Books by Ayana O Smith
Dreaming with Open Eyes engages interdisciplinary materials (from art, literature, music, and phi... more Dreaming with Open Eyes engages interdisciplinary materials (from art, literature, music, and philosophy) to articulate discourses of seeing and believing emerging in Rome at the end of the seventeenth century. Harnessing the artistic, literary, and philosophical theories of vision, illusion, and perception circulating among intellectuals associated with Queen Christina of Sweden and the Arcadian Academy in Rome, Dreaming with Open Eyes argues that visual symbolism and vivid language were considered the most important tools for conveying truth to the audience. Situating operas by Alessandro Scarlatti and Carlo Francesco Pollarolo into broader debates about the representative functions of image and sound explains the harsh criticism launched at opera by early members of the Arcadian Academy; recapturing opera’s visual devices allows modern scholars and interpreters to perceive operatic truth from a seventeenth-century viewpoint. Each chapter engages one or more “monuments” to visual culture, including early modern frescoes and paintings, treatises on art and literary criticism, and an Arcadian drama. Due to its rich illustrations, musical examples, and interdisciplinary framework, Dreaming with Open Eyes will appeal to readers not only in opera studies, but also in literature, intellectual culture, history of philosophy, and visual studies.
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Published Papers by Ayana O Smith
Popular Music, 2005
Scholars in the field of literary theory have defined clearly the role of signifying in African-A... more Scholars in the field of literary theory have defined clearly the role of signifying in African-American literature. This article identifies one aspect of the signifying tradition and its influence on the early blues tradition. Since the Signifying Monkey is the ultimate trickster in the African-American narrative tradition, this article presents evidence for considering the blues singer as a trickster figure at several different levels. First, the singer identifies with the trickster's character traits through pseudo-autobiographical content in song narratives, particularly in expressing socially aggressive or unacceptable exploits. Second, the trickster figure can be perceived as the singer's alter ego, as in songs about the boll weevil and similar folk characters. Third, the topics or tropes associated with crossroads and railways, used frequently in blues texts, relate to the liminal nature of Esu-Elegbara (the African ancestor of the Signifying Monkey), who embodies the boundary between the word and its (mis)interpretation.
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Eighteenth Century Music, 2010
In 1711 the opera L'Anagilda was performed in the private theatre of Francesco Maria Ruspoli, an ... more In 1711 the opera L'Anagilda was performed in the private theatre of Francesco Maria Ruspoli, an important Roman patron of the Arcadian Academy. L'Anagilda's librettist (Girolamo Gigli) and composer (Antonio Caldara) were both associated with this society, but the opera contrasts with the basic goal of Arcadian aesthetics – namely, to reform literature and opera by imitating the structure of ancient Greek tragedy and the stylistic purity of Italian renaissance poets. Rather, Gigli and Caldara created an opera infused with comedy, interspersed with fantastic intermezzos and formulated according to a genre not endorsed by Arcadian literary critics, the mock heroic. This article explores topics related to one central question: why would Gigli and Caldara openly flout the literary precepts of Arcadia? Gigli was a career satirist whose works eventually caused him to be exiled from his native Siena, all of Tuscany and the Papal States, and to be expelled from three major literary academies, the Intronati, the Cruscanti and the Arcadians. Since he continually criticized the organizations to which he belonged for their narrow-mindedness, prejudice and hypocrisy, I contend that L'Anagilda represents a critique of Arcadia. Yet in the process, Gigli also shows the Arcadians that there is more than one path to verisimilitude and the imitation of classical models. Despite the mock-heroic characteristics of the libretto, Gigli adheres to some Arcadian structural requirements, and Caldara's score heightens the characterizations and the overall verisimilitude of the opera.
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Early Modern Rome, 2011
This paper seeks to address how the aesthetic developments that Annibale Carracci debuted in the ... more This paper seeks to address how the aesthetic developments that Annibale Carracci debuted in the Palazzo Farnese (1597-1604) continued to influence artistic, intellectual and cultural trends for the next ninety years, until the founding of the Arcadian Academy in 1690. The pivotal connection between Annibale and Arcadia is Queen Christina of Sweden. The Palazzo Farnese was her first residence in Rome, beginning in 1656, and in this illustrious dwelling she gathered a circle of scholars, clerics, and scientists in her Accademia reale. Many similarities exist between Annibale’s new expressive techniques and the stated goals of Christina’s academy, just as similarities exist between the depiction of Endymion in the Gallery and in a musico-poetic work commissioned by Queen Christina from her court poet, Alessandro Guidi--his L’Endimione (1688). Later, when Guidi joined the Arcadian Academy in July of 1691, he had a trio of Arcadian shepherds recite L’Endimione at his induction ceremony. The performance was followed by a lecture in Guidi’s defense, by Gianvincenzo Gravina, titled Discorso sopra L’Endimione. Comparisons between framing, narrative and illusionary devices in Annibale’s depiction of Endymion in the Gallery, and issues of narrative time, structure and imagery in Guidi’s L’Endimione will create a backdrop for other parallels, thus demonstrating the relational continuum from artwork to aesthetic academy to musico-poetic production. Other aesthetic monuments, such as Bellori’s novel analytical techniques, and the changing concepts of novità, imitazione and maraviglia provoked by the Domenichino affair, will be juxtaposed against Gravina’s Discorso and the Arcadian Academy itself; appropriate examples also will be drawn from music. In the field of music, perhaps, we should not consider 1667 the cut-off point for studies of Early Modern Rome, but consider how Annibale’s aesthetic continued to play an active part in Roman cultural life through the 1690s.
