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Gilda seduced: A tale untold

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 August 2008

Elizabeth Hudson
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Extract

A natural starting point for a critical reading of Verdi's Rigoletto might be the protagonist's ‘Cortigiani, vil razza dannata’ in Act II: an utterance around which much of the emotional intensity of the opera is centred. Rigoletto's outburst can be discussed to great advantage in terms of current musicological fashion, as it alters conventional forms in fascinating and provocative ways, and to great dramatic effect. Yet such an approach presupposes that the key to understanding operas lies in their Great Moments – those passages of intense musical expression that tend to be quoted in movies and television commercials. Of course these moments are a crucial aspect of our delight, and can be a rich source for interpretative ventures. But there is more to opera: various levels of meaning invite our exploration and enjoyment; hermeneutic ‘secrets’ lurk behind seemingly ‘trivial or irrelevant’ passages, and can lead to new perspectives on familiar works.

Type
Research Article
Information
Cambridge Opera Journal , Volume 4 , Issue 3 , November 1992 , pp. 229 - 251
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1992

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References

1 Kermode, Frank, The Genesis of Secrecy (Cambridge, Mass., 1979), 1.Google Scholar

2 Abbate's, Carolyn recent book, Unsung Voices (Princeton, 1991)Google Scholar, has shown how fruitful this approach can be in operatic criticism.

3 For a useful overview of Verdi's treatment of narrative, see Van, Giles de, ‘Musique et narration dans les opéras de Verdi’, Studi verdiani, 6 (1990), 18–54.Google Scholar

4 Abbate, Carolyn (see n. 2) refers to this as ‘the one technical demand of operatic narrative: that the sung word be comprehensible’ (p. 72)Google Scholar; see also Abbate's, ‘Erik's Dream and Tannhäuser's Journey’, in Reading Opera, ed. Groos, Arthur and Parker, Roger (Princeton, 1988), 129–67.Google Scholar An obvious example would be the manner in which music retires behind text in recitative, allowing words to speak their message with minimum competition from the musical system. As Abbate also points out, strophic musical settings collaborate with the text's rhythm and metre so that we can focus on the semantic message.

5 At the beginning of the opera, for example, background is filled in through various asides. The only exception is in the first act, when Rigoletto tells Gilda about her mother. This emphasis on the immediate moment is not unusual for Verdi, although it contrasts sharply with Il trovatore, Rigoletto's immediate successor in Verdi's oeuvre, in which pre-history overshadows the dramatic present, and the opera bristles with texts that tell us of the past. The musical consequences of the focus on ‘action’ in Rigoletto was a powerful factor in its reception as a ‘forward-looking’ opera in the first pan of this century; the abundance of narratives in Il trovatore, with the conventional language they involve, is one element leading to criticism of its ‘old-fashioned’ language.

6 The insignificance of the verbal content in this scene is underscored by Verdi's continuity draft of Rigoletto, in which part of this recitative is sketched without words – the text was filled in later. See L'abbozzo del Rigoletto di Giuseppe Verdi (Milan, 1941)Google Scholar; rpt. as Rigoletto: Ristampa anastatica dell'abbozzo autografo (Bologna, 1978).Google Scholar

7 The movement interposed between the slow movement and cabaletta in a double aria. The terms come from Basevi, Abramo, Studio sulle opere di Giuseppe Verdi (Florence, 1859).Google Scholar A useful discussion of this terminology in English is Powers, Harold, ‘“La solita forma” and the Uses of Convention’, Acta musicologica, 59 (1987), 65–90.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

8 See Budden, Julian, The Operas of Verdi, I (London, 1973), 499.Google ScholarZecchi's, Adone ‘Choruses and Coryphaei in Rigoletto’, Verdi: Bollettino dell'Istituto di studi verdiani, III/7 (1969), 510–44Google Scholar, makes a similar point.

9 As ‘kinetic’ sections in the conventional pattern of a double aria, providing motivation for lyrical musical movements, scene and tempi di mezzo are logical places to insert narrative explanation: some action occurs or is reported in order to set off the lyric sections.

10 It is, of course, a critical commonplace that musical weight and formal placement undergo a transition in Verdi's work at this time, the composer increasingly attempting to give emphasis to active moments until, in his last works, the distinction becomes blurred (and, it might be argued, a way of communicating dramatic content in musical terms lost). Here, however, formal function remains clearly articulated, and musical weight is distributed accordingly.

11 Thompson, Kristin, ‘The Concept of Cinematic Excess’, in Narrative, Apparatus, Ideology: A Film Theory Reader, ed. Rosen, Philip (New York, 1986), 130–42; here 135–6.Google Scholar

12 The dramatic purpose of the abduction lies in its immediate effect on stage in Act I; once the second act begins, the event matters only because it has put Gilda in the Duke's power, and the drama depends on what happens next – on what the Duke does to Gilda.

13 In Hugo's Act III scene 1, the King (the Duke in the opera) does not even mention Blanche's (Gilda's) abduction; and the courtiers refer only to the aftermath, relating events that occurred between the acts. In Act III scene 4, Blanche begins a narrative, but is stopped before she reaches the events witnessed on stage.

