Don Giovanni

The complete title translating into The Rake Punished, or Don Giovanni, Mozart’s famous opera first premiered on October 29, 1787 by the Prague Italian opera at the present-day Estates Theatre. Classified as a comic opera, Don Giovanni tells the story of the title character, a young, arrogant and promiscuous man who is hated by most. The opera opens with a masked Don Giovanni attempting to seduce the Commendatore’s daughter, Donna Anna. When the Commendatore discovers them together, he duels Giovanni and loses. When Donna Anna discovers her father has been murdered by Giovanni, she forces her fiancé, Don Ottavio, to seek vengeance on him, whose identity she does not yet know. As Giovanni escapes from Ottavio with his servant Leporello, they happen upon a wedding procession. After attempting to seduce the bride and duel many members of the party, Giovanni leaves with two others swearing vengeance upon him, including Donna Elvira, who had been scorned by Giovanni some time earlier. After attempting to seduce Elvira’s maid, Giovanni and Leporello are almost killed by a group of vengeful wedding guests. As they hide in a graveyard, Giovanni taunts Leporello for being so frightened. Suddenly, a statue from the graveyard announces that Giovanni’s laughter will not last beyond sunrise. Taking a closer look at the statue, Giovanni and Leporello discover that it is the tombstone of the Commendatore. Half-jokingly, Giovanni invites the statue to dinner. Much to his surprise, the statue nods. Once the statue arrives for dinner, instilling Leporello with paralyzing fear, it asks Giovanni to repent for his sins. When Giovanni adamantly refuses, the ground opens up, and the statue takes Giovanni below the surface with it.



This book was created from a scan of the original artifact, and as such the text of the book is not selectable or searchable.