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Gianvincenzo Gravina’s Discorso sopra l’Endimione (1691) teaches us three important concepts abou... more Gianvincenzo Gravina’s Discorso sopra l’Endimione (1691) teaches us three important concepts about the creation and perception of verisimilitude within the literary society of the Arcadian Academy in Rome: (1) representations in poetry and musical drama should accord with the audience’s “commonly held beliefs”; (2) images which portray such beliefs are the most effective means of representing truth; and (3) mythology is the most important literary source of truth. After establishing this theoretical construct, Gravina applies it to a music-dramatic text—Alessandro Guidi’s L’Endimione (1688)—a work upheld as an exemplar of stylistic purity, poetic novelty and representational verisimilitude.
L’Endimione narrates the shepherd Endymion’s love for the moon goddess Cynthia. Surprisingly, though, the plot seems to contradict Gravina’s theories of verisimilitude; at the most iconic and central moment of the narrative, Guidi reverses the traditional mythological narrative and subverts the gender roles of the two main characters. This essay seeks to understand the fundamental conflict posed by Gravina’s theory and his analysis. Using sources drawn from art, mythography and literature, spanning the ancient and early modern eras, this essay provides a narrative paradigm, based on the iconography of the subject Endymion, against which Guidi’s text can be read. The result is a broader historical and intellectual context both for Gravina’s theory and for the values of Arcadian verisimilitude, and a practical model for analyzing late seventeenth- and early eighteenth-century musical drama.
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Book Reviews by Ayana O Smith
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“Let him resist the dart of Love.” As Campaspe sings these lines, she appears opulently dressed ... more “Let him resist the dart of Love.” As Campaspe sings these lines, she appears opulently dressed as the goddess Flora, atop a float covered in flowers, and surrounded by Cupids hovering in the air. Conflicts in the source materials for this opera make it unclear whether Campaspe has an onstage audience—the suitors who vie for her affection, Alexander the Great and his court painter, Apelles. Using musical analysis and primary sources, this paper will assert a new interpretation of Campaspe as Flora. The iconographic subject, Campaspe Painted by Apelles, and the historical narrative on which it is based (Pliny the Elder, Natural History), both demand a scenic interpretation with fluid framing and shifting perspectives. Visual theories of literature and drama from the Arcadian Academy (both Scarlatti and the librettist Pietro Ottoboni participated in this literary reform movement) enable us to understand the whole opera as an enactment of the immagine del vero, the image of truth. Campaspe as Flora becomes a moving extension of paintings embedded into the narrative throughout Scarlatti’s La Statira. At the very center of the opera, Campaspe’s performativity highlights the themes of resistance and desire on which the entire plot hangs.
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Gianvincenzo Gravina’s Discorso sopra l’Endimione (1691) teaches us two important concepts about ... more Gianvincenzo Gravina’s Discorso sopra l’Endimione (1691) teaches us two important concepts about the creation and perception of verisimilitude according to the aesthetics of the Arcadian Academy: 1) mythology is the most important source of historical truth in literature, and 2) representations in poetry and musical drama should accord with what Gravina calls “commonly held beliefs” in order to prevent “bitterness in the senses of the audience.” In his Discorso, Gravina analyses Alessandro Guidi’s L’Endimione (1688) as an exemplar of verisimilitude among dramatic texts intended for musical setting. This work tells the story of the love of the lowly shepherd Endymion for the moon goddess Cynthia (also known as Diana, the goddess of the hunt). Surprisingly, though, Guidi’s text seems to contradict Gravina’s theory of “commonly held beliefs;” at the most iconic and central moment of the narrative, Guidi uses gender subversion to reverse the traditional mythological narrative and to extend the denouement. Despite such stunning narrative differences, Gravina considers the text to be truthful because it represents characteristics of “feminine love and deception,” erasing any hint of dominant female sexuality and thus allowing the male character to be seen as more heroic, and because the narrative can be read as a Neoplatonic meta-text representing transformation from states of grief to states of happiness through humble unification with divine light. By using principles of iconography, drawing upon sources from Renaissance and Baroque mythography, literature and art (particularly Annibale Carracci’s fresco in the Palazzo Farnese, which would have been well known by Guidi’s patron, Queen Christina of Sweden), this paper will provide a narrative standard against which Guidi’s text can be read, will create a broader context for Gravina’s gendered and Neoplatonic interpretations, and will suggest a practical model for approaching verisimilitude in late seventeenth- and early eighteenth- century musical drama.
