Leseprobe_Metastasio_Briefe

Pietro Metastasio (1698–1782) Biography
1731–43: this was the author’s most prolific period. This temporal arc saw the composition,
among his most noted works, of Demetrio (1731), Adriano in Siria
and Issipile (1732), Demofoonte, and L’Olimpiade (1733), La clemenza di Tito
(1734), Temistocle, Achille in Sciro, and Ciro riconosciuto (1736), and Zenobia
(1737, although first performed only in 1740); together with the feste teatrali,
azioni teatrali, and other compositions including Il tempio dell’Eternità
(1731), L’asilo d’amore (1732), Le cinesi (1735), La pace fra la virtù e la bellezza
(1738), and Il natal di Giove (1740). Among the azioni sacre we can include
Sant’Elena al Calvario (1731), La morte d’Abel (1732), Giuseppe riconosciuto
(1733), Betulia liberata (1734), Gioas re di Giuda (1735), and Isacco figura del
Redentore (1740). The death of la Romanina (February 26, 1734) – who left
him sole heir to her property (and which the poet would refuse in favour
of her husband) – and of Charles VI (October 20, 1740) profoundly
marked his life and slowed down his poetic output. In 1733 the Venetian
publisher Bettinelli began working on an exhaustive edition of Metastasio’s
works, completed in 1745.
1744–60: Metastasio composed the operas Antigono (1744), Attilio Regolo (1750,
though already conceived ten years earlier), Il re pastore (1751), and L’eroe
cinese (1752). At Farinello’s request, during the latter’s service to the Spanish
monarchs, Metastasio also reworked Didone abbandonata (1752), Semiramide
riconosciuta (1753), and Adriano in Siria (1757), in addition to composing
Nitteti (1756). These years also saw the composition of feste teatrali,
complimenti, and azioni drammatiche conceived for the imperial family’s
private celebrations, and include L’augurio di felicità (1749), La rispettosa
tenerezza (1750), L’isola disabitata (1753), Il tributo di rispetto e d’amore (1754),
La gara (1755), and Il sogno (1756). On March 1, 1755 Metastasio was faced
with the demise of the “second” Marianna (von Althann), while that
same year witnessed the Paris edition of his works, by Quillau, with a
preface by Calzabigi. Two years later he oversaw a new corrected edition
of his own works using the Stamperia Reale di Torino font, which would
be completed in 1768.
1760–75: this period saw the composition of Metastasio’s final librettos and feste
teatrali, most of them composed for celebratory-laudatory occasions and
weddings, with Alcide al bivio (1760) followed by Il trionfo di Clelia (1762),
Egeria (1764), Romolo ed Ersilia (1765), and Ruggiero o vero L’eroica gratitudine
(1771). During this period Metastasio also worked on the composition of
cantatas, sonnets, operas, and various other works. In 1773 he completed
the Estratto dell’Arte poetica d’Aristotile, which he had been working on
since the 1730s, together with a translation of Horace’s Ars poetica,
already largely finalised in 1749, with contributions from Count Luigi
15