diversity would have to be overcome. Creating the

idea of an Italian culture was “a form of selective and largely elite consciousness that ennobled some

traditions, while excluding many others”.12 They sought to turn this cultural ideal into political reality

and in doing so it was only natural that the two often blended together. Since there was no common

political leader or royal family to represent them, culture became the glue that would bind the

nation. The arts were used to construct this idea of ‘Italianness’. After Italy was united, the arts were

further exploited to turn certain figures into icons of the Risorgimento, like Manzoni and Verdi, who

came to personify Italy.13

All nations must have a founding story. I would like to make a comparison between Italy’s

creation of their national history and the foundation myths of new colonies during the period of

ancient Greek colonisation. These myths told the story of the origins of a city. They were often based

on different accounts, such as memories of the citizens, or were simply invented. These myths

usually feature some justification about why it was necessary for a nation to be formed or why it was

destined to be. There are usually several different accounts of how it was formed with varying

details and through different viewpoints. The foundation myth was a significant feature of Greek

colonisation and there were several aspects to the story that they all shared: some difficulty had to

be overcome, the presence of key figures that made the foundation of the city possible and who

after their death would have been worshiped as gods and heroes14, and the blessing of the gods

given to the colony. Usually the citizens claimed that they had been told by an oracle to found a new

city. We can see similarities between these myths and the one that Italian nationalists were forming.

In The Duties of Man Mazzini asks:

What can you, with his isolated powers, do for the moral improvement, for the progress of

humanity? God gave you this means when he gave you a country, when…he divided humanity

into distinct groups upon the face of our globe, and thus planted the seeds of nations. Bad

government has disfigured the design of God…15

He believes that every person belongs to a nation, and that those people are destined to be united

as God has planned, implying that the foreign rulers that divided Italy were going against the will of

God.

12

Albert Russell Ascoli and Krystyna von Henneberg, ‘Introduction: Nationalism and the Uses of Risorgimento Culture’, in Making and Remaking Italy, The Cultivation of National Identity around the Risorgimento, ed. by Ascoli and von Henneberg (Oxford: Berg, 2001), p. 7. 13

Ascoli and von Henneberg, p. 8. 14

Oswyn Murray, Early Greece (London: Fontana, 1993), p.120. 15

Giuseppe Mazzini, The Duties of Man and Other Essays (New York: E. P. Dutton & Co., 1907), pp. 51-52.

5

Adrian Lyttelton believes that the need to establish a national identity with its own history arose

from secularisation and a wish to have a new history that would be a history of the people, and not a

history of its rulers. It would concentrate on society and culture and not battles.16 It was not just

contemporary historians that were relied upon to spread the history of Italian nationality; opera,

drama, novels and art reached a much greater audience and would have had a strong influence on

public feelings and passions. The arts were capable of inspiring the people into action.

Opera played an important role in Italian society during this period. It has been suggested that

the Opera house was used as a political forum, giving a voice to the community at a time when

political demonstration was forbidden. The audience were able to express their opinions through the

encoring or applauding of certain choruses or arias.17 Suzanne Aspden noted that the opera chorus

could be the indicator of the opera’s political stance.18 She takes as an example Rossini’s Guillaume

Tell which had revolutionary themes and powerful choruses. It was written for a French audience so

that when it was staged in Northern Italy the title, location, and some political themes had to be

changed. Music scholar, James Parakilas, believes that opera rather than theatre became the main

cultural forum for ‘bourgeois liberalism’ because of its capacity to bring the audience together into a

unified voice.19 In January 1848, after a rising in Palermo, the King of Naples granted the concessions

of a Constitution, freedom of the press and formation of a national guard. In response to this an

audience in Rome tied their handkerchiefs together as a symbol of unity.20

During the Napoleonic regime the theatres were a place where monarchies could communicate

with their public. After the Ancien Regime, royal theatres such as the San Carlo in Naples, provided a

setting in which the new royal families could display their status.21 In Restoration Italy the theatre

allowed the new rulers to publicise themselves in the way they wished to be seen. Nobles came in

military dress. Nobility was not to be identified with privilege any longer, but instead with service.22

Although police were present and operas were censored, the nobility were not worried by these

16

Adrian Lyttelton, ‘Creating a National Past: History, Myth and Image in the Risorgimento’, in Making and Remaking Italy, ed. by Ascoli & von Henneberg, p. 27. 17

Anthony Arblaster, Viva La Libertà!: Politics in Opera (London: Verso, 1992), p. 65. 18

Suzanne Aspden, ‘Opera and National Identity’, in The Cambridge Companion to Opera Studies, ed. by Nicholas Till (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), p. 286. 19

Aspden, The Cambridge Companion to Opera Studies, p. 287. 20

Kimbell, p. 40. 21

John A. Davis, ‘Opera and Absolutism in Restoration Italy, 1815 – 1860’, The Journal of Interdisciplinary History, No.4, Vol. 36, Opera and Society: Part II, Spring, 2006, 569-594, (p. 573). 22

Davis, ‘Opera and Absolutism’, p. 577.

6

new Romantic themes of sacrifice, duty and honour; these were the values that they themselves

were trying to instil.23

The opera house needed the financial help of either the sovereign or the state.24 In 1816 the San

Carlo theatre burnt down but was rebuilt in just four months.25 One must conclude that the theatre

was of great political significance. Royal families saw the theatre as an instrument to ‘educate’ the

audience and inspire certain feelings and ideas within them. However, the theatre’s important

position in Italian society meant that it could also be used as a forum for political ideas and a

demonstration of resistance.26 The success of an opera relied on the audience’s reaction to it, unlike

today where we place so much value on the professional critic’s opinion. The court theatres, like the

opera house in Turin, had a very different atmosphere from those where ordinary people’s views

prevailed. ‘No applause or disapprobation of the performance is expressed by the audience, such

demonstrations being deemed an infringement on the rules of etiquette’.27 Only if the monarch

allowed it was applause or enthusiasm shown. We have an account from the French writer Stendhal

in 1817 recording such an occurrence in Naples:

The public could scarcely restrain its desire to applaud: the King set the example, I heard the

voice of His Majesty from my box, and the transports mounted to a furore which lasted three-

quarters of an hour.28

Unlike today, a great deal of focus was given to the libretti. Copies of the text would have been

handed out, and as the lights were kept on throughout the performance it was easy to follow the

story line.29 At least one patriotic sentiment or metaphor can be found in most of Verdi’s operas.

Highlighting this aspect would have been a very effective way to protest legally, as Austrian officials

would have been sitting in the boxes above.30 Although the police did not like the encoring of arias, if

the audience demanded it, the orchestra would generally play. Thomas Forrest Kelly discusses the

première of Verdi’s Otello in Milan on February 5 1887. During one particular double-bass passage

when Otello makes his entrance on stage the audience exploded with applause. The opera is

stopped and Otello had to make the entrance again. This occurrence was reported in The Times:

23

Davis, ‘Opera and Absolutism’, p. 577. 24

Kimbell, p. 39. 25

Davis, ‘Opera and Absolutism’, p. 578. 26

Kimbell, p. 40. 27

Quoted in Kimbell, p. 43 from Lady Blessington, The idler in Italy, entry for May 1823. 28

Quoted in Kimbell, p. 44. 29

Christopher Headington, Opera, A History (London: Arrow Books Ltd., 1991), p. 195. 30

Martin, Aspects of Verdi, p. 10.

