{"id":9018,"date":"2011-08-09T22:28:26","date_gmt":"2011-08-10T02:28:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/french\/?p=9018"},"modified":"2017-10-19T14:43:33","modified_gmt":"2017-10-19T12:43:33","slug":"what-is-the-secret-french-connection-linking-victor-hugo-verdi-batman-and-the-thriller-se7en","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/french\/what-is-the-secret-french-connection-linking-victor-hugo-verdi-batman-and-the-thriller-se7en\/","title":{"rendered":"The “French Connection” Linking Victor Hugo, Verdi, Batman, and the Film “Se7en”"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today, Opera<\/span><\/a><\/strong> composer\u00a0Giuseppe Verdi<\/strong>\u00a0<\/span><\/span>is widely celebrated as one of the major figures of what Italians proudly call “il\u00a0Risorgimento<\/strong><\/em>“, the movement which, exactly 150<\/strong> years ago<\/strong>, gave birth to\u00a0l’unification de l’Italie\u00a0<\/span><\/a><\/em><\/strong>(the Italian unification.)\u00a0<\/em>Many people, however, still ignore, even in today’s Italy, that their beloved\u00a0maestro italiano<\/span><\/a><\/em><\/strong>\u00a0was in fact born a\u00a0Frenchman<\/span><\/span>!<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

The reason being that,\u00a0when Verdi was born, the region of his birth, which included the current city of\u00a0Parma<\/strong>, was incorporated into the freshly conquered territories of the\u00a0Napoleonic Empire<\/span><\/a>—<\/strong>a fact that his mother aimed to conceal \u00e0 tout prix<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0(at all costs) by not disclosing to anyone his true date d’anniversaire <\/em><\/strong>(birthday date)!<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Whether or not that had anything to do with his “naissance fran\u00e7aise<\/em><\/strong>” (“French birth”), lying on a strict “technicality” that is, Verdi was unquestionably known to have professed enthusiastic admiration for the French literature prevailing in his time. His\u00a0la Traviata<\/em><\/strong>, for example, was an opera adaptation of a major work of\u00a0Alexandre Dumas, <\/span><\/a>fils<\/span><\/a><\/em><\/strong>, known as\u00a0“la dame aux Cam\u00e9lias<\/em><\/strong>.<\/em>“<\/span><\/p>\n

Two years before the world discovered\u00a0la<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0Traviata<\/strong><\/em>, Verdi had performed another opera adaptation inspired from yet another French literary work:\u00a0Rigoletto<\/em><\/strong><\/span>, directly based on a novel of\u00a0Victor Hugo<\/strong><\/span>.<\/span><\/p>\n

At first, things didn’t go so smoothly for Verdi’s\u00a0Rigoletto<\/em><\/strong>, since the original Hugo work in question, facetiously titled “Le roi s’amuse<\/em><\/strong><\/span>” (“The King Has Fun<\/strong>“, sometimes known in English as “The King’s Fool<\/strong>“) was deemed quite controversial from the outset…<\/span><\/p>\n

Although Victor Hugo had already set the stage of his\u00a0roman\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>(novel) to be taking place several centuries before, back in the times of French King\u00a0Fran\u00e7ois Ier\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>(in English “Francis I<\/strong>“), several censors saw the Hugolian\u00a0work in effect as tantamount to a criminal offense known as\u00a0l\u00e8se-majest\u00e9\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>(or “injured majesty.”)<\/span><\/p>\n

Indeed, numerous parts of\u00a0“le roi s’amuse<\/em><\/strong>” -some openly referring to French nobles surrounding the King as “des b\u00e2tards<\/em><\/strong>” (“bastards”)- were simply interpreted as a thinly-veiled attack against the reigning French King,\u00a0Louis-Philippe<\/strong>, who, incidentally, and as you may recall from the still recent\u00a0“Basta with Bastille Day” post<\/span><\/a><\/strong>, was the son of one of the key “hijackers<\/strong>” of the French Revolution<\/strong> operating at the behest of his British<\/strong> controllers. And since le monde a toujours \u00e9t\u00e9<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0petit <\/em><\/strong>(the world has always been small),\u00a0chief among those British “handlers” was the great-great-great-grandfather<\/span><\/a> of the current owner of the (“French loving…”)\u00a0Fox News channel<\/strong>,\u00a0Rupert Murdoch<\/span>!<\/strong><\/span><\/a>\u00a0(For more on this important issue, read “Basta with \u201cBastille Day\u201d! Why the Real French National Holiday Should Be June 20th!<\/span><\/a><\/strong>“)<\/span><\/p>\n

In order to escape the tight reins of censorship held by the Austrian authorities who at the time controlled large parts of northern Italy, and be able to perform\u00a0Rigoletto<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0in the renown Opera house\u00a0La Fenice\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>in Venice<\/span><\/strong><\/span>, Verdi was compelled to shift the setting of his opera from\u00a0France<\/strong>\u00a0to a local and relatively “low-key” place in\u00a0Italy<\/strong>, the city of Mantua<\/strong>.\u00a0Mantua is famous, among other things, for offering a temporary refuge to\u00a0Shakespeare’s Romeo<\/strong><\/span><\/a>,\u00a0before his return to V\u00e9rone<\/em> (Verona<\/span><\/a>)<\/strong>.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0Verdi’s Rigoletto,\u00a0<\/em>based on Victor Hugo’s Triboulet<\/em>, from the novel “le roi s’amuse<\/em><\/span>“, is reminiscing of another “baroque<\/em>” character of Hugo’s: Gwynplaine<\/span><\/a><\/span>\u00a0featured in “l’Homme qui rit<\/span><\/a>.<\/em>”\u00a0<\/span> While the latter is known to have provided the character basis of Batman<\/span>‘s archenemy “The Joker<\/span><\/a><\/span>“, the former can in many ways be considered as an early model of yet another foe of Batman’s: The Joker’s admirer and female partner in crime,\u00a0Harley Quinn<\/span><\/a>, whose name is either a wordplay on the French word arlequin<\/em>, or the Italian\u00a0harlequin<\/em>.\u00a0
\n<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

After this politically induced change of scenery, shifting from France to Italy, the portrayed womanizing\u00a0French King<\/strong>,\u00a0Francis I<\/strong>, “starring” in Hugo’s novel, was suddenly “demoted” to the rank of a\u00a0Duke of Mantua\u00a0<\/strong>in Verdi’s opera; the King’s Fool, the buffoon named\u00a0Triboulet\u00a0<\/strong><\/em>who was based on a truly historical character belonging to the French King’s entourage<\/em><\/strong>,\u00a0turned into\u00a0Rigoletto<\/strong><\/em>, the namesake of the Opera; and Triboulet’s secret daughter, Blanche<\/strong>, <\/em>became Gilda<\/strong><\/em>, Rigoletto’s daughter.<\/span><\/p>\n