I began reading this on
the bus coming back from Valencia, having consumed Byron’s Corsair on the way
up, before a performance of Il Corsaro. Amazing to see what had happened to the
English language in a few decades! OK, the Byron was supposed to be poetic…
Crowest’s short
critical biography was written at the end of the nineteenth century. Verdi is
still alive, but has completed all of his operas, including Falstaff. What is
truly amazing about the book is the inclusion of quotes from reviewers
throughout the century. It should be compulsory reading for anyone who might be
put off expressing themselves because of a fear of what criticism might bring.
In an apparent stream, critics of the nineteenth century queued up to lambast
Verdi’s work as crass, unintellectual, in bad taste, loud, shallow… By the end
of his life, most of the critics are kowtowing to greatness.
I have to find myself
agreeing with quite a lot of the detailed points, however, as the above
illustrates. Otello and Falstaff are different, however, in that they have
stopped using the set pieces that he seemed to love in the earlier years.
An interesting if now
irrelevant fact relates to the composer’s name. VERDI, Crowest assures us, came
to stand for Victor Emmanuel Re d’Ilalia. Though Verdi, we are told here,
shunned all aspects of politics, his identification with Italian nationalism
cannot be denied.
Overall this seems to
confirm what I am coming to believe more strongly by the day – that people
don’t know what they like, they like what they know. Given enough airings, even
Verdi became acceptable!
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