Landscape and gender in Italian opera : the Alpine virgin from Bellini to Puccini / Emanuele Senici.
"Emanuele Senici explores the connection between landscape and gender in Italian opera through the emblematic figure of the Alpine virgin. In the nineteenth century, operas portraying an emphatically virginal heroine, a woman defined by her virginity, were often set in the mountains, most frequ...
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| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Book |
| Language: | English |
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New York :
Cambridge University Press,
©2005
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| Edition: | Paperback re-issue. |
| Series: | Cambridge studies in opera.
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | Contributor biographical information |
| Summary: | "Emanuele Senici explores the connection between landscape and gender in Italian opera through the emblematic figure of the Alpine virgin. In the nineteenth century, operas portraying an emphatically virginal heroine, a woman defined by her virginity, were often set in the mountains, most frequently the Alps. The clarity of the sky, the whiteness of the snow and the purity of the air were associated with the 'innocence' of the female protagonist. Senici discusses a number of works particularly relevant to the origins, transformations, and meanings of this conventional association including Bellini's La sonnambula (1831), Donizetti's Linda di Chamounix (1842), Verdi's Luisa Miller (1849), and Puccini's La fanciulla del West (1910). This convention presents an unusual point of view - a theme rather than a composer, a librettist, a singer, or a genre - from which to observe Italian opera 'at work' over a century."--Publisher description. |
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| Physical Description: | x, 356 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm. |
| Bibliography: | Includes bibliographical references (pages 327-348) and index. |
| ISBN: | 0521834376 9780521834377 9780521107785 0521107784 |