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E-book
Author Smith, Ayana O., 1973- author

Title Dreaming with open eyes : opera, aesthetics, and perception in Arcadian Rome / Ayana O. Smith
Published Oakland, California : University of California Press, [2018]
©2018

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Description 1 online resource (xiii, 311 pages)
Contents Founding Arcadia : the aesthetics of verisimilitude and Buon gusto -- Performing L'Endimione : a history and reappraisal of Guidi's Favola pastorale -- Reading the classics : intellectual and cultural resonances in Gravina's Discorso sopra L'Endimione (1691; publ. 1692) -- Reconciling icon, mythos, and tupos : the role of images in L'Endimione? -- Believing in opera : visual modes in Alessandro Scarlatti's La Statira (Rome, 1690) -- Deceiving the eye : mirror, statue, and stone in Carlo Francesco Pollarolo's La forza della virtù (Venice, 1693) -- Epilogue, constructing gender and politics : Queen Christina's image
Summary "Dreaming with Open Eyes examines visual symbolism in late seventeenth-century Italian opera, contextualizing the genre amid the broad ocularcentric debates emerging at the crossroads of the early modern period and the Enlightenment. Ayana O. Smith re-evaluates significant aspects of the Arcadian reform aesthetic, and establishes a historically informed method of opera criticism for modern scholars and interpreters. Unfolding in a narrative fashion, the text explores facets of the philosophical and literary background, and concludes with close readings of text and music, using visual symbolism to create readings of gender and character in two operas: Alessandro Scarlatti's La Statira (Rome, 1690), and Carlo Francesco Pollarolo's La forza della virtù (Venice, 1693). Smith's interdisciplinary approach enhances our modern perception of this rich and underexplored repertory, and will appeal to students and scholars not only of opera, but also of literature, philosophy, and visual and intellectual cultures."--Provided by publisher
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references and index
Notes Description based on online resource; title from digital title page (viewed on February 14, 2019)
Subject Pollarolo, Carlo Francesco, approximately 1653-1723. Forza della virtù.
Scarlatti, Alessandro, 1660-1725. Statira.
Opera -- Italy -- 17th century
Opera -- Italy -- 17th century -- Philosophy and aesthetics
Symbolism in opera.
MUSIC / Instruction & Study / Voice
MUSIC / Lyrics
MUSIC / Printed Music / Vocal
HISTORY / Europe / Italy
Opera
Symbolism in opera
Italy
Form Electronic book
LC no. 2018029613
ISBN 0520970403
9780520970403