7

The encore nuisance is even more rampant in Italy than among us, and sometime leads to

curious results. When, for example, Othello was compelled to leave his wife’s chamber so that

the famous recitative in unison for the double-basses proceeding his entry might be repeated

a second time, the border line between the sublime and the ridiculous was distinctly passed,

the more so as that recitative was played indifferently the first time and very badly the second

time.31

Operas, including Verdi’s, would have been very difficult to censor when they were using

symbolic story lines such as in Nabucco.32 In I Lombardi alla prima crociata the audience were able to

identify with the medieval Lombards and saw the Austrians as the Saracens, destroying the Holy

Land. Again it can be seen as a symbol for a homeland that has been taken over by foreign rule.

George Martin in Aspects of Verdi claims that these similarities were not accidental and that Verdi

purposefully pushed the boundaries of what the censors would allow.33 In Macbeth, Verdi composed

a chorus called ‘O patria oppressa’, sung by Scottish exiles. In Venice the audience threw bouquets

of red and green onto the stage and when the police banned the Italian colours the audience

decided to throw yellow and black, the Austrian colours, knowing that the singers would refuse to

pick them up.34

The importance of the opera house in the lives of ordinary people suggests that these

metaphors and symbols could have had a significant influence on the audience. After the Congress

of Vienna, even though Italy was suffering from a recession, a huge number of new theatres were

built and old ones were restored. This proves just how important opera was to the Italians. Davis

suggests in Opera and Absolutism in Restoration Italy that perhaps during a recession it was even

more important to be producing opera that the public would definitely go and see.35 Therefore they

would have been conscious of putting on operas that would reflect public opinion. This could be a

reason why Verdi, the most successful Italian composer of this period, would put nationalist

messages in his operas. Davis makes the point that nationalists used opera as a mode for spreading

their message because it was popular, not the other way around. He explores several different

reasons for its popularity, the first being that other forms of communication were banned or

controlled. Even meetings of more than a dozen people in private required police permission.36 A

second reason could be that opera enabled Italian Romanticism to be expressed in its music and

31

Quoted in Thomas Forrest Kelly, First Nights at the Opera (Yale: Yale University Press, 2004), p. 356. 32

Martin, Aspects of Verdi, p. 10. 33


Martin, Aspects of Verdi, p. 11 , taken from Vincenzo Marchesi, Settant’anni di storia poliitica di Venezia. 35

Davis, Opera and Absolutism, p. 569. 36

Davis, Opera and Absolutism, p. 580.

8

themes. Davis describes opera as “providing the only opportunity for new sensibilities in painting,

literature and music to be expressed all together.”37 Yet another reason Davis gives is that there

were leading Italian theatres that could afford the costs of staging new productions and therefore

were able to keep the public interested.38

Opera was the main form of entertainment that the people had. Yet they did not attend solely to

view the opera, but also for the many other activities taking place. When an opera began it was

quite normal for not everyone to have arrived and taken their seats, unless it was a special event like

the première of a much anticipated new opera. They would go to socialise, gossip among friends or

discuss business and they would frequently leave their seats during a performance.39

So what kind of impact did opera have on the audience if they were so focused on the social

aspects of the opera? How much attention were they even paying to what was happening on the

stage? Stendhal said in his Life of Rossini that “Silence is observed only at premières; or, during

subsequent performances, only while one or other of the more memorable passages is being

performed.”40 So how did they know when a ‘memorable passage’ was about to be played? There

would have been certain parts to an opera that would always occur, such as the prima donna’s aria

di sortita which was usually placed about a third of the way through the first act.41 The composer

had to consider how he would get the attention of the audience at the key moments and how the

audience would interact with those moments. Kimbell argues that in the early 1800’s it would not

have been possible for ‘’every detail to have some ideal significance’’. 42 Instead, audience

expectations affected how operas were written and performed.

37




Cited in Kimbell, p. 42, taken from Stendhal, Life of Rossini, p. 429. 41

Kimbell, p.78. 42

Kimbell, p.79.

9

Romantic Ideology and the Themes of 19th-Century Italian Opera

In 1816, Anne-Louise-Germaine Necker, Madame de Staël-Holstein wrote of Italian opera:

You will say to me that in Italy people go to the theatre not to listen, but to meet their close

friends in the boxes and chat. And I will conclude from this that spending five hours a day

listening to so-called words of Italian opera can only dull, through lack of use, the intellects of

a nation.43

She encouraged Italian authors to translate foreign literature and poetry so as to broaden their

style and themes. Italian Romantics at the time argued that Italian literature was centred on

mythology and ancient history and that authors were simply imitating classic works. They argued

that modern themes would better represent modern culture and society, and that authors would

then be able to draw on their own experiences and feelings; this would make the work more sincere

in its emotion and therefore more powerful. They disputed that modern Italian drama was being

limited by the traditional rules of style and form. Madame de Staël-Holstein’s remarks are often seen

as signalling the beginning of the Romantic revival of theatre and opera. We can see the movement

develop through the works of Rossini, Bellini and Donizetti, reaching its height with Verdi.

Romanticism was rejected by some Italians as they felt that it was a German idea and that the

popularity of the new movement would only justify the Austrian’s supremacy. They instead felt that

Latin and the classics were their true national heritage.44 They believed Classicism was the true

Italian style and that they were defending their culture from foreigners but they and the Romantics

both sought to preserve the national identity and culture.45Giacomo Leopardi was one of these

Classicists who strongly defended Greek, Latin and Italian works. However, Classicism was widely

associated with the Napoleonic regime. Lyttelton argues that Romanticism triumphed because it was

a new movement and “could be used as a metaphor for the revolt against established authority”.46

By trying to compete with the great Romantic literature coming from Germany and Britain, Italians

were stepping away from the old classical structure and becoming more innovative. They were

moving forward while also looking to their past for a sense of national identity. Classicism was

“dead and finished like the Venetian Republic” according to Ermes Visconti.47 In Romantic theatre

43

Quoted in Gary Tomlinson, ‘Italian Romanticism and Italian Opera: An Essay in Their Affinities’, National Traditions in 19

th Century Opera, Vol. I (Surrey: Ashgate, 2010), p. 38.

44 Adrian Lyttelton, ‘Creating a National Past’, p. 32.

45 Gary Tomlinson, National Traditions, Vol. 1, p. 39.

46 Lyttelton, ‘Creating a National Past’, p 32.

47 Quoted in Lyttelton, ‘Creating a National Past’, p 33, taken from Visconti,’Idee elementary sulla poesia

romantica’, in Discussioni e polemiche sul Romanticismo, ed. By E. Bellorini (Bari: Laterza, 1944), p. 469.

10

and literature, the central character would no longer be the great ruler; it would be a regular citizen.

Romanticism focused on the themes of family, religion, history, and nations. Italian Romanticism was

a combination of these Romantic themes with the structure and form of Classicism.

