Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 16.djvu/114

Rh 104 fortune at that period. Metastasio was now twenty. During the last four years he had worn the costume of abbe, having taken the minor orders without which it was then useless to expect advancement in Rome. His romantic history, personal beauty, charming manners, and distin guished talents made him fashionable. That before two years were out he had spent his money and increased his reputation for wit will surprise no one. He i very sensibly determined to quit a mode of life for w.iich he was not born, and to apply himself seriously to the work of his profession. Accordingly he went to Naples, and entered the office of an eminent lawyer named Castagnola. It would appear that he articled himself as clerk, for Castagnola, who was a stern master, averse to literary trifling, exercised severe control over his time and energies. While slaving at the law, Metastasio did not wholly neglect the Muses. In 1721 he composed an epithalamium, and probably also his first musical serenade, Endimiane, on the occasion of the marriage of his patroness the Princess Pinelli di Sangro to the Marchese Belmonte Pignatelli. But the event Avhich fixed his destiny was the following. In 1722 the birthday of the empress had to be celebrated with more than ordinary honours, and the viceroy applied to Metastasio to compose a serenata for the occasion. He accepted this invitation with mingled delight and trepida tion ; for Castagnola looked with no favour on his clerk s poetical distractions. It was arranged that his authorship should be kept a profound secret. Under these conditions Metastasio produced Gli Orti Esperidi. Set to music by Porpora, it won the most extraordinary applause. The great Roman prima donna, Marianna Bulgarelli, called La Romanina from her birthplace, who had played the part of Venus in this drama, was so enraptured with the beauties of the libretto that she spared no pains until she had dis covered its author. Asked point-blank whether he had not written the words of the successful play, Metastasio was obliged to answer, Yes ! La Romanina forthwith took possession of him, induced him to quit his lawyer s office, and promised to secure for him fame and independence, if he would devote his talents to the musical drama. It was thus that the opera, already partially developed by the Csesarean poet, Apostolo Zeno, attained perfection. The right man had been found for maturing this form of art which the genius of the age demanded, but which was still but incomplete. In La Romanina s house Metastasio became acquainted with the greatest composers of the day, with Porpora, from whom he took lessons in music ; with Hasse, Pergolese, Scarlatti, Vinci, Leo, Durante, Marcello, all of whom were destined in the future to set his plays to melody. Here too he studied the art of singing, and learned to appreciate the style of such men as Farinelli. His singularly pliant genius discerned the conditions which the drama must obey in order to adapt itself to music in the stage it then had reached. Gifted himself with extra ordinary facility in composition, and with a true poetic feeling, he found no difficulty in producing plays which, while beautiful in themselves, judged merely as works of literary art, became masterpieces as soon as their words were set to music, and rendered by the singers of the greatest school of vocal art the world has ever seen. Read ing Metastasio in the study, it is impossible to do him justice. Our only chance of rendering him a portion of his due is to approach these lyrical scenes so passionate in their emotion, so cunningly devised for musical effect with the phrases of Pergolese or Paesiello ringing in our ears, and to imagine how a Farinelli or a Caffariello voiced those stanzas which demand for their artistic realization the &quot; linked sweetness long drawn out &quot; of melodies as the Italian school developed them. In short, Metastasio is a poet whose poetry leapt to its real life in the environment of music. The conventionality of all his plots, the absurdities of many of his situations, the violence he does to history in the persons of some leading characters, his &quot; damnable iteration &quot; of the theme of love in all its phases, are explained and justified by music. He can still be studied with pleasure and profit. But our only chance of understanding the cosmopolitan popularity he enjoyed is by remembering that at least one half of the effect he aimed at has been irrecoverably lost. Metastasio resided with La Romanina and her husband in Rome. The generous woman, moved by an affection half maternal half romantic, and by a true artist s admiration for so rare a talent, adopted him more passionately even than Gravina had done. She took the whole Trapassi family father, mother, brother, sisters into her own house. She fostered the poet s genius and pampered his caprices. Under her influence he wrote in rapid succession the Didone Abbandonata, C atone in Utica, Ezio, Alessandro nell Indie, Semiramide Riconosciuta, Siroe, and Artaserse. These dramas were set to music by the chief composers of the day, and performed in the chief towns of Italy. Every month added to Metastasio s renown. But meanwhile La Romanina was growing older ; she had ceased to sing in public ; and the poet felt himself more and more dependent in an irksome sense upon her kindness. He gained 300 scudi (about 60) for each opera ; this pay, though good, was precarious, and he longed for some fixed engagement. Abandoning himself gradually to despondent whims and fancies, it became clear that some change in his condition was desirable. And the opportunity for a great change soon presented itself. In September 1729 he received the offer of the post of court poet to the theatre at Vienna, with a stipend of 3000 florins. This he at once accepted. La Romanina unselfishly sped him on his way to glory. She took the charge of his family in Rome, and he set off for Austria. In the early summer of 1730 Metastasio settled at Vienna in the house of a Spanish Neapolitan, Niccolo Martinez, where he resided until his death. This date marks a new period in his artistic activity. Between the years 1730 and 1740 his finest dramas, Adriano, Demetrio, Issipile, Demofoonte, Olimpiade, Clemema di Tito, Achille in Sciro, Temistocle, and Attilio Regolo, were produced for the imperial theatre. Some of them had to be composed for special occasions, with almost incredible rapidity the Achille in eighteen days, the Ipermnestra in nine. Poet, composer, musical copyist, and singer did their work together in frantic haste. The impress of the peculiar circumstances under which they were created is still left upon them, not only in negligence of style, but also in an undefinable quality which marks them out as products of collaboration. But what must always surprise us is that they should be as good as they are. Metastasio understood the technique of his peculiar art in its minutest details. The experience gained at Naples and Rome, quickened by the excitement of his new career at Vienna, enabled him almost instinctively, and as it were by inspiration, to hit the exact mark aimed at in the opera. At Vienna Metastasio met with no marked social success. His plebeian birth excluded him from aristocratic circles. But, to make up in some measure for this com parative failure, he enjoyed the intimacy of a great lady, the Countess Althann, sister-in-law of his old patroness the Princess Belmonte Pignatelli. She had lost her husband, and had some while occupied the post of chief favourite to the emperor. Metastasio s liaison with her became so close that it was even believed they had been privately married. From his letters to his friend La Romanina, and to the great singer Farinelli, who reigned supreme at the court of Madrid, we learn the little details of the poet s life in