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# **Fiesco's Conspiracy at Genoa**

FRIEDRICH SCHILLER TRANSLATED BY FLORA KIMMICH INTRODUCTION BY JOHN GUTHRIE

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# Fiesco's Conspiracy at Genoa

*By Friedrich Schiller*

*Translated by Flora Kimmich, with an Introduction and Notes to the Text by John Guthrie*

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Translation © 2015 Flora Kimmich. Introduction and Notes to the Text © 2015 John Guthrie

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Friedrich Schiller. *Fiesco's Conspiracy at Genoa*. Translated by Flora Kimmich, with an Introduction and Notes to the Text by John Guthrie. Cambridge, UK: Open Book Publishers, 2015. http://dx.doi.org/10.11647/OBP.0058

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Cover image: Bernhard Neher (der Jüngere), 'Die Verschwörung des Fiesco zu Genua' (fresco), photograph by Rolf-Werner Nehrdich, courtesy of the Zentralinstitut für Kunstgeschichte München/Rolf-Werner Nehrdich, Munich.

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# Contents


Portrait of Friedrich Schiller (between ca.1786 and ca.1791) by Anton Graff. Oil on canvas. Dresden State Gallery.1

<sup>1</sup> Image in the public domain, from Wikimedia Commons. See http://commons. wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Anton\_Graff\_-\_Friedrich\_Schiller.jpg

'My *Robbers* may perish! My *Fiesco* shall remain.'2

*The Conspiracy of Fiesco at Genoa* was Schiller's second play and the first in which he dealt with a historical subject. After the *succès de scandale* that *The Robbers* (1781) had been, Duke Karl Eugen of Württemberg restricted Schiller's movements and he busied himself with finishing his medical dissertation to qualify as a doctor. The dissertation contains a reference to the historical figure of Fiesco, whom Schiller links with Catiline as an example of an extreme character who is led by his senses and passions. The same two figures are again linked on the title page of the play through a quotation from Sallust. Schiller was pointed in the direction of a particular view of the historical figure by Rousseau, who gives Fiesco as an example of the type of the sublime criminal.3 He turned to historical accounts of Fiesco's conspiracy, but was not interested in adhering to all the historical facts: what fascinated him was a character whose moment of greatest success revealed his weakness and failure. He sensed that his play would more than challenge his audience, and as

<sup>2 &#</sup>x27;Meine *Räuber* mögen untergehen! Mein Fiesco soll bleiben.' Schiller, while working on *Fiesco*, as reported by Karl Philipp Conz. Quoted in Friedrich Schiller, *Werke und Briefe*, 12 vols. (Frankfurt 1980-2004) (abbreviated as WB), vol. 2 *Dramen I*, ed. Gerhard Kluge (Frankfurt 1988), p. 1182. I am grateful to Alessandra Tosi, Flora Kimmich and Charlotte Lee for their comments on an earlier version of this introduction, to Francis Lamport, whose translations of Schiller and infectious enthusiasm for Schiller's dramas on stage have long been a source of inspiration, and finally to Charles Freeman for a guided tour of Genoa in September 2014.

<sup>3</sup> Schiller read Helfrich Peter Sturz, *Denkwürdigkeiten von Johann Jakob Rousseau*, Erste Sammlung (Leipzig 1779). See pp. 145-146.

with *The Robbers*, he wrote a preface and a further explanatory text that was posted up with the cast list for the first performance in Mannheim. He had a disheartening experience when he read from his play to actors from the Mannheim theatre and they showed no great interest. This was ascribed to his fierce declamatory style and strong Swabian accent. The one-man show was apparently not a good advertisement for staging the play, and this is understandable in view of the plenitude of characters involved, the use of masks and frequent changes of scene. The theatre intendant in Mannheim, Freiherr von Dalberg, was unimpressed and did not immediately offer Schiller the contract he was hoping for. The actor August Wilhelm Iffland, sitting on the same committee judging plays in Mannheim, certainly thought the play had weaknesses. But he also believed that it had great merits and was worth performing. After the play was published in spring 1783, Schiller created a stage version based on some of the suggestions made by Iffland. When the play was performed in Mannheim it was not the success that Schiller had hoped for. He attributed this to the political mentality of his audience: he said he thought there was not enough enthusiasm for republican ideas in the region.4