14 Hugo, Victor, Le Roi s'amuse (III.4) in Ubersfeld, Anne, ed., Oeuvres complètes: Théâtre, I (Paris, 1985), 918.Google Scholar

15 A facsimile of this libretto is published at the back of the Rigoletto volume of a rather bizarre series of libretti illustrated as post-modern cartoons, Le opere a fumetti: I libretti di Giuseppe Verdi illustrati (Parma, 1985).Google Scholar

16 For an account of the genesis of the opera and the accompanying battle with the censors, see Budden, Operas (n. 8); Kimbell, David, Verdi in the Age of Italian Romanticism (Cambridge, 1981), 260–70Google Scholar; and Conati, Marcello, La bottega della musica: Verdi e la Fenice (Milan, 1983), 185–265.Google Scholar For the relevant passages from Il Duca di Vendôme, see Conati, Marcello, Rigoletto di Giuseppe Verdi: Guida all'opera (Milan, 1983), 283–4.Google ScholarConati, Both (284) and Lavagetto, Mario, Quei più modesti romanzi (Milan, 1979), 92Google Scholar, suggest that this passage in Il Duca di Vendôme closely resembled the now-lost version in the first draft of the libretto, La maledizione; they believe, that is, that even in the earliest draft no version of a seduction duet appeared.

17 Published by Baker, Evan, ‘Lettere di Giuseppe Verdi a Francesco Maria Piave, 1843–1865. Documenti della Frederick R. Koch Foundation Collection e della Mary Flagler Cary Collection presso la Pierpont Morgan Library di New York’, in Studi verdiani, 4 (1986–1987), 136–66; here, 156–7.Google Scholar

18 Abbiati, Franco, Giuseppe Verdi (Milan, 1959), II, 175–6.Google Scholar

19 Abbiati, , II, 84Google Scholar: ‘se si tratta anche di cambiare la posizione in cui Francesco va colla chiave in camera di Bianca lo puoi anche fare, anzi credo (come ti scrissi nell'ultima mia) che converrà per noi trovare qualche cosa di meglio’ (If we also want to change the place in which Francesco goes into Bianca's room with the key, you can do it; in fact I believe [as I wrote in my last letter] that we will succeed in finding something better).

20 In Andrew Porter's singing translation for the critical edition, ‘Tutte le feste al tempio’ becomes ‘Let me confess my weakness’. See the vocal score of Rigoletto, ed. Chusid, Martin (Chicago and Milan, 1985), 252.Google Scholar

21 Foucault, Michel, The History of Sexuality. Volume I: An Introduction, trans. Hurley, Robert (New York, 1978), 58 and 61–2.Google Scholar

22 Gilda's musical development has interested several commentators, most notably Osthoff, Wolfgang, ‘The Musical Characterization of Gilda’, in Verdi: Bollettino dell'Istituto di studi verdiani, III/8 (Parma, 1973), 1275–314.Google Scholar However, Osthoff focuses primarily on solo passages (a comparison of ‘Caro nome’ and ‘Tutte le feste’), and does not investigate Gilda's musical role in these two duets.

23 Indeed, this is Rigoletto's first extended solo, famous for the range of aria-like self-expression that extends far beyond the usual bounds of an opening scena.

24 Rigoletto's refusal to reveal his name to his daughter is answered by the Duke's, who offers Gilda a name, but the wrong one.

25 As David Rosen has pointed out to me, in the scena even the servant gets to prevent Gilda from finishing her musical idea.

26 Budden (see n. 8) evocatively describes ‘Caro nome’ as ‘Gilda weav[ing] fantasies of semiquavers round her lover's name’ (I, 497).

27 The embellished return of the opening phrase, with its descending chain of appoggiaturas, makes the connection more obvious; see bars 30–3 in the critical edition (n. 20).

28 Gabriele Baldini, for instance, refers to ‘Caro nome’ as ‘that tedious aria based on a hackneyed cadential formula’ in The Story of Giuseppe Verdi, trans. and ed. Parker, Roger (Cambridge, 1980), 180.Google Scholar

29 I use here the typology of Genette, Gérard, Narrative Discourse: An Essay in Method, trans. Lewin, Jane E. (Ithaca, 1980)Google Scholar; although I have kept technical terms to a minimum, my analysis relies on his distinction between external and internal analepses.

30 The abbreviation of text (six lines instead of eight) leads to a corresponding abbreviation in the usual sixteen-bar prototype: the first four lines are set to the usual paired phrases (a + a′); the next two lines are set as the closing cadential phrase (four bars), leaving out the usual intervening four-bar phrase.

31 Budden and Baldini, among others, have remarked on the change in Gilda's character across the first two acts, contrasting the naiveté of her vocal style in Act I with the maturity she achieves in Act II. Osthoff (see n. 22) points to the many ways in which ‘Caro nome’ and ‘Tutte le feste’ complement each other; he stresses the affective change achieved by the opening instrumental solos – flute in Act I, oboe in Act II. He also discusses a tonal relationship, ‘Caro nome’ in E major and ‘Tutte le feste’ in E minor: a point that seemed to carry some weight for Verdi, as both were transposed down from the versions in the continuity draft (in F major and F minor respectively).

