Plenary I: Stories

Abstract: Of Bears, Satyrs, and Diana's Kisses: Metamorphosis in Early Modern Opera

Presented by: Wendy Heller, Princeton University

The first Act of Francesco Cavalli's opera La Calisto (Venice, 1651) presents an intriguing transformation of Giove's seduction of the nymph Callisto. As in Ovid's Metamorphosis, Giove disguises himself as Diana, borrowing--in his operatic guise--not only her body but her voice. In the opera, however, Callisto makes no attempt to avoid the sexual assault, nor does she discern the biological sex of her seducer. The actual mechanics of the sexual act--the presence or absence of that most potent evidence of Giove's prowess--are shrouded in ambiguity. Moreover, in this Venetian variation on Callisto's story, desire replaces shame: Callisto revels in Diana's kisses, pursuing the reluctant huntress in a delirium of remembered bliss. Callisto's subsequent metamorphoses--first into bear by the jealous Juno and finally into a constellation by a magnanimous Giove--are not the consequences of a rape but rather Callisto's apparent sexual fulfillment, all within the suggestive context of a female homoerotic encounter.

This paper explored the stories of two Arcadian women--Callisto and the goddess Diana--as transformed in Cavalli's opera La Calisto. After considering the literary and artistic sources upon which the opera is likely based, I demonstrated some of the ways in which composer Cavalli and librettist Giovanni Faustini recounted these women's histories, elaborating and transforming the eroticism inherent in the visual images, providing an intriguing exploration of the nature of female desire. Finally, I demonstrated the way in which Diana's and Callisto's destinies are ultimately contrived so as to suppress their desire in favor of a more Neoplatonic vision of love, culminating in an atypical lieto fine that may also have frustrated Venetian audiences.