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Last year however he produced two operas at Milan, "Guglielmo Ratcliff" and "Silvano," which proved successful. Whether "Cavalleria Rusticana" is to remain as his only hold upon popular favor, the future alone can tell; but that he has talent of the highest order, and that he has produced an opera whose reception has been almost unparalleled in the world of music cannot be questioned.
The kettle was boiling, she set the tea; and while she was arranging in a vase "Given away with every half-pound of our choice Congo!" the penny bunch of violets which she had been unable to resist, her lips were moving to the strains of the hackneyed but ever beautiful intermezzo in "Cavalleria Rusticana," which floated up from the room immediately underneath hers; but as she drew her chair up to the fire, the music of the violin ceased, and presently she heard footsteps ascending the stairs slowly.
And still the question remains: how much of this success is due to the playwright's skill or to the skill of the actors? How is it that in this play the actors obtain a fine result, act on a higher level, than in their realistic Sicilian tragedies? D'Annunzio is no doubt a better writer than Capuana or Verga, and his play is finer as literature than "Cavalleria Rusticana" or "Malia."
For a few years he made a precarious living in obscure towns, by teaching, and had at last reached desperate extremities when one day he read in a newspaper that Sonzogno, the music publisher, had offered prizes for the three best one act operas, to be performed in Rome. He at once entered into the competition, and produced "Cavalleria Rusticana." It took the first prize.
Kronold as Santuzza, Miss Campbell as Lola, Guille as Turridu, Del Puente as Alfio, and Jeannie Teal as Lucia. The story upon which the text of "Cavalleria Rusticana" is based is taken from a Sicilian tale by Giovanni Verga.
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