Manzoni said that in Milan “where it has been talked about more and for a longer time than

elsewhere, the word ‘Romanticism’ has been adopted, if I am not mistaken…, to represent a

combination of ideas more rational, better organised and more comprehensive than in any other

place”.48 By 1815 a literary revolution was under way. Truth and a true depiction of everyday life

were becoming more important in literature and theatre. Italian Romanticism was influenced by the

literature of Northern Europe but it quickly developed its own national style. Italian Romanticists

saw the importance of translating foreign works so that they could be inspired by the great works of

Shakespeare and Schiller. However, Italian Romantics came to believe that it was more important to

write about issues and struggles of the modern world, and not fantasy. These issues were ones of

national identity, brotherhood and freedom. Romanticism in Italy sought to fully portray life and

society exactly how it was in a particular place and time. The plot should not just be a story imagined

from the writer or composer’s head.

Romantic literature used historical events, places and people as a way to express the society and

politics of nineteenth-century Italy. By focussing on their shared past they could justify their views

that the peninsula should be united. They could also learn from the mistakes of their past that led

them to being ruled by foreign powers. Virtues that nationalists wished to encourage within

individuals, such as duty, loyalty, and heroism, could be found in famous historical figures. They

were used as examples of how men must be in order to achieve unification.49

Nationalist sentiment was being expressed in the works of authors such as Manzoni, the most

famous being I Promessi Sposi, first published in 1827, in which he sought to create a national Italian

language. Verdi read it when he was sixteen. At the time when it was written, there was no standard

Italian language. Each region or city had its own dialect. This difficulty in communication across the

peninsula is one of the factors which made the Italians so divided. The creation of a national

language would be necessary in order for them to establish themselves as a nation. People were

strongly patriotic in their loyalty to their own regions, and were often competitive and suspicious of

those from a different part of Italy. Some cities had become famous for their literary or artistic

achievements and some had developed into commercial centres. Because of this they found it hard

to set aside their local pride and put the greater good first, the nationalist cause that would be

48

Kimbell, p. 9, taken from Manzoni, Sul Romanticismo . 49

Kimbell, p. 13.

11

better for all in the long run.50 Manzoni thought it would be untrue to have the peasant characters

speaking literary Italian and having them speaking in a local Milanese dialect would mean the novel

would not have a great appeal in the other regions. Instead, for the first published version of I

Promessi Sposi, he created a language that was a combination of Milanese and Tuscan dialects.

Choruses of Manzoni’s plays were sung in Milan during the 1848 revolution.51

The twentieth-century Marxist philosopher Antonio Gramsci was of the opinion that opera in

nineteenth-century Italy had only succeeded in distracting people from developing a proper

Romantic literature. He wrote:

Among its other meanings romanticism has assumed that of a special relationship or bond

between intellectuals and the people, the nation. In other words, it is a particular reflection of

“democracy” (in the broad sense) in literature… And in this specific sense Romanticism has

never existed in Italy.52

However, Simonetta Chiappini argues in The Risorgimento Revisited: Nationalism and Culture in

Nineteenth-Century Italy, that opera was, between 1830 and 1850, the “most artistically

sophisticated and representative form of Italian Romanticism.53

Opera would play a significant part in rallying people to the nationalist cause. The language and

culture of Italy that the Romanticists and Classicists were debating were of the elite. Only a small

percentage of the peninsula used this language and only one quarter of the population was

literate.54 In order for the new leaders of Italy to spread their nationalist message they would have

to figure out a way to communicate with the masses, not just with the elite. Verdi bridged the gap

between high culture and daily life. By using stories taken from the Bible, history, or from plays by

Shakespeare and other famous authors, he was writing opera for the masses; all Italian would have

been familiar with the stories.55 His music was the music of the people and opera was an experience

that could be shared by many.

50

Kimbell, p. 5. 51

Kimbell, p. 15. 52

Quoted in Mary Ann Smart, ‘Verdi, Italian Romanticism, and the Risorgimento’, The Cambridge Companion to Verdi, ed. by Scott L. Balthazar (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), p. 29. 53

Quoted in Simonetta Chiappini, ‘From the People to the Masses: Political Developments in Italian Opera from Rossini to Mascagni’, The Risorgimento Revisited: Nationalism and Culture in Nineteenth-Century Italy, ed. by Silvana Patriarca and Lucy Riall (Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012), p. 57. 54

Raymond Grew, ‘Culture and Society, 1796-1900’, Italy in the Nineteenth Century: 1796-1900, ed. by John Davis, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), p. 221. 55

Grew, Italy in the Nineteenth Century, p. 220.

12

Mazzini understood the important role that opera could have in a political revival. In his Filosofia

della Musica he laments composers imitating Rossini and calls for the reform of opera. He believed

that opera should be a true representation of the time and place in which it was set:

If musical drama must harmonize with the progress of civilisation, and follow its paths, or

open them up, and exercise a social function, it must above all reflect in itself the historical

epochs that it sets out to describe….Musical drama still rests on the false ideal of the

classicists; it disowns not only truth but historical reality as well.

Mazzini also thought that characters should have their own distinct musical style to suit their own

personality – “Why are there not many types of melody, where there are many types of characters?”

he asked. The chorus too needed to be its own character. It needed to represent the public.56

Although Mazzini was not an admirer of Verdi, Verdi understood Mazzini’s theories on opera

and music. Mazzini associated Romanticism with individualism and instead wanted greater attention

given to the role of the chorus, the creation of a vivid local colour and increased characterisation.

Italian composers of the first half of the century experimented with Romanticism, adopting some

aspects of it while the rest of their composition remained quite conservative. Verdi based some of

his earlier works on texts of Romantics, such as Victor Hugo and Shakespeare. Tomlinson feels that

Victor Hugo’s dramatic and Donizetti’s melodramatic ideals that appear in Verdi’s Rigoletto make it

the epitome of the second phase of Italian Romanticism, which was begun around 1830 by Mazzini

and others. These operas showed extreme emotions, passion and horror, and had direct political

themes.57 In the early 1830’s, Mazzini recognised some of his values within the music of Donizetti

and there is little doubt that Verdi was influenced by the composer. 58 There are many similarities

between Donizetti’s Lucrezia Borgia and Verdi’s Rigoletto and both are based on plays by Victor

Hugo. It is very possible that Verdi, while studying in Milan, would have seen the première of

Lucrezia Borgia at La Scala in 1833. There are many other examples of where Verdi took inspiration

from Donizetti throughout his works from the 1840’s and 1850’s. Bellini and Rossini also had some

influence on his Romantic style.

Verdi’s I due Foscari was based on Byron and set in Venice. Each central character had their own

recurring theme. It is very likely that this was an attempt to put into practice Mazzini’s ideas from his

Filsofia della Musica. The opera was filled with images of Venice that Mazzini had also used as an

example of how opera should reflect the place and time in which it was set:

56

Tomlinson, National Traditions, Vol. 1, pp. 44-45 57

Tomlinson, National Traditions, Vol. 1, p. 49. 58

Tomlinson, National Traditions, Vol. 1, p. 48.

