Volume 22, Number 4 · March 20, 1975
The Giant of Busseto
By Robert Craft
Letters of Giuseppe Verdi
selected, translated, and edited by Charles Osborne
Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 280 pp., $7.95
Seven Verdi Librettos
with English text by William Weaver
Norton, 689 pp., $20.00
The Operas of Verdi: From Oberto to Rigoletto
by Julian Budden
Praeger, 510 pp., $20.00
Verdi
by Joseph Wechsberg
Putnam's, 255 pp., $15.00
"Verdi, Ghislanzoni and 'Aida': The Uses of Convention"
by Philip Gossett
The University of Chicago, Critical Inquiry, Vol. 1, No. 2 pp.
Most creators with Giuseppe Verdi's stature have altered the language, the substance, and the direction of their art. But the giant of Busseto was himself something of an exception to this rule. Nurtured in a popular and regional tradition that he never completely outgrew, he nevertheless fashioned operas with a universality that has been rivaled by only two other composers. Yet his work is self-contained, and his path leads down a cul-de-sac.
Review, 3034 words
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