Opera Ludica. Alcune riflessioni sul gioco a carte nel teatro musicale fra Ottocento e Novecento

The essay aims to shed light on the relationship between opera and play, focusing on the card scenes in four operatic masterpieces of the 19th and 20th centuries: "Carmen" (1875), "The Queen of Spades" (1890), "The Girl of the Golden West" (1910) and "The Rake’s Progress" (1951). In these operas, the idea of play is much more than a simple cue or thematic subject: it has a substantial and paradigmatic function, directly connected with the dramaturgic and musical architecture of the work. On the other hand, these operas share some features that can be linked to the idea of time and to the metalinguistic value of play: although play and music take place in time, they tend to annul it, thus entering a supra-temporal dimension.