13

Venice – voluptuous, carefree, heedless, but mysterious and terrible, where life was

consumed between love and terror, between a palace and a prison, between the sigh of a

young beauty wandering through the evening breezes of the lagoon, and the muffled wail of

an orphan drowned in the canal.59

59

Quoted in Tomlinson, National Traditions, Vol. I, p. 44, from Mazzini, Filosofia della Musica.

14

Verdi’s Operas and the debate that surrounds his legacy

Historians and musicologists alike have debated Verdi’s connection with Italian nationalism.

They have examined all the different areas: society, politics, censorship, and audience reception as

well as the libretti and music. They have studied police files, administrative files of theatres,

newspaper reviews and personal letters in hopes of uncovering the truth. The main questions being

debated are how was this association formed between Verdi and the Risorgimento in the mind of

the public and when exactly did Verdi achieve this status as a symbol of Italian nationalism? First I

will look at some of Verdi’s operas that are thought to have nationalist aspects to them and then I

will outline the main arguments made by scholars.

Verdi’s first opera Oberto, Conte di San Bonificio premiered on 17 November 1839 at La

Scala when he was twenty-six years old. It was reasonably successful and Verdi was given a contract

with La Scala to produce another three operas. His second, Un giorno di regno, was not a hit and

almost caused Verdi to give up composing altogether, until he saw the libretto for what would be his

first masterpiece.

Nabucco premiered at La Scala in 1842 and over the next two years it was staged more than

fifty times. It is the opera that is today most linked to Italian nationalism. It is based on a biblical

story of the Jews enslaved by the Babylonians. The Israelites are suffering under the persecution of

Nabucco, the Babylonian King. Fenena, the younger daughter of Nabucco, falls in love with Ismaele,

nephew of the King of Jerusalem. Nabucco proclaims himself as God and is hit by a lightning bolt,

causing him to become mad. Abigaille, his illegitimate daughter, takes over as ruler of the

Babylonians and orders the death of the Israelites. When Nabucco’s senses return he is overcome

with grief as Fenena is to be killed along with the slaves. He prays to the Hebrew God for help and

rushes to save the slaves along with his loyal soldiers. Abigaille, too, in the end acknowledges the

Hebrew God.

Abigaille’s vengeful aria in Act Two is immediately followed by the Israelite High Priest’s “Tu

sul labbro”, a tranquil prayer introduced by six cellos. It emphasises the differences between the

merciless Babylonian rulers and the suffering Israelites. In the famous chorus “Va, Pensiero”, the

Israelites sing:

Oh, mia patria si bella e perduta!

Oh, membranza si cara e fatal!

15

In Nabucco Verdi had done what Donizetti and Bellini had done before him and kept the

musical style powerful yet simple.60The chorus here is the voice of the people. Julian Budden wrote

that “The great swing, the sense of a thousand voices is something inherent in the melody even if it

is sung as a solo or played on an instrument.”61 Verdi uses the chorus as a way to express a sense of

community and of people joining together for the greater good.

Nabucco was Verdi’s first successful opera. Very little first-hand information has been found

about its composition, especially within his correspondence.62 No letters were exchanged between

Verdi and his librettist, Temistocle Solera, as they were both in Milan. Therefore we can only use

accounts written much later by Verdi or approved by him. We have an autobiographical account

allegedly dictated by Verdi to Giulio Ricordi in 1879 when Italy was a new nation that needed

national myths.63 He says in this document that before he began work on Nabucco he had decided to

give up composition. He was grieving the loss of his family - his two children and his wife,

Margherita, died within two years of each other - and also the failure of Un giorno di regno.

However, Bartolomeo Merellim, the impresario at La Scala, brought the libretto of Nabucco to his

attention. He remembers being given the text and walking home reading it:

Along the way I felt a kind of vague uneasiness, a supreme sadness, an anguish that welled in

the heart! ... I went home and, with a violent gesture, threw the manuscript on the table and

stood before it. As it fell, the sheaf of pages opened on its own; without knowing how, my

eyes stared at the page that lay before me, and this line appeared to me: Va, pensiero, sull’ali

dorate.64

He says that when he returned with Nabucco his “artistic career began”. 65 It was performed fifty-

seven times at La Scala, a record that still remains unsurpassed. With the success of Nabucco, Verdi

realised what it was that the audience wanted. Powerful choruses feature in nearly all of Verdi’s

subsequent operas.

Verdi’s next opera was I Lombardi alla prima crociata in 1843. Verdi set out to replicate

those features that had made Nabucco so successful two years previously. We find another

powerfully patriotic chorus similar to that which had been so successful in Nabucco. It was based on

an epic poem by Tommaso Grossi written in 1826. The poem can be seen as a nationalist work, using

60

Julian Budden, The operas of Verdi, 3 Vols. (London: Cassell, 1973), Vol. 1, p. 27. 61

Budden, The Operas of Verdi, Vol.1, p. 107. 62

Roger Parker, Leonora’s last act: Essays in Verdian Discourse (Chichester: Princeton University Press, 1997), p. 21. 63

Parker, Leonora’s Last Act, p. 21. 64


Parker, Leonora’s Last Act, p. 22.

16

Italian historical events as examples of how to form a new nation.66 It has been argued that the

opera supported the view that Italy should be unified under the Church with the Pope as head of

state.67 Although Verdi was fervently anti-Church, to many it seemed like the most likely way that

Italy would be unified. When I Lombardi alla prima Crociata premiered at La Scala in 1843, the

reviews made little reference to the poem. The reviews do note that Verdi gave a greater

importance to the role of the chorus and how the characters had their own motifs. However, one

review by Carlo Tenca in La Moda discusses the affect the opera could have on its audience:

The individualism of affect disappears in the face of this so fervid imagination: and it has

sentiments much more vast, more collective, which will agitate the masses, who will embrace

whatever contains the most sublime image of nation or of humanity. And it is precisely in the

expression of a grand and complex thought that the creative power of Verdi is revealed; it

resides in the lament of an entire people who tremble as slaves on the banks of the Euphrates,

and the religious aspirations of two nations, who become brothers, bonded by a single prayer;

or it is the cry of war that sends the crusaders off to the conquest of Palestine, it is in the

pained moan of those troops, afflicted by thirst in the desert. Even these individual emotions,

without which dramatic action cannot exist, need to be reinvigorated for Verdi by a higher or

more generous idea; and even love itself must connect to something more exalted that

surpasses vulgar complacency, as occurs in Nabucco and in I Lombardi, where it is elevated by

religious exaltation.68

This kind of review would have been rare for the time but is similar to something that would have

been written years later. The author makes associations between melody and the individual, and

between harmony and the collective. Mary Ann Smart believes he must have come across these

theories in Mazzini’s Filosofia della Musica. By 1845, Verdi was the second most performed

composer in Italy, the first being Donizetti. In 1847, New York Tribune correspondent Margaret

Fuller wrote that "there is little hope of hearing in Italy other music than Verdi's".69

Mazzini believed that if opera developed “historical individuality, the individuality of the

period which the drama depicts, the individuality of the characters, each of whom also represents an

