ABSTRACT
During the celebrations which preceded forty days of austerity and abstinence, servants became masters, elaborate parades took place and athletic feats were staged. Federico has succeeded in inventing a colloquial Italian for the charming intermezzo scored in a spoken register, and verging on Neapolitan usage with frequent dialectal syntax. Goldoni, then, is the principal writer of comedies during the eighteenth century in Italy. Goldoni’s reform of the commedia dell'arte, which is manifested in a return to the written theatre and a projection of comedy once again as literature, did not constitute an immediate abandonment of the scenari and formulari of stage managers and actors. Lorenzo Da Ponte brought all the charm and decay of the late eighteenth century to his operatic librettos. Da Ponte's Le nozze di Figaro has often been regarded as a mere translation and adaptation of the Beaumarchais play, carried out to provide a vehicle for the musical genius of Mozart.
