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Lorenzo Da Ponte: The Life and Times of Mozart¿s Librettist
Lorenzo Da Ponte The Life and Times of Mozarts Librettist Author:Sheila Hodges "Hodges. . . shows us a lover of language, a scholar, contradictory, big-hearted, as swift and many-sided as his libretti."Publishers Weekly Three of the greatest operas ever writtenThe Marriage of Figaro, Don Giovanni, and Così fan tutte join the exquisite music of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart with... more » the perfectly matched libretti of Lorenzo Da Ponte. Da Pontes own long life (17491838), however, was more fantastic than any opera plot. A poor Jew who became a Catholic priest; a priest who became a young gambler and rake; a teacher, poet, and librettist of genius who became a Pennsylvania greengrocer; an impoverished immigrant to America who became professor of Italian at Columbia Universitywherever Da Ponte went, he arrived a penniless fugitive and made a new and eventful life. Sheila Hodges follows him from the last glittering years of the Venetian Republic to the Vienna of Mozart and Salieri, and from George IIIs London to New York City. "Anyone with literary, biographical, musical, or historical interests will delight in this well-written and vivid portrayal of a multifaceted man."John Greenhalgh, Classical Music« less