66

Mary Ann Smart, ‘How Political Were Verdi’s operas? Metaphors of progress in the reception of “I Lombardi alla prima crociata”’, Journal of Modern Italian Studies, Issue 2, Volume 18, 2013, pp. 190 – 204. Accessed 11 January 2014; page numbers not marked online. 67

Mary Ann Smart, ‘How Political Were Verdi’s operas?’, pp. 190 – 204. 68

Quoted in Mary Ann Smart, ‘How Political Were Verdi’s operas?’, pp. 190 – 204, taken from Simonetta Chiappini, ‘La voce della martire. Dagli ‘evirati cantori’ all'eroina romantica’, In Storia d'Italia, Annali 22, ‘Il risorgimento’, ed. by Banti, Alberto M. and Ginsborg, Paul (Turin: Einaudi, 2007), pp. 289-328. 69

Quoted in Peter Stamatov, ‘Interpretive Activism and Political Uses of Verdi’s Operas in the 1840’s’,

American Sociological Review, No. 2, Vol. 67, June 2002, 345-366, (p. 348).

http://www.tandfonline.com/action/doSearch?action=runSearch&type=advanced&searchType=journal&result=true&prevSearch=%2Bauthorsfield%3A()



17

idea”, then opera could play a great part in stirring nationalist feelings within its audience.70 Verdi

seemed to be paying great attention to Mazzini’s words when he wrote La Battaglia di Legnano in

1849. The opera had its première in Rome in January of that year. At this time the Pope had just

been overthrown as head of the Papal State and had escaped and fled the city.71 On the 5th February

there was to be a meeting to decide how the Papal State would be governed. Republicans flocked to

Rome including Mazzini and Garibaldi. It was at this exciting time that Verdi’s opera was first seen.

The opera is set in 1176 when two Italian cities join together to defeat the Germans led by Frederick

Barbarossa. It is the only opera of Verdi’s that openly deals with Italian nationalism and there were

many demonstrations during this run. The theme of the greater good being put above the individual

is once again dominant in the story. Throughout the opera the characters cry out ‘Italia’, stressing

that their loyalty is to the nation and not to their city.72

The Pope appealed to France, Austria and Spain to help restore his power. France sent

troops to Rome and although the Italian Republicans held out for longer than expected they were

defeated in July. It resulted in countless Italian deaths, leaving nationalists disillusioned. They feared

that a republic of Italy might not be possible. Many however now accepted the idea of a

constitutional monarchy under Vittorio Emanuele.73 At a concert in Rome, as a protest to the French

occupation, there were many cheers and cries for an encore when an aria from Nabucco was played

that contains the line “that will blow death to the foreigner”.74

At that time it was common for operas to be set around a love story. Verdi however, did not

always do what was typical or what the audience expected. 75 He was more interested in themes of

power and government. While he was not afraid to show his political beliefs and ideas in the opera

house, he rarely showed scenes of love and passion. Not until 1859, in Un Ballo in Maschero, did he

compose a love duet between two adults.76 We know from this and from La Traviata (1853) that he

was capable of composing romantic music and we can see through his letters from his wife that he

was a passionate man.77 So why did he hold these emotions back in his music? Maybe he felt that

such things were private, that they did not belong on the stage. Or maybe he was trying to show his

audience that the collective fight for independence should be put before personal matters. In his

70

Quoted in Chiappini, The Risorgimento Revisited, p. 69, from Mazzini, Filosofia della Musica. 71




Stamatov, p. 351. 75



Martin, Aspects of Verdi, p. 12.

18

operas there are numerous scenes of couples being separated because they had a greater

responsibility.

Don Carlos premiered in Paris on the 11 March 1867 during the time of The Roman

Question, the struggle between the Italian state and the Pope. It was based on a play by Friedrich

Schiller about the conflict between the Church and the State in Spain ruled by Philip II. The opera

dealt with the issues of the duty of the individual for the common good, freedom of conscience and

freedom of the press and the need for the Church to adapt to more liberal doctrines. In 1864, Pope

Pius IX had issued a Syllabus of Errors listing 80 “principal Errors of our time”. 78 They included

freedom of conscience, freedom of discussion and the press and the mistaken belief that the “The

Roman Pontiff can and should reconcile and harmonise himself with progress, liberalism and recent

civilisation.” The politics in Don Carlos were clear to all. At the première a leader of the Catholic

party in France turned his back to the stage when the King says “Tais-toi, prêtre” (hold your tongue,

priest).79 Martin has said that “of all Verdi’s operas Don Carlos was the most finely tuned to the

politics of its day”. This was Verdi’s last opera that featured contemporary political issues. However,

in Aida there is still the patriotic chorus, the Church versus the state, and an oppressed group. There

is a phrase when Amonasro says “Pensa che un popolo vinto, sdraiato, per te soltanto, per te

soltanto risroger puo…”. While Aidia was first performed in 1871 the word ‘risorgere’ would

immediately have reminded the audience of the struggle in the 1840’s and 1850’s.

Verdi wrote the Messa da Requiem to honour the one year anniversary of Manzoni’s death

in 1873. Afterwards he gave the impression of his intention to retire yet he composed two new

operas: Otello and Falstaff. None of his political thoughts at the time featured in Otello and there are

only hints of his Risorgimento themes. He focused more on the psychology of man, love and death.

After the much awaited première of Verdi’s Otello in 1887, a critic for Il Secolo wrote:

For now, the whole impression of the audience can be summed up in a shout: Viva Verdi! That

shout, thirty years ago, was fortunate in representing, in the sum of its letters, all the national

aspirations of our people – last night it summed up all its memories of artistic glories, all the

aspirations for maintaining intact the ancient and eternal splendour.80

There has been much debate on Verdi and his status as composer of the Risorgimento. George

Martin has defined the two sides of the argument as the Traditionalist view and the Revisionist

78



Kelly, p.357.

19

view.81 The former is that at the première of Nabucco in 1842 the crowd erupted into cheers on

hearing the chorus “Va, Pensiero” and called for an encore, instantly turning him into an icon of

Italian nationalism. This account has been attributed to early 19th century biographers of Verdi. The

Revisionist view was truly set off when Roger Parker discovered an error in Franco Abbiati’s Life of

Verdi. Abbiati, a biographer of Verdi, references a review in the Gazzetta Musicale di Milano of the

opening night at La Scala in March 1842, which claims that the audience cried out for an encore of

“Va, Pensiero”.82 However, Parker has not found this passage that Abbiati quotes. He searched

through the reviews of that first performance of Nabucco but found no record of an encore of “Va,

Pensiero”. According to the Gazzetta privilegiata di Milano the chorus that was encored was

actually “Immenso Jehova”. Also during the second run of Nabucco at Milan in the autumn of 1842

there was no mention of an encore of “Va, Pensiero”. Between 1842 and 1848, supposedly the

period in which Verdi’s choruses were used as patriotic hymns, Parker finds no significant mention of

“Va, Pensiero” in the contemporary reviews or evidence for any Nabucco song being specifically

popular during this time.83 Parker does not dispute that there was some connection between Verdi’s

opera and the Risorgimento, no matter how small: “Verdi was, after all, Italy’s most famous and

popular opera composer at a time when opera was the most important form of bourgeois cultural

activity and social entertainment”84 But still there is little contemporary evidence to support his title

of ‘vate del Risorgimento’.