More success greeted a version of Schiller's play created by Karl Martin Plümicke in Berlin in 1784 and performed widely at other German theatres in the following years. Plümicke adapted the play to the audience's conservative taste – the revolutionary content is marginalised, the issue of freedom in Genoa and the future of the Republic disappears, monarchy is restored and Fiesco, a much nobler character here, whom both Verrina and Julia fail to kill, renounces his newly acquired ducal status and passes it to the eighty-year-old Andrea Doria before committing suicide.5 Plümicke's tampering with the play may have been a reason why Schiller decided to make more changes to his own play and create a version for the stage, which was performed in theatres in Dresden and Leipzig. It shows Fiesco being stabbed by Verrina at the play's conclusion, though Schiller did not

<sup>4</sup> Schiller's letter to his later brother-in-law W. F. H. Reinwald, 5 May 1784. Schiller, Friedrich von, *Schillers Werke*. Nationalausgabe. Ed. Julius Petersen et al. 42 vols. (Weimar: Herman Böhlaus Nachfolger, 1943-) . Vol. 23, p. 277.

<sup>5</sup> See Liselotte Blumenthal, 'Aufführungen der Verschwörung des Fiesko zu Genua zu Schillers Lebzeiten (1783-1805),' *Goethe. Neue Folge des Jahrbuchs der Goethe-Gesellschaft* 27 (1995), 60-90; here pp. 75-78.

himself approve this ending. Schiller's play, in Plümicke's version and versions authorized by Schiller, was performed a number of times during his lifetime, but its popularity did not last. A critic in the *Journal des Luxus und der Moden* suggested in 1792 that plays like *The Robbers* and *Fiesco*, in which rebellion and uprising are directly shown, should for the present, when so much was subject to misunderstanding, not be presented on stage.6 Once the radical phase of the French Revolution had set in, the taste for revolutionary plays in Germany died out and plays which dealt with republics became unpopular. Thus, even though the play does not have a clear political message, it was considered to be dangerous.

It is thought that Schiller got to know more about the subject of Fiesco's conspiracy in 1780 with reading Robertson's history of the reign of the Emperor Charles V of Spain.7 Robertson as a Scottish Enlightenment historian was keen to show progress in history. He depicted Fiesco's conspiracy as one of the boldest actions in history and Fiesco as a noble, gifted and charismatic figure whose positive qualities shown in public yet masked deeper and darker ambitions.

He saw Fiesco as an inscrutable figure who was given to the pursuit of pleasure. His succinct description of the conspiracy was itself based on a detailed account of the events by Cardinal de Retz, which Schiller also studied.8 Retz's *La Conjuration de Fiesque* (written in 1638-39) was in turn a bold adaptation of a narrative by the Italian historian Agostino Mascardi. The cautious political orthodoxy and the moral strictures of Mascardi are turned on their head by the young Abbé de Retz, who instead writes an enthusiastic apology for his Genoese hero's rebellion against the tyranny of the Dorias.9 In de Retz's depiction of Fiesco, one can detect the idea of the hero as a pre-destined being. His rebellion against authority is motivated by a kind of inner conviction, a personal necessity that drives him to seek *gloire* at any cost.10

<sup>6</sup> Quoted in WB 2, p. 1174.

<sup>7</sup> A German translation of Robertson's *History* had been published in 1770-1771, and a second edition in 1779: *Dr. William Robertsons Geschichte der Regierung Kaiser Carls des Fünften. Aus dem Englischen übersetzt ... von Julius August Remer*, 3 vols. (Braunschweig 1770-1771). See G. Kluge, Commentary to WB 2, p. 1149.

<sup>8</sup> *Des Kardinals von Retz Histoire de la conjuration du comte Jean Louis de Fiesque* (Paris 1682).

