Literary Journal #11 - Pagliacci

    Ruggero Leoncavallo's famous opera, Pagliacci, is a great masterpiece of music, literature and play. Although operas are not considered as a major branch of literature, they contain no less factors of literature than other forms of literature. Not only they have stories, they are plays and they are music. Out of many, many operas, Pagliacci is my personal favorite. It is a story of clown, Canio, and his commedia troupe. Canio's wife, Nedda, cheats on him and has affair with another clown Silvio. Driven mad after he found out about the affair, Canio stabs both Nedda and Silvio at the end of the opera.(for details, please visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pagliacci) It will be insensitive to compare this work directly to other regular plays, but Pagliaacci is definitely a masterpiece in both literature and music.
 
    I personally feel Pagliacci and Shakespeare's plays have many things in common. One of them is that they both deal with human emotions and relationships that lead their characters into chaos and death. The tragic heroes complete and perfect the stories of humans. The biggest difference seems like Pagliacci is quite Italian. An English man would kill himself before killing his wife for cheating. But probably the reason Italians have made most of the best operas is their rich emotions and unstoppable passion.

    I remember posting a Youtube video of Vesti la Giubba (Put on the Costume) in this blog. It is sung by Canio, after he finds out about the affair. Even though he feels devastated, he still has to prepare for the show. Living as a clown, he has to make people even when he himself is very sad and depressed. Here is another great, great recording by the legendary Mario Lanza.

    Even though I understand new forms of arts have been developed throughout last several decades, I feel very sad not many people write operas anymore. People consider operas only as an antique form of art and don't think they would be fun. Yes, I admit some, no actually many lines in Italians operas are really lame. Often they like to kill their characters for no sufficient reason and talk about love in very vague ways. But everything develops over time. I want to see more operas coming out in the future. They are a perfect form of literature and art. Musicals are good too, but it seems to me operas often deal with more serious human emotions and are more attached to the literature and writings they are based on.