Parker points out that when Verdi wrote his autobiographical story of discovering Nabucco it

was 1879, after the period of revolution. He therefore considers the myth of “Va, Pensiero” to be a

piece of nostalgia, remembering those times of action. Parker believes that Verdi was romanticising

the event and enhancing the importance of the chorus himself. Parker says in The Verdian Patriotic

Choruses in the 1840’s that “Italians in the heat of battle did not want, did not need to deal in

metaphor”.85 They preferred songs that “portrayed their present situation directly and without

equivocation”. He makes the argument that a song’s message may change with time and that “Va,

Pensiero” may have been given a greater importance because of the way that we view the past

today. He gives an example of Frederick Douglass (1818-1895), a slave in America and later a writer

81

Martin, ‘The Scholars Squabble’, p. 113. 82

Franco Abbiati, Giuseppe Verdi, Vol. 1 (Milan: Ricordi, 1959), p. 415. 83



Roger Parker, “Arpa D'or Dei Fatidici Vati”: The Verdian Patriotic Choruses in the 1840’s (Parma: Istituto Nazionale di Studi Verdiani, 1997), p.99.

20

and social reformer, who didn’t read into the lyrics he and the other slaves would sing, but now,

looking back, has a different understanding of them, as songs of sorrow and frustration.86

Mary Ann Smart is another scholar that believes that Verdi did not enjoy this reputation at the

time in which he was composing. She argues that the lyrics of the chorus “lack urgency, evoking only

a dulled, remote pain.” She feels that as there is no “impulse towards action, change, or movement”

that therefore the chorus would have been unlikely to provoke such a reaction in its audience.87 La

Scala closed for several months after the fighting of the Cinque Giornate in Milan of March 1848

between the rebels and the Austrians. Instead concerts were held of patriotic and military music.

She points out that Verdi’s name appears nowhere in these programmes. She also discovered that

“Va, Pensiero” was never reprinted as an independent piece. This suggests that it could not really

have been that popular. Nevertheless, she does believe that it was Verdi’s intention to provoke

nationalist feeling within his audience.88

The failure of the 1848 revolutions marked a turning point for both politics and opera,

although this may have just been a coincidence. After the revolutions the opera house was a lot

more cautious; censoring texts, forbidding demonstrations, and even threatening directors, even in

Milan where censorship had been very mild under Austrian authorities.89 The impresari and others in

the opera theatre would have been wary of promoting any revolutionary feeling. They relied on

ruling groups for their livelihood. Revolutions would mean the end of seasons and a great loss of

earnings. For this reason Rossillini argues that the opera industry would not have wanted to have

been tied up in nationalism. Between 1848 and 1849 people didn’t leave their homes at night for

fear of shots being fired.90 G. B. Benelli wrote: “if they would only get it over at last, and let poor

artists breathe”.91 However, after the failure of the 1848 revolutions, the Austrian authorities in

Milan approved performances of a few of Verdi’s popular operas, including Nabucco. Considering

this, both Parker and Abbate believe it is highly unlikely that Verdi’s operas were connected to the

revolution in the public’s mind. 92

Mary Ann Smart wonders if censorship could be the reason why there is no evidence surfacing

for audience reaction to Verdi’s operas during this time. Censorship was not as serious during the

86

Parker, Leonora’s Last Act, pp. 40-41. 87

Smart, The Cambridge Companion to Verdi, p. 34. 88

Smart, The Cambridge Companion to Verdi, p. 38. 89

Rosselli, The Opera Industry in Italy from Cimarosa to Verdi: The Role of the Impresario (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984), p. 168. 90

Rosselli, The Opera Industry in Italy, p. 168. 91

Quoted in Rosselli, The Opera Industry in Italy, p.168. 92

Abbate and Parker, A History of Opera, p.247.

21

18th century, which was a period of general stability, but became a bigger issue after the French

Revolution. Rules on censorship varied throughout the territories. Censorship was strict in the Papal

States. All authorities agreed that disrespect could not be shown towards the sovereigns.

Expressions of patriotism were not allowed. Verdi even cancelled his performances of Un Ballo in

Maschera from the San Carlo opera theatre in Naples because of an argument over censorship.

Verdi’s famous ‘Risorgimento’ opera titles often had to be changed in order to be performed in

Naples or Palermo. In 1846 the patriot Luigi Torelli wrote of censorship in Lombardy:

Any writing, therefore, that even remotely tries to depict the unhappy state of a certain class

of person, or town, or region, is prohibited or mutilated, because there must be no suffering

under the Austrian government, at any cost. Any writing that recalls, in colors at all vivid, the

actions of a people who liberate their country from a foreign yoke, is prohibited and

mutilated, because it could inflame the souls by example and disturb the peace of the most

contented people on the face of the earth. Any writing that, even at arm's length, points

towards the absurdity or flaws in a law, or any other abuse by the magistrates, is prohibited or

mutilated, because one must not in any way suggest that the government can create a bad

law or an imperfect one, or appoint an inept or dishonest functionary.93

Parker thinks it highly unlikely that the lack of evidence is a result of Austrian censorship as

there are many other references in the contemporary sources of choruses causing a reaction within

an opera’s audience. Verdi was a citizen of Parma, ruled by the Duchess Marie-Louise, which seemed

to be the most peaceful state of this period. Verdi had few problems with censors here, unlike in the

other states, and was never punished for his political views.94

Simonetta Chiappini points out that between the election of Pope Pius IX in 1846 and the fall

of the Venetian republic in 1849, there was less police control and censorship of opera, which may

be why we have much evidence during this period of the audience responding politically. Older

operas, that previously had not roused patriotism within the people, were suddenly being

appreciated for their nationalist ideologies. In Palermo, in 1848, Lord Acton was witness to the

audience’s reaction to the line “You took my heart and mind, my Country, Gods and Freedom!”.

93

Quoted in Smart, ‘How Political Were Verdi’s operas’, pp.190-204, taken from Torelli, Luigi, Pensieri sull'Italia di un aninomo lombardo, L.R. Delay, Paris 1846, p. 27. 94

Martin, Aspects of Verdi, p. 7

22

They sprung to their feet and while waving their handkerchiefs, yelled “Long live the Pope, the King

and the league of Italy!”95

We have some evidence of audiences reacting to the political messages in Verdi’s operas

within police reports. There are reports of disturbance of the public order from December 1847 in

Venice from when Verdi’s Macbeth was running in Venice. The audience cried out for encores of the

Scottish exiles’ chorus ‘’La Patria Tradita’’.96 In March the police banned Act 4 of Macbeth, which

contained this chorus. In November and December 1848, the song appeared in two amateur

concerts put on to raise money for the defence of Venice.97 This suggests that the chorus did have a

political significance to those in Venice during the 1848 revolutions. Stamatov notes that the only

other evidence for a political reaction from the audience to this song outside of Venice during this

period came from Verona.

