ISO UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO STUDIES 



Curiose (The Inquisitive Women), has been recently used as an Italian 

 opera text and set to music by Wolf-Ferrari. There is also a record 

 of a play, called Neighbors, produced in London in 1866 and said to be 

 "adapted from Charles Goldoni's comedy," 1 but it is impossible now 

 to judge, from the Italian titles of Goldoni's one hundred and twenty- 

 one comedies, which one it may have been. In any case, the play 

 was soon forgotten. 



If Goldoni is, then, a name known only to the student of literature, 

 and quite unknown to present-day play-goers, the name of Alfieri is 

 even more remote for the purposes of this paper. No one of his plays 

 has had a career on the English stage, and only his Saul given in the 

 original by the elder Salvini has been witnessed by a few American 

 connoisseurs of the past generation. 



In this connection it may be interesting to consider the repertory 

 of Tommaso Salvini with reference to the light which it sheds upon 

 Italian dramatic literature. As the greatest tragic actor in the annals 

 of the Italian theater his career is full of interest for us, for he is well 

 known in America, having made five professional tours in this country 

 — in 1873, 1880, 1882, 1886 and 1889. Salvini was born in 1829 and 

 is still living. In 1895 he published his autobiography. 2 From it 

 we see what dramas he himself appeared in, and also what plays con- 

 stitute the repertory of his almost equally illustrious contemporaries, 

 Adelaide Ristori and Ernesto Rossi, who likewise made tours in the 

 United States. 



Salvini tells of a traveling company in Italy in the 40's, which 

 gave alternating performances of the works of Goldoni and Alfieri. 

 In the course of his autobiography he mentions the various plays in 

 which he took part, among others Merope, Said and Philip the Second 

 by Alfieri; The Sagacious Wife and Pamela by Goldoni; Adelchi by 

 Manzoni (1785-1873); Oedipus at Colonnos by Nicolini (1782-1861); 

 Fornarelto by Dall 'Ongaro (1808-73); Francesca da Rimini by 

 Silvio Pellico (1 789-1854); Pia de' Tolommei by Carlo Marenco 

 (1800-46) ; Sophocles by Paolo Giacometti (1816-82), written expressly 



1 See Clement Scott, Drama of Yesterday and Today, Vol. II, Appendix, London, 1S00. 

 "Salvini, Ricordi, annedoti ed impressioni, Milan, 1805; Leaves from the Autobiography of Tommaso 

 Salvini, The Century Co., New York, 1893. 



