The Memoirs of Count Carlo Gozzi Volume II Part 7

I enlightened them, so far as this was possible; advised them not to waste their time in such perilous fooleries, which distracted their attention from the serious concerns of their profession; bade them look out for young comedians of talent, with whom they might marry and propagate the breed of actors. They never failed to express that loathing for the trade which all actresses profess, remaining actresses, however, in the utterance of their repugnance. In order to open their eyes to the real state of the case, I then dictated answers to these lovers, affectionately urging them to declare themselves on the essential point. Cold replies came with the next post, and after a short exchange of letters the correspondence dropped. In this way, they were brought to see their error, remaining always ready to resume it on the next occasion.

Their sentiments for me, according to their own showing, were the most enduring and substantial; and my incredulous laughter wounded them. They bullied and maligned each other, complained, and accused their comrades at my judgment-seat. I p.r.o.nounced sentence against them all; but the most persecuted were always the object of my heartiest protection. When I wrote parts adapted to their characters, they were lifted to the heavens. What obligations! What grat.i.tude! What vows of love! I cannot deny that in certain moments they were justified in thinking they had gained my affection. The next day they found me quite another man, indifferent and icy cold. _Amour propre_ then made them fly into a rage, and grow the angrier the more they saw me laugh at their frenzies.

All things considered, it is very difficult to frequent the society of young actresses, who harbour in their b.r.e.a.s.t.s six books upon the art of love beside those of Ovid, to be their daily guide, philosopher, and friend, to make their fortunes in the theatre, and not to fall into some low matrimonial sc.r.a.pe, which would be called a solemn act of folly by the world. I use such terms as sc.r.a.pe, baseness, folly here, in order to adopt the language of people in general; although I am persuaded by personal observation, and by philosophical study of the current training given to girls, that it is easier to find a good wife on the stage than in private families. People in general are not philosophers enough to recognise and confess this truth; but the opinion of the general is always respectable.

My temperament, my abhorrence of ties, my partiality for study, the pity for human woes which I derived from knowledge of my neighbours, and the thirty-five years which I counted at the period in question, were my faithful counsellors. I have already written a chapter on my love-affairs, which sufficiently explains my sentiments.[31]

In the midst of these feminine intrigues and rivalries, it is impossible to distribute protection with perfect impartiality among all claimants.

The girl who is most persecuted by her comrades, most looked down upon, and reckoned stupidest in her profession, will always be chosen out by me for support and advancement, without regard for hostile gossip bred by envy.

In course of time I saw all these young women married, thanks to the fame they acquired through my efforts on their behalf. Some of them found husbands in the theatre, and some outside it. Without withdrawing my a.s.sistance from married actresses, I took care, from the moment of their nuptials, to cause no shadow of disturbance in their home. This I did by persistently refusing to visit them, which made them know me in my true principles apart from pleasantry. My conduct astounded them, and they affected notable displeasure at my withdrawal from their intimacy.

With regard to the chief men in this commonwealth of comedians, they were always most attentive lest I should receive annoyances. Above all things, they begged me not to take notice of any indiscretions prompted by levity, professional jealousy, touchiness on points of honour, pretensions to leading parts in my forthcoming plays, which might issue from the steaming brains of their women. I used to reply that, so long as the company maintained its good reputation, and so long as such quarrels and idle chatterings were confined to the women, I should never deign to be annoyed or to withdraw my aid and friends.h.i.+p from their troupe; but that if the men took to the same follies and dissensions as the women, I should have to think otherwise.

It was a comfort to me to pa.s.s my hours of leisure among those lively-witted, humorous, civil, merry people. It gratified me to observe that the men were eagerly sought after and invited to the tables of the quality and honest folk, while the women received similar attentions from gentlefolk of their own s.e.x, a thing almost unheard of with respect to others of their calling. Finally, I was pleased to see them thriving in their business and making profits by their theatre, which I had revived and continued to sustain by a long series of new and successful dramatic pieces. If prejudice or malignity were to cast it in my teeth that I had evil motives in this choice of my companions through so many years, I might easily turn the satire back against what is commonly called the respectable society of _casini_, a.s.semblies, and caffes. In order not to incur hatred by describing inconvenient facts, I will, however, confine myself to begging my critics to reflect and to be indulgent for differences of taste.

Returning to my comic proteges, I have yet to say that the insinuation of so-called culture into our theatres gradually corrupted the customs of this well-regulated family of actors, much in the same way as the advance of culture into private families corrupted domestic manners.

Outsiders, hired at wages to swell the ranks and to take serious parts in tragedies or comedies, introduced a new freedom of thinking and behaving. The old habits of the troupe, which may perchance have only worn a feigned appearance of respectability, altered for the worse. The time has not arrived for describing this change, which I shall have to do in its proper place, since it was closely connected with important occurrences in my own life.