Isaiah Berlin wrote in his paper The Naiveté of Verdi that Verdi’s “convictions, whether they

moved to the right or to the left, moved with those of the popular feeling; he responded deeply and

personally to every twist and turn in the Italian struggle for unity and freedom.”98 I am inclined to

agree with him on this. One way to study the society of the times is to look at it through the eyes of

composers, impresarios, editors and performers.99 Carlotta Sorba believes that the audience and

opera producers had a strong relationship: “Audience expectations and values contributed to

shaping romantic operas, which, in turn played an important role in social and political

transformations of the period, creating an interchange between opera and society”. Sorba points

out that Verdi was very eager to please his audience. He cared more about the opinion of the

audience than that of the critics. This need to satisfy the public affected the subjects and themes he

put in his operas.100 Therefore, opera is an invaluable source of evidence for the study of Italian

society and public opinion in Nineteenth Century Italy and proves that the arts and society are

always connected.

Anthony Arblaster comments in his introduction to Viva la Libertà! that perhaps people are

reluctant to tie art with politics because of their notion of what politics is. Most people will associate

it with party politics and power-hungry politicians. Arblaster believes that politics is “not only about

95

Quoted in Chiappini, The Risorgimento Revisited, p. 67, taken from ‘La fine dell’eta borbonica’ in Il Teatro di San Carlo, 2 vols (Naples, 1978), p. 178. 96

Stamatov, p. 350. 97

Quoted in Stamatov, p. 350, from Carnesecchi, ‘Venezia sorgesti dal duro servaggio’: La musica patriottica negli anni della Repubblica di Manin, (Venice: Il Cardo, 1994), pp. 43-47. 98

Isaiah Berlin, ‘The Naiveté of Verdi’, The Hudson Review, No. 1, Vol. 21, Spring 1968, pp. 138-147 (p.141). 99

Carlotta Sorba, ‘To please the Public: Composers and Audiences in Nineteenth Century Italy’, Journal of Interdisciplinary History, Vol. 36 (2006), pp. 595-614 (p. 597). 100

Sorba, ‘To Please the Public’, p. 597.

23

how we are governed, or who governs us, but also about the collective values and purposes of our

societies, and what they might be, or should be”.101 In this sense, everyone is interested or involved

in politics. Art has always tried to interpret life and therefore politics is sure to be included in some

way. Arblaster makes the point that opera is a public and dramatic art and it would thus be very

unlikely that politics had no part in it. Opera was a form of public entertainment and so had appeal

to the masses, making it necessary to focus on themes that were relatable to everyone.102 The

chorus was the mode through which the public voice was heard. It is widely agreed that drama seeks

to explore the human life and condition. Arblaster asks why this would not be the case with opera.

Many operas have been based on great authors like Shakespeare and Henry James. The political

aspect of Shakespeare’s Macbeth is clear to all. So why would Verdi have ignored this aspect? And

why would he be less likely to want to have a political significance within his works than a

playwright?103 It would be foolish to think that all composers were disinterested in relaying political

or moral messages and that they cared solely for the musical construct. Composers were very

involved with the writing of the libretti, having strong ideas about what they wanted from the text.

Verdi wrote very clear instructions to his librettists.104 He always wanted to keep the libretti as close

to the original literary source as possible and put a great deal of thought into the plots. 105

It is important to note that Verdi’s operas were not the only case of music being used to

make political statements. In 1844, twenty-one Venetians invaded the Kingdom of Naples to depose

the King. However, they were not successful and were sentenced to death. As they were led to their

execution they sang the chorus “Chi per la patria muor, vissuto chi è assai” (he who dies for his

country, has lived long enough), composed by Saverio Mercadante for his opera Donna Caritea in

1825.106

Arblaster is not a student of music. He approaches his book from a historical and political

perspective. He accuses some musical commentators as having “a perverse, wilful determination

…to deny the political dimension of opera, as of much other music, as if to admit its existence was to

allow the exalted realm of pure music to be contaminated by contact with sordid reality”.107 He also

points out that some people view music as a form of escapism, a way to relax, un-associated with

their everyday lives. They are therefore reluctant to see the ties between music and politics.108 But

101

Arblaster, Viva La Libertà!, p. 2. 102




Budden, The operas of Verdi, Vol. 1, p. 32. . 106

Martin, ‘The Scholars Squabble’, p. 114. 107


Arblaster, Viva La Libertà!, p. 6.

24

he argues that there is much more to opera and that it is not given enough credit as an art form. It is

just as capable as drama or literature when it comes to commenting on society and the human

condition.

Opera is able to tell a story through its libretti; but Arblaster argues that even if these words

were not included, the audience would still be able to have some idea as to what the song was

about. He gives the example of “Va, Pensiero”, where the strong unified vocal line, even without the

lyrics, would still give the sense of a group of people crying out of their common woes. The

importance of the music should not be overlooked. Opera is ‘dramma per musica’ after all.109 We

therefore should examine any political meaning in the music just as much as in the words.

Arblaster’s main reason for believing that Verdi’s music and political views were

interconnected is that he feels that there is a strong sense of the composer’s personality in his

music, that there is no separation between himself and his creative works, unlike with Mozart or

Rossini.110 As an example he points out the parent-child themes within Verdi’s operas. Between 1838

and 1840, Verdi suffered a terrible tragedy, losing both his children and his wife. Father and child

stories, such as Rigoletto and Gilda and Boccanegra and Amelia, could be seen as an expression of

Verdi’s sorrow. Arblaster argues that if this is so, if Verdi’s personal life could flow into his work, then

why is it unlikely that his political ideas could not do the same? Verdi was a known nationalist liberal.

His opinions are clear to us through his personal letters. When revolution broke out in Milan, Verdi

wrote to his librettist, Francesco Piave “You speak to me of music!! What’s got into you? ...Do you

believe I want to concern myself now with notes, with sounds? …There must be only one music

welcome to the ears of Italians in 1848. The music of the cannon!”111 Verdi composed the patriotic

song “Suona La Tromba” for Mazzini soon after telling him in 1848 “May this hymn soon be sung

amid the music of the cannon on the Lombardy plains”.112 In 1859 Verdi was sent as a delegate from

Parma to Turin. When the Piedmontese and Garibaldi’s troops advanced on Rome in 1860 he wrote

“Those are composers, and what operas! What finales! To the sound of guns!”113 We cannot

question his passion for the nationalist cause. He was anti-church and lost out on the post of

Maestro di Musica in Busseto because he lacked its support. He lived for many years with

Giuseppina Strepponi before being married in 1859, making them the subject of much gossip and

disapproval in Busseto. Apparently Strepponi was “ignored in the street and no one sat near her in

109



William Weaver, Verdi: A Documentary Study, (London: Thames and Hudson, 1977), pp. 174-5. 112

Quoted in Kimbell, p. 231. 113

Quoted in Arblaster, Viva La Libertà!, p. 96.

25

church”.114 Antonio Barezzi, the father of Verdi’s deceased wife, wrote to Verdi on the subject

causing Verdi to reply “…I claim my right to freedom of action, because all men have a right to it, and

because my nature rebels against mere conformity.” 115 He clearly had no problem defying the

Church publicly and going against the norm. So I think it is very unlikely that he would have shied

away from expressing his opinions in his operas. If he was afraid of censorship he could easily mask

the political meanings of the story with metaphors.

