Doomed Love

Verdi's 'Aida' at San Diego Opera,
enjoyed by MARIA NOCKIN

Most opera libretti are taken from plays or novels and many of the stories appeared in several forms before they graced the lyric stage. Aida, however, is different because its story was first seen as an opera.

In 1866, while on a trip to the Upper Nile, French Egyptologist Auguste Mariette collected material for a short story he expected to call La Fiancée du Nil. By 1870 he had done little with it, however, and he then thought that it would please his employer, the Khedive, if the story could form the basis for an opera. The Khedive liked the story so Mariette passed it on to Camille du Locle, who together with Joseph Méry, had co-authored the French libretto of Verdi's Don Carlos. The composer was not sure he wanted to compose music for Aida and took some time to think it over, but when du Locle threatened to ask Richard Wagner to write the opera, Verdi took up the challenge.

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