<sup>9</sup> Derek Watts, *Cardinal de Retz*. *The Ambiguities of a Seventeenth-Century Mind* (Oxford 1980), p. 134.

<sup>10</sup> Watts, pp. 135-136.

#### *x Fiesco's Conspiracy at Genoa*

Portrait of Fiesco from Schiller's 1859 edition of *Die Verschwörung des Fiesco zu Genua*, engraving by Karl Moritz Lämmel.11

Schiller takes over the uninhibited display of creative energy, the audaciousness and immorality of Fiesco's actions as well as his independence, his apparent disinterestedness and dissimulation. But the most significant change to the historical facts is with Fiesco's death – whereas the historical Fiesco had fallen accidentally to his death in the harbour of Genoa, in Schiller's play his fellow conspirator Verrina pushes him into the sea. This ending was the result of Schiller treating Fiesco as a tragic character. Fiesco is blind to his faults and fails to heed warnings. He plays with the idea of power in his imagination and feels himself superior to the artist Romano,

<sup>11</sup> Image from Wikimedia Commons: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Friedrich\_ Pecht\_gez,\_Schiller-Galerie,\_Friedrich\_von\_Schiller,\_Sammelbild,\_Stahlstich\_ um\_1859,\_Fiesco\_aus\_Die\_Verschw%C3%B6rung\_des\_Fiesco\_zu\_Genua,\_Karl\_ Moritz\_L%C3%A4mmel.jpg. Scan by Bernd Schwabe, CC BY 3.0.

who presents to him his tableau depicting the rape of Virgina by Appius Claudius. The painter merely depicts past events, Fiesco claims, whereas he believes he can control them as they are happening. Fiesco's fate follows the pattern of Aristotelian tragedy in which the hero loses contact with reality, overestimates his own powers, leading to his destruction. In addition, many elements of Schiller's play come from Shakespearean tragedy. The idea of basing character tragedy on a historical conspiracy is Shakespearean. There are verbal reminiscences of *Hamlet*, *Macbeth* and *Othello*, 12 and thematic links to *Coriolanus* and *Julius Caesar*. As Caesar is warned of the Ides of March, Fiesco is warned by the Moor to beware of Doria. Fiesco has elements of Caesar (charisma, yet aloofness and the potential to become a tyrant) as well as of the conspirators (deviousness, the underdog, a rebel against tyranny), while Verrina owes something to Shakespeare's Brutus (nobility, and tragically divided). Leonora is Fiesco's Portia, but while Shakespeare's Portia kills herself, Schiller compounds Fiesco's guilt by making him her accidental murderer.

The leaning on Shakespeare shows how in his second play Schiller was learning his trade. His *Fiesco* can be seen as several plays merged into one. It has been called 'a republican play without republicans,' but it is wrong to look for an analysis of republicanism in the modern sense or even from the point of view of Schiller's own time. Although it deals with republicanism as an alternative to tyranny, the reasons for the failure of the rebellion are to be found in the character of Fiesco rather than the political situation. It is a historical drama but not in the sense that, like Schiller's later plays, it attempts to show a pattern in the workings of history such as a triadic scheme which points to a goal in the future. Rather, it attempts to examine the remarkable and mysterious character that is Fiesco. Although he has a legitimate grudge against tyranny in Genoa that will come about by the handing of power from the aged Andrea Doria to his younger, depraved nephew Gianettino, he soon becomes obsessed by the idea of the acquisition of power and greatness. He is playing a part in a play, and so involved is

<sup>12</sup> How like the words in the anonymous letter to Brutus, 'Speak, strike, redress!' (*Julius Caesar* II, 1) is the artisans' exhortation to Fiesco: 'Strike! Throw down! Set free!' (*Fiesco* II, 8) before he relates to them an allegory of the sharing of power in the animal kingdom so reminiscent of Menenius' belly speech in *Coriolanus*; Verrina's 'When do we meet again?' (*Fiesco* II, 19) to the witches in *Macbeth*; Leonora's 'Let me not pronounce it in your hearing, virginal light!' (*Fiesco* III, 3) to Othello's 'Let me not name it to you, you chaste stars!' (*Othello* V, 2). Schiller read Shakespeare's works in Wieland's prose translations.

