MOZART AS DRAMATIST
27
hilarity, and grows inevitably out of it, and yet transcends it com–
pletely. Mozart here foreshadows the later vision of
The Magic Flute.
Figaro
would be a lesser work if this sublime note were introduced
at the end without prior warning or articulation. Actually strands
tending to it have appeared all through the piece.
1
Act I is devoted
to comic intrigue, but the first appearance of the Countess, at the
start of Act II, moves the drama to a new plane. Living in the world
of comedy, she wears the mask of the court for conversation and in–
trigue; but in soliloquies we see the real woman, and the court sees
her too, when she unmasks at the final reconciliation. This recon–
ciliation has been gracefully prepared by another: in Act III, when
Don Bartolo and Marcellina discover that Figaro is their long-lost
bastard, and happily get married at last. Thanks to Beaumarchais'
sense of burlesque, it is a hilarious moment; thanks to Mozart's music
it is also a strangely beautiful one, suggesting a new serenity to hu–
man relationships. The Sextet here opens up a significant sub-plot
by showing signs of friction in the little love-nest of Figaro and
Susanna. Their misunderstandings do more than provide extra comic
situations; they force us to contrast Figaro-Susanna and the Count–
Countess in the entire complex of love, desertion, jealousy, suspicion,
and forgiveness. With the servants, the causes for jealousy are only
imaginary, and their feelings are more or less trivial: Susanna slaps
Figaro (twice), and he generalizes anger at her "betrayal" into a
conventional diatribe against womanhood,
((Aprite un po' quegli
occhi."
Their reconciliation is correspondingly superficial: they are
safely behind their
commedia dell' arte
masks when all is forgiven
in a charming duet,
((Pace, pace, mio dolce tesoro."
But with the
masters, though there certainly has been betrayal, the Countess reveals
poignant grief instead of jealousy. His fury when his schemes are
thwarted, and especially when he thinks her unfaithful, is intense
and extremely unpleasant; Almaviva is Mozart's most savage creation.
Yet in spite of injury and high feelings, their reconciliation is deep
and true, the most beautiful thing in the opera. They are able to
meet on terms that we had not dreamed were still available to them.
The doors of Wisdom, Virtue, and Love are not far away.
1 See, for a little more detail, "Marriages in
Figaro," Opera News
XVIII,
December 21, 1953.