Some weaknesses are so entwined with our instincts as to be incurable.

Such, in my case, are good faith and compliance, which often degenerated into silliness. During the whole course of my life, as my writings prove, and as is well known to my friends and acquaintances, I have always scourged hypocrisy. I cannot, however, deny the fact that the apparent honesty, piety, and good behaviour, in which my proteges persevered for so long a period, was convenient to their friends and extremely profitable to their pockets; whereas the freedom of thinking and acting introduced among them by the science of this depraved century and by so-called culture, brought them to the condition of the builders of the Tower of Babel.

I have seen them pa.s.s from ease to indigence, forget that they were relatives and friends--all at war together, all suspicious, each man of his neighbour--all irreconcilable and hostile--in spite of frequently renewed attempts on my part to bring them into harmony again; so that, at the last, I had to withdraw from their society, as will be stated in the sequel of these Memoirs.

XLII.

_The end of the rage for Goldoni and Chiari.--I go on amusing my fellow-citizens with plays.--Make reflections, and perhaps catch crabs._

We had arrived at the year 1766, when it became evident that my band of comedians, by this time well established in their theatre, and supported by the public, who flocked eagerly to see the pieces I provided for them, were about to win a decisive victory over our adversaries.

Chiari's works stood revealed in all their native nakedness; the glamour of enchantment had departed. Those of Goldoni, in spite of their real merit, did not make the same effect as in the past. People noticed that he repeated himself; they discovered poverty of ideas, flaccidity, and faults of construction in his later pieces. They said that he was played out.

The truth is that a rage so vehement and fanatical as that created by Chiari and Goldoni was bound to die away. They had been so much spoken and quarrelled about that their very names began to pall upon the ear.

In Italy, moreover, there is no well-founded and intelligent respect for authors. Dramatists in particular are merely regarded as purveyors of ephemeral amus.e.m.e.nt. Perhaps Venice exceeds every other capital in this way of thinking. A Venetian citizen, to take a single instance, was congratulating Goldoni on the success of one of his comedies; then, as though ashamed of condescending to so trivial a theme, he added: "It is true that works of this sort are trifles, which do not deserve our serious attention; and yet I can imagine that you may have been gratified by the reception of your play."

Goldoni, with true business-like prudence, had compelled the shabby Italian comedians to pay him thirty sequins for every piece, good, bad, or indifferent, which he supplied them. I gave my dramatic fancies away gratis. It is very probable that, finding themselves eclipsed by what their rivals got for nothing, Goldoni's paymasters waxed insolent against him.

Chiari stopped writing when he saw that his dramas ceased to take.

Goldoni went to Paris, to seek his fortune there, whereof we shall be duly informed in his Memoirs. Sacchi's company remained in possession of the field and earned a handsome competency.

It became a necessity, a sort of customary law dictated by my friends.h.i.+p, to present these actors every year or two with pieces from my pen. The ability with which they had interpreted my fancies deserved grat.i.tude; and the sympathy of the Venetians, who had so warmly welcomed them, called for recognition. Accordingly, I added the _Donna Serpente_, the _Zobeide_, and the _Mostro Turchino_ to those dramatic fables which I have already mentioned. This brought us down to the year 1766.[32]

The new _genre_ which I had brought into fas.h.i.+on, and which, by being confined to Sacchi's company, inflicted vast damage on their professional rivals, inspired other so-called poets with the wish to imitate me. They relied on splendid decorations, transformation scenes, and frigid buffooneries. They did not comprehend the allegorical meanings, nor the polite satire upon manners, nor the art of construction, nor the conduct of the plot, nor the real intrinsic force of the species I had handled. I say they did not comprehend the value of these things, because I do not want to say that they were deficient in power to command and use them. The result was that their pieces met with the condemnation which their contempt for me and for the public who appreciated me richly deserved.

You cannot fabricate a drama worthy to impress the public mind for any length of time by heaping up absurdities, marvels, scurrilities, prolixities, puerilities, insipidities, and nonsense. The neglect into which the imitations of my manner speedily fell proves this. Much the same may be said about those other species--romantic or domestic, intended to move tears or laughter--those cultured and realistic kinds of drama, as people called them, though they were generally devoid of culture and of realism, and were invariably as like each other as two peas, which occupied our stage for thirty years at least.[33] All the good and bad that has been written and printed about my fables; the fact that they still hold the stage in Italy and other countries where they are translated in spite of their comparative antiquity; the stupid criticisms which are still being vented against them by starving journalists and envious bores, who join the cry and follow these blind leaders of the blind--criticisms only based upon the t.i.tles and arguments I chose to draw from old wives' tales and stories of the nursery--all this proves that there is real stuff in the fabulous, poetical, allegorical _genre_ which I created. I say this without any presumptuous partiality for the children of my fancy; nor do I resent the attacks which have been made upon them, for I am humane enough to pity the hungry and the pa.s.sion-blinded.