he, that he does not sense the potential for events to get out of control. He is unable to achieve the ideal balance between the senses and reason that Schiller believed necessary. He aspires to be great by being seen to do great deeds in the services of what appears to be a political aim. But his egotism gets the better of him. For he knows that politics can be a pretend game and that being seen to be great is a matter of convincing others that you are. He is duped by himself and is his own undoing. He has no real antagonist: neither Andrea Doria, to whom he is opposed but with whom there is no confrontation, nor his former ally Verrina, who sends him to his death. Together they constitute his nemesis.

There are some ways in which Schiller's play does not conform to the pattern of classical tragedy. Not everything emanates from the hero's tragic flaw. The action of the play is carefully motivated and dependent on characters' behaviour, but there is also a sense of random events and the arbitrariness of fate. This makes the play seem modern. Schiller at this stage of his life was interested in chaos, evil and the interdependence of mind and body rather than the power of the mind to influence events and the conformity of events to a pattern. Thus we find Fiesco himself saying: 'What reason, that busy ant, drags together laboriously an accidental gust can heap up in an instant' (Act II, Scene 4). Indeed, the fact that Schiller toyed with different endings is proof that he believed events could take a different turn. The Moor Muley Hassan embodies this unpredictability, and the association with chaos and evil. He pays the price for this and becomes a victim of Fiesco's revenge and a victim of nemesis.

Schiller chose to incorporate into his drama what amounts to two other plays that are essentially domestic tragedies, the form of literary drama that had established itself in Germany when he was beginning to write at the end of the 1770s. The first involves Fiesco's love life. Although he loves his wife Leonora (who is also admired by one of the conspirators, Calcagno), he pursues Julia, the young widowed sister of Gianettino Doria, and then humiliates her in Leonora's presence. Fiesco accidentally murders the faithful Leonora, thinking that she is Gianettino, in whose cloak she has disguised herself. It is the climax to the tragic misadventures of a libertine and sensualist. But it also points to a deeper split in the hero's mind which shows that love, domestic life and politics don't mix. This is made clear in Leonora's eloquent speech in Act IV, Scene 14, in which she weighs up the claims of ambition for power and love. Although she is a sentimental character, she yet reflects Fiesco's weaknesses and her death is

a consequence of his excesses. As in his later plays, Schiller reveals what it is like to be a woman in a man's world.

The other domestic tragedy is the plot surrounding the conspirator Verrina's daughter Berta, which owes much to Lessing's reworking of the Virginia story in *Emilia Galotti*. Berta is raped by the brutish Gianettino, cursed by her father and locked away. Unlike Emilia, Berta herself is of little psychological interest, and Schiller focuses on her father's dilemma, integrating the political with the family matter. The play has even been seen (somewhat inflatedly perhaps) as Verrina's tragedy.13 In this view, domestic tragedy has been moved up a notch to become a matter of state. To be sure, it ends happily, for Berta is reunited with her lover, the noble young conspirator Bourgognino (and true to the form of Shakespearean comedy, she appears in the guise of a young boy). Here, as elsewhere, the play has elements of comedy showing another side to the serious elements, as in the case of Julia Imperiali. There is a comic side to Leonora's character inasmuch as she appears as the typical woman of sensibility led by her emotions.14 The figure of the Moor, Muley Hassan, also creates levity with his obsequiousness, bluntness, and ostentatiously clipped language. He flatters his master and disguises his own motives. Like one of Shakespeare's fools he makes nonsensical statements like, 'My feet have their hands full' (Act II, Scene 15). He is a character who, although improbable in some respects (Gianettino rather naively puts his trust in him and he rapidly switches allegiances) is linked to the serious themes of the play. He is unlike the Shakespearean fool in that he represents moral evil and Fiesco's failure to see that underscores his tragedy.

