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Lorenzo Da Ponte Rodney Bolt

Lorenzo Da Ponte By Rodney Bolt

Lorenzo Da Ponte by Rodney Bolt


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Summary

In 1805 Lorenzo da Ponte opened a grocery shop in New York. In the first forty years of his life had been poet, priest, lover, libertine, collaborator with Salieri, librettist for three of Mozart's sublime operas. By the end of his life he would have founded New York's first opera house and become the professor of Italian at Columbia University.

Lorenzo Da Ponte Summary

Lorenzo Da Ponte: The Adventures of Mozart's Librettist in the Old and New Worlds by Rodney Bolt

In 1805, the year that Wordsworth completed "The Prelude" and Nelson defeated the French at Trafalgar, Lorenzo da Ponte opened a grocery shop in New York. In the first forty years of his life had been poet, priest, lover, libertine, collaborator with Salieri, librettist for three of Mozart's most sublime operas, friend of Casanova, and a favourite of Emperor Joseph II. By the end of his life he would have founded New York's first opera house and become the first professor of Italian at Columbia University. Da Ponte lived through the period when opera came of age - when he was born, Handel was all the rage; if he had survived four more years he could have witnessed Wagner's debut - and he plotted and schemed his way through the opera worlds of both London and Vienna. This was a man who converted from Judaism to Christianity, took the cloth, was banished twice from Venice once for scandalous behaviour, and later for scurrilous versifying, who was an inspired innovator but a hopeless businessman, and who loved with wholehearted loyalty and recklessness.

Lorenzo Da Ponte Reviews

PRAISE FOR 'HISTORY PLAY' 'With gobsmacking audacity, Bolt recreates an alternative life of Marlowe that compellingly views the known facts from a different angle.' Independent 'A triumph It has both a serious remit and enough puns and anagrams to make Shakespeare (or possibly Marlowe) blush. It made me laugh out loud. And, most of all, it made me want to go back to the plays. This was a book that needed to be done perfectly or not at all. It is perfect.' Spectator 'HISTORY PLAY's rich and meticulously researched portrait of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries is written with a keen sense of Elizabethan metaphor and contemporary analogy I was happy to go along for the ride' Times Literary Supplement

About Rodney Bolt

Rodney Bolt's first book, History Play, an speculative biography of Christopher Marlowe, was published in summer 2004 by HarperCollins. He has worked as a writer and director and won travel-writing prizes in Germany and the United States.

Additional information

GOR006891133
9780747580140
0747580146
Lorenzo Da Ponte: The Adventures of Mozart's Librettist in the Old and New Worlds by Rodney Bolt
Used - Very Good
Hardback
Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
2006-08-07
448
N/A
Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.
This is a used book - there is no escaping the fact it has been read by someone else and it will show signs of wear and previous use. Overall we expect it to be in very good condition, but if you are not entirely satisfied please get in touch with us

Customer Reviews - Lorenzo Da Ponte