Goldoni, who was then at Paris, vainly striving to revive the Italian theatre in that metropolis, heard of the noise my fables were making in Italy, and abased himself so far as to send a fabulous composition of his own fabrication back to Venice. It was called _Il Genio buono e il Genio cattivo_, and appeared at the theatre of S. Giov. Grisostomo, enjoying a long run. The cause of its success lay in the fact that his piece displayed dramatic art, agreeable characters, moral reflection, and some philosophy. I conclude, therefore, that allegorical fables on the stage are not so wholly contemptible.

At the same time, just as there are differences between the different kinds of dogs, fishes, birds, snakes, and so forth, though they all belong to the species of dogs, fishes, &c., so are there notable differences between Goldoni's _Genio buono e cattivo_ and my ten _Fiabe_, though all are grouped under the one species of dramatic fable.

Goldoni, who has deserved renown for his domestic comedies, had not the gifts necessary for producing poetic fables of this kind; nor could I ever understand why my ridiculous censors cast the ephemeral success of his two _Genj_ in my teeth, with the hope of mortifying a pride I did not feel.

The dramatic fable, if written to engage the interest of the public and to keep its hold upon the theatre, is more difficult than any other species. Unless it contains a grandeur which imposes, some impressive secret which enchants, novelty sufficient to arrest attention, eloquence to enthral, sententious maxims of philosophy, witty and attractive criticisms, dialogues prompted by the heart, and, above all, the great magic of seduction whereby impossibilities are made to seem real and evident to the mind and senses of the audience--unless it contains all these elements, I repeat, it will never produce a firm and distinctive impression, nor will it repay the pains and perseverance of our poor actors by its permanent pecuniary value. It may be that my fables possess none of these qualities. Yet the fact remains that they contrived to produce the effects I have described.

XLIII.

_I re-open a lawsuit, and continue to scribble my fantastic pieces for the stage_.

In this same year, 1766, my brothers warmly urged me to revive the lawsuit against Marchese Terzi of Bergamo.[34] Since our family doc.u.ments had been dispersed, and only three old wills and some worm-eaten summaries remained to guide me, I obtained an injunction ordering the defendant to produce the deeds whereby he claimed the disputed property, and the papers relating to several suits between his ancestors and ours. At last two enormous chests, full of musty writings, were delivered at the Magistracy of the Avvogaria. Perhaps my adversaries thought to dash my spirits and damp my ardour by this ocean of pages which had to be explored. If so, they were mistaken. I procured one of those licenses, which are technically called courtesies, from Signor Daniele Zanchi, the defendant's advocate, to study the doc.u.ments at his chambers, and set myself down with imperturbable phlegm to peruse millions of lines in antique characters, faded, half-effaced, semi-Gothic, and for the most part hieroglyphical. I selected those which seemed to the purpose, and had forty-two volumes of transcripts filled at my cost by Signor Zanchi's copyists.

Painful circ.u.mstances leave ineffaceable impressions on the memory. The examination of those vast ma.s.ses of ma.n.u.script, word by word and letter by letter, so different from delightful literature in prose or verse, taxed every nerve and fibre. I well remember that my study of them lasted over more than two months, in the dead of a hard snowy winter.

Signor Zanchi, taking pity on my s.h.i.+vering wretchedness, kindly furnished me with a brazier of live coals; and yet I thought, what with the irksome labour and the cold, that I should have to breathe my last between the walls of the fortress of my enemies.

I shall not weary my readers with a detailed account of this tedious lawsuit. My brother Almor, whose heart was always in the right place, contributed to the expenses according to his means. My brother Francesco, remaining a wary economist, refused to exceed an annual payment of 150 _lire_ during the progress of the suit. My brother Gasparo only lent his name and a.s.sent. The following anecdote is characteristic of his easy-going, popularity-loving temperament. Some gentlemen, friends and supporters of the Marquis, asked him with serious faces: "What the devil is this annoyance you are causing Marchese Terzi?" To which he shrugged his shoulders and answered: "I know nothing about the matter. They are devices of my brother Carlo, a litigious fellow, who thinks that he is in the right here." He did not mean, I fully believe, to shun responsibility and odium by s.h.i.+fting the blame to my shoulders. This answer was only of a piece with the pacific indolence which made him bear infinite wretchedness in his own home.

In the course of two years I had to expend 17,000 _lire_ on the costs of this suit; and had it not been for the generosity of friends, among whom Signor Innocenzio Ma.s.simo stood first, Marchese Terzi would have scored one of those victories which make us inclined to doubt of Providence.