Links to other forms of theatre, like the Italian *commedia dell'arte*, in which masks and costume are given priority over realism are striking. *Fiesco* is a play in which masks play a crucial role, especially at the outset and denouement, but with the metaphor of the mask ever present. The play opens with a masked ball that Fiesco has arranged. It enables him to exhibit his virtuosity and skills of control and manipulation. But his wife Leonora tears off her mask in disgust at her husband's philandering. Gianettino Doria wearing a green mask commissions the Moor Muely Hassan to murder Fiesco in a white mask. All the conspirators-to-be are masked, suggesting intrigue and deception rather than full-blooded republican idealism. Moreover, the conspirators are linked to the depravity of their

<sup>13</sup> Kluge, Commentary to WB 2, pp. 1225-1227.

<sup>14</sup> See Nikola Roßbach, *Schiller-Handbuch*, p. 61.

opponents through masks: after the masked ball we are told that Berta has been raped by the masked man in the green coat, the hated Gianettino Doria. All this points to the problems Fiesco will encounter by virtue of his desire to impress, control, manipulate. The revenge of the mask occurs in the final act when Fiesco accidentally murders his wife, who has disguised herself in Gianettino's scarlet cloak. He interprets this as a sign from heaven. Fiesco's nemesis has come. The mask has fallen; he experiences the shame and agony of not having his wife by his side as the newly proclaimed Duke. He has been beaten at his own game.

Beneath the masks, we find not just humans but humans that can behave like animals. Characters constantly refer to one another, sometimes half in jest, as a type of animal. Some of this is proverbial, but the recurrent imagery tells us there is a thin line between man's potential for nobility and his propensity to follow his instinctual nature. The Moor offers himself to Fiesco as 'your tracking hound, your coursing hound, your fox, your snake, your go-between and henchman.' '*One fox can sniff out another,'* Fiesco says to him. Though Fiesco aspires to be the noble lion and rule over all animals, he strikes back like a cornered beast. The animal metaphors resurface on a broader level. 'Is it exactly a pleasure to be the foot of this sluggish manylegged beast of a *republic*,' Fiesco asks. Genoa the Republic becomes a sacrificial animal; Verrina tells Fiesco that he has torn Genoa from Andreas Doria, just as a wolf tears the lamb from its mother. In the Genoese world of politics it is the law of the jungle that prevails. Schiller shows us in *Fiesco* how reason is constantly in danger of being overpowered by man's animal nature.

While elements of both comedy and tragedy can be seen to have been borrowed from various sources, the distinctive feature of Schiller's early plays is their language. Here again, Schiller was influenced by the same models. Thus we sense the power of rhetoric used to sway the people in Menenius's famous belly speech from *Coriolanus* in Fiesco's tale of the lion and the dog with which he addresses the artisans. Time and again we find character's making general statements about human affairs that remind us of characters in Lessing's plays. (One example must suffice: compare Gianettino I, 5, 'Force is the most effective form of persuasion,' with Emilia's words, 'Seduction is true force,' in V, 7 of *Emilia Galotti*.) The Bible was also an important source of inspiration for Schiller's language. At the same time the sources fade into the background and there are many distinctively original marks in Schiller's language. The interlocking dialogue between Verrina

and Fiesco in the penultimate scene is a good illustration. Verrina's crossquestioning, one character's repetition of the other's words and phrases, or of their own, thrust and counter-thrust, produce sustained tension and pathos, a climactic ending to the political battle which decides the fate of Genoa.15 This is heightened by the use of stage directions (e.g. '*very moved.' 'more pressing.' 'with terrible scorn'*). Schiller's use of gesture continues along the path begun by Lessing towards a more expressive dramatic language and goes much further, injected as it is with the emotions of the *Sturm und Drang*: there is an abundance of bodily movement and gesture which emphasises the spontaneity of the action, and is often extreme. Thus the play opens with two characters, Rosa and Arabella rushing onto the stage in disarray, Leonora ripping off her mask and throwing herself into a chair before rising to her feet; it ends with the violence of Fiesco being pushed into the sea.

