Adelaide Ristori sublime declamatrice dantesca sulla scena italiana e internazionale del secondo Ottocento

Abstract

This essay examines the presence of Alighieri’s poetry in the repertory and the self-promotion of Adelaide Ristori. During her career the exceptional tragic performer showed a clear interest in recitals where she used to combine excerpts from famous tragedies and Italian classics. Among others the Divina Commedia’s episodes were accurately selected to please the European public. The format conception was influenced by the collaboration with the young actor Ernesto Rossi, her scene partner in Paris with the Compagnia Reale Sarda between the months of June and August 1855, who was an excellent Dantean reciter. Reviews, reports, and playbills testify that over the years Ristori assimilated and re-elaborated the practice by way of an original dramaturgical operation. Her ability to recite the poem, particularly the Inferno’s fifth canto, emerged several times between 1856 and 1865, when she acted in London and in Paris. According to a consolidated bibliography, the Ristori’s international triumphs launched the season of the Italian Grande Attore. The recitation of Dante’s popular plots contributed to the success of the actress outside and inside Italian borders, and it represented both a typical brand of ‘Italianness’ and a masterpiece of her theatrical creations.