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When poet Alessandro Guidi (1650-1712) joined the Arcadian Academy in 1691, his induction ceremon... more When poet Alessandro Guidi (1650-1712) joined the Arcadian Academy in 1691, his induction ceremony included a dramatic reading of his most recent libretto text, L’Endimione. This favola pastorale had been commissioned by Queen Christina of Sweden (1626-89) in 1685 and was completed in 1688, but due to her death in 1689 it was never set to music. To complement L’Endimione’s Arcadian debut, literary critic Gianvincenzo Gravina (1664-1718) delivered a lecture, the Discorso sopra l’Endimione, which analyzed the work’s adherence to various aspects of verisimilitude. Guidi’s libretto and Gravina’s lecture were published in 1692, a volume which includes a statement by Guidi refuting all of his previous works. Since L’Endimione sets out in a new direction in comparison to the author’s earlier output, it can be surmised that the principal reason for Guidi’s refutation was to emphasize his new “Arcadian” tone with respect to his earlier “Baroque” conceits. Together, Guidi’s L’Endimione and Gravina’s Discorso provide a rich source of detail about Arcadian reform principles at an early stage of their development. The ideas expressed by Gravina were later expanded and collected in his seminal treatise Della ragion poetica (1708), but Gravina were later expanded and collected in his seminal treatise Della ragion poetica (1708), but this source (like other major Arcadian writings) includes few discussions of individual libretto texts. Gravina’s Discorso, therefore, provides rare insights into how literary reform ideas should be realized in the text of a musical dramatic work.
An analysis of these two texts will highlight three important and inter-related concepts: verisimilitude, gender and Neoplatonism. This study will demonstrate the wide variety of dramatic and narrative choices that affect verisimilitude, both in Guidi’s libretto and in Gravina’s analysis. In the Discorso, issues of narrative time, the drama’s resonance with the audience, and certain gendered characteristics of Diana, the female protagonist, figure prominently in the author’s formulation of verisimilitude; all of these concerns will be shown to emerge from Gravina’s Neoplatonic reading of Guidi’s L’Endimione.
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Books by Ayana O Smith
Published Papers by Ayana O Smith
L’Endimione narrates the shepherd Endymion’s love for the moon goddess Cynthia. Surprisingly, though, the plot seems to contradict Gravina’s theories of verisimilitude; at the most iconic and central moment of the narrative, Guidi reverses the traditional mythological narrative and subverts the gender roles of the two main characters. This essay seeks to understand the fundamental conflict posed by Gravina’s theory and his analysis. Using sources drawn from art, mythography and literature, spanning the ancient and early modern eras, this essay provides a narrative paradigm, based on the iconography of the subject Endymion, against which Guidi’s text can be read. The result is a broader historical and intellectual context both for Gravina’s theory and for the values of Arcadian verisimilitude, and a practical model for analyzing late seventeenth- and early eighteenth-century musical drama.
Book Reviews by Ayana O Smith
Conference Presentations by Ayana O Smith
An analysis of these two texts will highlight three important and inter-related concepts: verisimilitude, gender and Neoplatonism. This study will demonstrate the wide variety of dramatic and narrative choices that affect verisimilitude, both in Guidi’s libretto and in Gravina’s analysis. In the Discorso, issues of narrative time, the drama’s resonance with the audience, and certain gendered characteristics of Diana, the female protagonist, figure prominently in the author’s formulation of verisimilitude; all of these concerns will be shown to emerge from Gravina’s Neoplatonic reading of Guidi’s L’Endimione.
L’Endimione narrates the shepherd Endymion’s love for the moon goddess Cynthia. Surprisingly, though, the plot seems to contradict Gravina’s theories of verisimilitude; at the most iconic and central moment of the narrative, Guidi reverses the traditional mythological narrative and subverts the gender roles of the two main characters. This essay seeks to understand the fundamental conflict posed by Gravina’s theory and his analysis. Using sources drawn from art, mythography and literature, spanning the ancient and early modern eras, this essay provides a narrative paradigm, based on the iconography of the subject Endymion, against which Guidi’s text can be read. The result is a broader historical and intellectual context both for Gravina’s theory and for the values of Arcadian verisimilitude, and a practical model for analyzing late seventeenth- and early eighteenth-century musical drama.
An analysis of these two texts will highlight three important and inter-related concepts: verisimilitude, gender and Neoplatonism. This study will demonstrate the wide variety of dramatic and narrative choices that affect verisimilitude, both in Guidi’s libretto and in Gravina’s analysis. In the Discorso, issues of narrative time, the drama’s resonance with the audience, and certain gendered characteristics of Diana, the female protagonist, figure prominently in the author’s formulation of verisimilitude; all of these concerns will be shown to emerge from Gravina’s Neoplatonic reading of Guidi’s L’Endimione.