32 For a brief overview, see Gualerzi, Giorgio, ‘Stimmfach and musikalische Charakterisierung Gildas’, in Rigoletto: Texte, Materialien, Kommentare, ed. Csampai, Attila and Holland, Dietmar (Hamburg, 1982), 211–20.Google Scholar

33 As the Oxford English Dictionary defines it, seduction is ‘The action of inducing (a woman) to surrender her chastity’. The loss of chastity is central. Today, of course, we are less concerned with this aspect. The result, as Elizabeth Hardwick has written, is that ‘the old plot [of seduction and betrayal] is dead, fallen into obsolescence. You cannot seduce anyone when innocence is not a value.’ Seduction and Betrayal: Women in Literature (London, 1974), 208.Google Scholar

34 The Oxford English Dictionary entry on seduction points out that when an unmarried woman is seduced, English law holds that ‘the woman herself has suffered no wrong; the wrong has been suffered by the parent’. As a recent article illustrates, there is a link between this view of women as male property and present attitudes towards female culpability in cases of rape: ‘rape is often seen as a man's prerogative or a crime against the honor of a woman's family or husband – not a violation against the woman. In many countries … one cultural “solution” to rape is to have the young woman marry her rapist, thus legitimizing the union and preserving the family honor… In parts of Asia and the Middle East, the stain of rape is so great that victims are sometimes killed by family members to cleanse the family honor.’ Heise, Lori, ‘When Women are Prey’, The Washington Post, Sunday, 8 12 1991.Google Scholar

35 In the play, on the night before the last act opens she is with the Duke, listening again to his ardent protestations of love; this is one reason Blanche is so determined to believe that he continues to love her.

36 The Duke is not excused in either case: the delicate shifting between seduction and rape affects our judgement of Gilda (especially of her subsequent actions); but as seducer or rapist, the Duke remains a cad.

37 Foucault, , The History of Sexuality (see n. 21), 62.Google Scholar

38 This is hardly surprising. As Foucault (p. 83) makes clear, the relationship between power and sex is primarily repressive: it includes ‘the negative relation’ of power, in which, ‘where sex and pleasure are concerned, power can “do” nothing but say no to them; what it produces, if anything, is absences and gaps; it overlooks elements, introduces discontinuities, separates what is joined, and marks off boundaries. Its effects take the general form of limit and lack.’

39 To quote Baldini (see n. 28): ‘The passion with which she joins Rigoletto in the allegro vivo (con impeto) cabaletta … demonstrates a mature awareness of her new life’ (181).

40 Foucault, , I, 60.Google Scholar

41 I respond here to Catherine Clément's assertion that music serves mainly to mask the horrible acts against women in operatic plots, encouraging a passive acceptance of their murderous stories: Opera, or the Undoing of Women, trans. Wing, Betsy (Minneapolis, 1988).Google Scholar Katherine Bergeron's review, this journal, 2/1 (1990), 93–8, argues that Clément's reading presupposes that music merely serves the text, does not have its own voice.

42 Kerman, , Opera as Drama (1956; rpt. Berkeley, 1988), 127Google Scholar; and Tomlinson, , ‘Opera and Drame: Hugo, Donizetti, and Verdi’, Studies in the History of Music. Volume 2: Music and Drama (New York, 1988), 171–92; here, 189.Google Scholar

43 Verdi's reliance on convention disagrees with the standard picture of Rigoletto as marking a ‘break with convention’, his move towards freedom of dramatic expression. Scholars prefer the more innovative moments in Rigoletto; a full-scale double aria seems like an embarrassing lapse.

44 Budden, (see n. 8), Operas, I, 499.Google Scholar

45 Letter dated 14 December 1850; Cesari, Gaetano and Luzio, Alessandro, eds, I copialettere di Giuseppe Verdi (Milan, 1913), 110.Google Scholar

46 Compare, for example, ‘Questa o quella’ with his address to the Countess in the Introduzione (bars 225–8 in the critical edition [n. 20]).

47 One can also hear aspects of this voice in the Duke's Act I duet with Gilda, where we might expect the full brunt of the Duke's seductive efforts.

48 Baldini, (see n. 21), 179Google Scholar; Budden, , Operas (see n. 8), I, 499Google Scholar; see also Budden, , Verdi (London, 1985), 218.Google Scholar

49 And the proportion of strophic arias that the Duke sings is itself highly unusual at this point in Verdi's output.

50 Budden, , Operas, I, 499.Google Scholar

51 As Elizabeth Hardwick has written: ‘We ask ourselves how the delinquent ones feel about their seductions, adulteries, betrayals, and it is by the quality of their feelings that our moral judgements are formed. If they suffer and grieve and regret, they can be forgiven and even supported.’ Seduction and Betrayal (see n. 33), 180.Google Scholar

52 The Duke's Act II cabaletta is usually cut in performance. Although this clearly stems in pan from misunderstanding the brash, clumsy music's dramatic function, it is tempting to suppose that this omission also reveals a willingness to take the Duke's lyric outpourings at face value.