Table of Contents

Table of Contents

Introduction
Recognition: An Introduction
Recognition as a New Perspective
Figaro's "Scar" as the "Signature of a Fiction"

Chapter 1: Operatic Enlightenment in Die Zauberflöte
Enlightenment as Metaphor
Tamino's Recognition: "Wann wird das Licht mein Auge finden?"
Pamina, Papageno, and the End of the Opera
The "Scandal" of Recognition

Chapter 2: Recognition Scenes in Theory and Practice
Recognition in Classical and Contemporary Poetics
Recognitions of Identity in Mozart
Disguise and Its Discovery
The Quest for Self-Discovery
What Recognition Brings in the End

Chapter 3: Reading Opera for the Plot
Plot in Contemporary Poetics and Opera
Plotting in Le nozze di Figaro
Mozart and the Plot that is "Well Worked Out"

Chapter 4: Sentimental Knowledge in La finta giardiniera
La "vera" and la "finta" giardiniera
Reading Opera "for the sentiment"
Sandrina as "Virtue in Distress"
Count Belfiore, Madness, and the Restorative Recognition


Chapter 5: Don Giovanni: Recognition Denied
The Problem of the Ending
Dénouement and lieto fine
Recognition Prepared and Denied
"Life without the Don"

Chapter 6: Sense and Sensibility in Così fan tutte
Resisting the Ending
Reading Così "for the sentimen"
The Language of Sentimental Knowledge
"Vorrei dir," "Smanie implacabili," and Questions of Parody
Positions of Knowledge

Chapter 7: Fiordiligi: A Woman of Feeling
The Ideal of the Phoenix
Fiordiligi, Ferrarese, and "Come scoglio"
"Per pietà": Recognition Denied
The Triumph of Feeling over Constancy

Chapter 8: La clemenza di Tito: The Sense of the Ending
The Language of clemenza and pietà
The Politics of Tyranny
Vitellia's Transformation
Sesto's Conflict
Tito's Clemency

Afterword
"I called him a Papageno"
Beyond Mozart

Works Cited