Nineteenth-century theatre directors in Germany gradually found their way to Schiller's play and it had some notable performances. Although it has not been as frequently performed in Germany as Schiller's other plays, it has held its place on the German stage into the twenty-first century and appears again and again. In the twentieth century, it established itself in the repertoire and made the transition to silent film (in 1921) and television (in 1961 and 1999).

Like other works by Schiller, *Fiesco* was first translated into English during Schiller's lifetime. The play had some great admirers in England (more than one reviewer thought it Schiller's best play) but some detractors too, who criticised improbabilities, characters they found to be repugnant or the play's extreme style and excessive length. The first translation, by G. H. Noehden and J. Stoddart, attempted to tone down Schiller's language.16 Sir Walter Scott, strongly interested in German 'plays of Chivalry' and thinking that Schiller's Fiesco had not yet been translated into English had, by 1798, undertaken his own translation, but it remained published.17 There were

<sup>15</sup> See p. 121. FIESCO. The rotter was putting Genoa to the torch. VERRINA. But *that* rotter nonetheless spared the laws? FIESCO. Verrina is torching my friendship. VERRINA. So much for friendship. This is a technique which Schiller develops to great effect in his later plays.

<sup>16</sup> G. H. Noehden and J. Stoddart, *Fiesco, or the Genoese Conspiracy. A Tragedy Translated from the German of F. Schiller* (London 1796). William Taylor points out that Schiller's line 'Werde du eine *Hure* –' is weakened to: 'And thou may'st become a prey to dishonour!' See William Taylor, review of *Fiesco*, *Monthly Review*, n.s. 22 (1797), pp. 204-206.

<sup>17</sup> See Scott's letter of 5 May 1798 to the pubishers 'Messrs. Cadell & Davies.' Ruth M.

a handful more translations into English in the nineteenth century. One of them, by Colonel d'Aguilar in 1832 is mostly into prose, but sometimes blank verse. There was much praise for it at the time, though it scarcely reproduces the full range of Schiller's language and comes dangerously close to plagiarising Shakespeare.18 The translator explains in his preface that the weaknesses of the play and its exaggerations, were a direct result of the German language and of 'the German school.'19 And so he tried to soften the blow, to polish and refine the play for an English audience. A prose translation appeared anonymously in 1841,20 but surprisingly, the translator makes an exception to prose for Fiesco's monologue in Act III, where he uses blank verse in an attempt to heighten pathos. He also adds a scene, 'Berta in the Dungeon.' which Schiller wrote after the first version of the play and which was inserted at the beginning of Act V for the Mannheim stage version. This translation was followed by the publication in 1849 of a revised version of the first translation by Noehden and Stoddart in the Bohn's Standard Library, which helped to bring Schiller's name into the household, was also published in the United States and carried through into the twentieth century, alongside another translation by Edward Pearson, which appeared in the 1890s.21

Schiller's *Fiesco* has rarely been performed in Britain. There was an isolated professional performance at Drury Lane Theatre in 1850, when it was adapted to the 'exigencies of the English stage' by a certain Mr. Planché, with the excision of several scenes and the addition of others.22 The *Observer* reviewer found much to praise in the production, particularly the evocation of history and locality, but the play he thought to be without 'dramatic ingenuity, female interest, or skilful concatenation of events.'23

Adams, 'A Letter by Sir Walter Scott,' in: *University of Rochester Library Bulletin* 11 (1956). https://www.lib.rochester.edu/index.cfm?PAGE=3430

<sup>18</sup> *Fiesco, Or The Conspiracy of Fiesco at Genoa*. *An Historical Tragedy translated from the German of Schiller*. The copy in the Bodleian Library, Oxford shows the translation to be by 'the late Col. George d'Aguilar.' The title page has a quotation from Shakespeare's *Henry VIII* (Act IV, Scene I, ll. 440-442): Cromwell, I charge thee, fling away ambition, / By that sin fell the angels; how can man then, / The image of his maker, hope to win by it?