So when exactly was the connection between Verdi and nationalism made? In a review of

Parker’s Leonora’s Last Act, Joseph Kerman wrote of “Va, Pensiero” that it was “no triumph of

immediate political symbolism, it was a triumph of patriotic nostalgia.’’116 The earliest piece of

evidence that Smart came across for Verdi’s association with the word ‘patria’ came from 1846. It

was found in a pamphlet on Verdi’s career by Benedetto Bermani. He claimed that Verdi

transformed opera from “pleasant illusion” to something more serious and worthy of analysis.117 In

A History of Opera it is pointed out by Parker and Abbate that there is very little historical evidence

for Verdi’s operas being associated with the Risorgimento during the 1840’s.118 They argue that in

fact Bellini’s operas proved more rousing of political demonstrations around the 1848 revolutions.119

The druids in Bellini’s opera Norma could be seen as standing for the Italians while the Romans were

the Austrians. Bellini’s operas also featured patriotic choruses and marches. Verdi was not the first

composer to use political metaphors.

Parker and Abbate claim that the association was not made until much later when Italy was

looking for national monuments for the newly formed state to create for itself a sense of national

identity.120 They suggest that the myth of Verdi and the Risorgimento was first set off accidentally in

1858 and 1859 with ‘Viva V.E.R.D.I’, an acronym for Viva Vittorio Emaneule Re D’Italia. According to

George Martin, people started scratching it on city walls and that whenever Verdi was in public

crowds would gather and cheer for him. Parker believes that ‘Viva V.E.R.D.I’ was only used as a

rallying cry just before the unification when it would have been politically safe to do so,121 as

previously publically supporting Vittorio Emanuele would not have been tolerated.

114

Budden, Verdi, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), p. 54. 115

Charles Osborne, Letters of Giuseppe Verdi, (London: Gollancz, 1971), p. 84. 116

Joseph Kerman, ‘Review of Leonora’s Last Act: Essays in Verdian Discourse’, Journal of the American Musicological Society, No. 3, Vol. 52, Autumn 1998, 653-659 (p. 656). 117

Smart, ‘How Political Were Verdi’s operas?’, pp. 190-204. 118

Abbate and Parker, A History of Opera, p. 246. 119



Parker, Leonora’s last act, p.33.

26

In 1861, Verdi stood for election as a deputy to the first national Parliament. George Martin

says that Cavour “was eager to have such a well-known Risorgimento figure in the government”. If

this is true, it would be evidence for the idea that Verdi was a symbol of the Risorgimento at that

time, disproving others who believe it is purely a modern construct. Martin believes that the

association was made no later than the 1850’s.

Rosselli argues that “the nationalist implications of opera - even of a single opera - changed

with time as political circumstances changed and as nationalist feeling among the audience

hardened.”122 He takes as examples two performances of Bellini’s Norma ten years apart in

Cremona. The first performance was in honour of the Austrian Emperor Ferdinand in 1838. The

second was in early 1848 when it had to be cancelled and the theatre shut down because of the line

“Sgombre saran le Gallie” (“Gaul will be freed from the foreigner”) which caused nationalist protests.

Both Nabucco (1842) and I Lombardi alla Prima Crociata (1843) were dedicated to Austrian

archduchesses, the Viceroy of Lombardy and Marie-Louise, the Duchess of Parma123 but are now

seen as having nationalist undertones.

Despite the mixed evidence for the connection between Verdi and nationalism in

contemporary times, the composer remains linked with the Risorgimento in the minds of many.

Mary Ann Smart believes that this could be due to musicologists’ desire to prove that music is not

just a form of entertainment, but that it can have a greater significance.124 However, she also

acknowledges that others have been persevering with the issue because we know what a central

role opera played in Italian society in the nineteenth century. Parker does not dispute that opera

during the Risorgimento period was indeed concerned with nationalism, or that opera music did

have a new feeling of action, but he believes that it was only composed with the intention of

entertainment, not to actually rouse political feelings within its audience.125 He concludes that

Verdi’s reputation as composer of the Risorgimento was a construction of the late nineteenth

century.

122

Rosselli, The Opera Industry, p. 165. 123

Rosselli, The Opera Industry, p. 167. 124

Smart, ‘How Political Were Verdi’s operas?’, pp. 190-204. 125

Abbate and Parker, A History of Opera, p. 248.

27

Conclusion

So how and when did Verdi earn his status as an icon of the Risorgimento? Considering the

lack of evidence we have for an encore of “Va, Pensiero” being played at the première of Nabucco in

1842, I do not believe that Verdi’s reputation as a nationalist composer manifested instantly at this

event. I think it was something that developed over a long period of time and that after the

unification it was solidified in the public’s mind. We must conclude that the story of the encore was

constructed later, perhaps when Italy was finally united and the nation was in need of national

figures.

In light of the evidence, I do not think that Verdi became linked with nationalism in the

public’s mind until the première of La Battaglia di Legnano in 1849. It was a time of action. The

public were fervently nationalist and I am sure that Verdi, too, was caught up in the excitement.

From his personal letters that I have previously quoted, we can see that by 1848 he cared

passionately about the nationalist cause. After the revolutions perhaps the audience saw nationalist

messages in his earlier works that had previously gone unnoticed. Rosselli has given examples for

how nationalist aspects in operas became clearer to audiences as nationalist feelings among them

became stronger.

Some have argued that any political significance found in Verdi’s operas was not intentional

and therefore he “inadvertently became the composer of the Risorgimento’’.126 Even if it really was

not his goal to stir nationalist feelings within his audience, his music still had a significant influence

on the public at a time when opera and the theatres were used to make political statements. It is

possible that Verdi had read Mazzini’s Filosofia della Musica as we can see examples in La Battaglia

di Legnano of some of the ideas that were proposed in it. If he had, he would have been aware of

Mazzini’s theory that opera could have an influence on the public and therefore would play a

significant role in spreading nationalist messages. I think that La Battaglia di Legnano was the first

opera in which Verdi purposefully tried to arouse nationalist feelings within people.

Martin argues in ‘Verdi, Politics and “Va, Pensiero”: The Scholars Squabble’ that Verdi

represented, to the Italian public, an ideal of an independent Italy. A man could now rise up from a

very modest background, as Verdi did, based on his work and intellect, and not based on his

aristocratic birth. He was a composer of the people, not the elite. He was communicating with the

illiterate and spreading the message of freedom and nationalism to the masses.127 I have already

126

Osborne, The Complete Operas of Verdi, (London: Pan Boos, 1973), p.43. 127

Cited in Martin, ‘The Scholars Squabble’, p. 112.

28

pointed out that Verdi’s operas were heavily influenced by public opinion. I propose that his operas

became more obviously nationalist after the 1848 revolutions when the public felt very strongly

about Italian independence. On the balance of evidence, I think that Verdi did earn his status as a

nationalist icon. He came to represent the Italian people’s desire for freedom and that is why, to this

day, he remains a symbol of Italian independence.

29

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Documents

Dissertation