Beside the anxiety and incessant labour which preyed upon my health and spirits, I was annoyed by my adversary's powerful friends, who went about the town denouncing me for a quarrelsome, vexatious, captious, and inequitable fellow. Rude rebukes addressed to me by such persons I met with significant smiles and silence, never deigning to take up the cudgels in my own defence against accusations which I knew to be discourteous and baseless. In addition to all these sources of discomfort, I had to fight the battle single-handed; for my excellent friend and advocate, Signor Antonio Testa, was compelled by stress of business to leave me in the heat of action.

It is not to be wondered at that I fell ill at last. But what will seem more wonderful, nay, almost incredible, is that I sought distraction during my few leisure hours in planning and composing dramatic pieces. I used to take sheets of paper on which I had sketched the outlines of scenes in my pocket down to a coffee-house on the Riva degli Schiavoni.

There I engaged a room facing San Giorgio, had coffee brought, and ordered pen and ink. Thus furnished, I forgot my troubles for a while in the elaboration of soliloquies and dialogues. It was in this way that, while my suit dragged on through three tempestuous years, I produced the _Augel Belverde_, the _Re de'Genj_, the _Donna Vendicativa_, the _Caduta di Donna Elvera_, and the _Pubblico Segreto_. I flatter myself that none of these plays betrayed the melancholy and distraction of a hara.s.sed brain. They were welcomed with enthusiasm by the public, and brought fame and profit to my friends the actors.

After a long course of anxious litigation, complicated by somewhat tortuous proceedings on the part of my opponents, the cause was settled in the following way. I obtained as compensation for my claims a farm of about forty-six acres in the Paduan district, several houses in Venice, some substantial and some ruinous, a sum of money in the funds of the Mint, and three thousand ducats by way of repayment of arrears. A solemn agreement was signed, which may G.o.d preserve unbroken through all the centuries to come! After paying the costs and debts contracted in this long campaign, and a.s.signing their portions of the balance to my brothers, I took breath again, like a man broken by a tedious and disastrous journey, who stretches out his wearied limbs upon a bed of down.

XLIV.

_The beginning of dissensions in Sacchi's company.--My att.i.tude of forbearance and ridiculous heroisms._

Having spent ten years of serene recreation among my professional friends, the time had come for clouds to gather on the horizon. _Le due notti affannose_, my last dramatic venture, was the source of much profit to Sacchi. But the company, while gaining strength from actors hired to sustain serious parts, began to degenerate in their behaviour.

Though they professed the same severe morality as formerly, I noticed signs of change and of dissension. Differences between relatives spread the seeds of future dissolution. The imported actors helped the theatre, but introduced pernicious ideas into this previously happy family. They criticised the administration of the property; accused the managers of injustice, tyranny, even fraud; sympathised with those who thought themselves oppressed; threw stones, and carefully concealed the hands which launched them. Pluming themselves upon their sapience, they contrived to persuade the troupe that the plays I gave for nothing were not so beneficial as the latter blindly believed. They ascribed the crowds which filled the theatre to the attraction of stage decorations and their own spirited performance. Not unlike the fly in aesop's fable, they exclaimed: "Look at the dust which we are raising!" By artfully reckoning the cost of putting my fables on the stage, and by insinuating calumnies against the managers, they brought some of the sharers into a state of mutiny, made them depreciate my services, and stirred up anger and suspicion against Sacchi. Finally, they got them to think it would be more advantageous to exchange their shares for salaries, and prepared them for hating one another cordially.

The older and more sagacious comedians still continued to pay me court and beg for my poetical a.s.sistance. I thought it, however, wiser to suspend my collaboration for a year or two, without showing annoyance, or letting it be known that I was aware of what was being said against me. I could not take a better way of bringing them back to reason; and my private engagements provided me with a good pretext for withdrawing my a.s.sistance.

In the first year after my retirement, the public began to grumble at the lack of new pieces. In the second, it began to growl. The audiences thinned, and Sacchi's theatre became a desert. There were not wanting folk who from the boxes shouted insults at the actors. Their dejection increased daily; and then they all with one accord broke into protestations of affection and fervent entreaties for my help.

I had accustomed the public to novel kinds of drama, and the company had seconded my efforts. I did not think it right to a.s.sist them for ten years and then to drop them. To condescend to take affront at what comedians say or do is utterly impossible for me. I could, indeed, have laughed in their faces and turned my back. But I preferred to laugh in my sleeve while once more coming to their aid with the energy and good results which I shall presently describe.

The owners of the other theatres in Venice, finding themselves extremely injured by the plays I gave to Sacchi, kept making me proposals to write for their houses; and the pretty actresses who worked there seconded these misplaced endeavours by spreading snares to catch me with their charms. Though my old proteges would have richly deserved it, I had the burlesque heroism not to desert them.