<sup>19</sup> Ibid., p. ii.

<sup>20</sup> *Fiesco, the Conspiracy of Genoa; A Tragedy. Translated from the German of Friedrich von Schiller. In Five Acts* (London 1841).

<sup>21</sup> Edward Stanhope Pearson, *The Conspiracy of Fiesco at Genoa. A republican tragedy in 5 acts, translated* (Dresden 1896).

<sup>22</sup> *The Observer*, February 10 1850, p. 6.

<sup>23</sup> Ibid.

Whether the translation used was a factor in this lack of success is an open question but it is not surprising that, given the complexities of its plot and the many scene changes required, *Fiesco* did not find a place on the English stage. Performances in this country have been limited to those by university students of German and by fringe theatres (in English);24 it has not been part of the renaissance of interest in Schiller's plays that has created such successful productions in the West End and regional theatres in recent decades.25

There was not only a need for a new translation of Schiller's play for the twenty-first century, but for a full and accurate translation altogether. Unlike some of the earlier translations, which used a hybrid text, the translation offered here is based on the first version of the play, which Schiller published in book form and which, as we have suggested, can be considered the most authentic and original version of the play.26 The language of Schiller's early plays is often extreme, with some difficult metaphors. But it is also often immensely powerful. Flora Kimmich's translation achieves, in the first instance, accuracy and completeness. There is no attempt to tone down Schiller's language, make it more poetic, less compressed, or to eradicate obscurities. Her translation conveys the energy, intensity and roughness, the occasional elaborateness that Schiller's prose drama abounds in. It gives us the full flavour of the original without overly attempting to update or modify it. It has the faithfulness a good translation requires. At the same it does not attempt to archaise and use a form dramatic dialogue in English that might have been a parallel to that of Schiller's. It is a long overdue translation of Schiller's play as well as one for the twenty-first century.

<sup>24</sup> A production in German at Balliol College, Oxford in 1983. A highly successful production by the Faction Theatre Company, dir. Mark Leipacher, was staged at the New Diorama Theatre in London in 2013. Nevertheless, the reviewer of the Faction production was also critical of the 'intentional anachronisms' and modernisation of the translation. See Roger Smith, *One-Stop Arts.com*, 10th January 2013. The text used, *Schiller's Fiesco* by Daniel Millar and Mark Leipacher (unpublished), is a substantially condensed version and thus an adaptation rather than a translation.

<sup>25</sup> See John Guthrie, 'Classical German Drama on the British Stage. Schiller's *Wallenstein* at the Chichester Festival,' *Modern Drama* 54 (2011), 121-140.

<sup>26</sup> The text can be found in volume 4 of the Nationalausgabe and volume 2 of the Frankfurter Ausgabe of Schiller's works.

# THE CONSPIRACY OF FIESCO AT GENOA

A Republican Tragedy

Nam id facinus inprimis ego memorabile existimo sceleris atque periculi novitate. Sallust, said of Catiline1

http://dx.doi.org/10.11647/OBP.0058.02

Dedicated to Professor Abel of Stuttgart.

I have drawn the history of the conspiracy primarily from Cardinal Retz's2 *Conjuration du Comte Jean Louis de Fièsque,* from *L'Histoire des Conjurations, L'Histoire de Gênes,* and from Robertson's3 *History of Charles V*, part 3. The Hamburg dramaturg4 will forgive me the liberties I have taken with events if these liberties have succeeded. If they have not, I would rather have spoiled *my* fantasies than the facts. The actual catastrophe of the complot, where the Count is undone by unhappy chance just as he realizes his desires, necessarily had to be changed, for drama, by its very nature, can tolerate neither a random event nor the direct intervention of Providence. I would wonder why no tragic poet has ever worked with this material, did I not find sufficient grounds in just this undramatic turn of events. Higher spirits see the fragile spider webs of a deed run through the entire space of the universe and perhaps attach themselves to the remotest boundaries of the future and the past, while man sees only the free-floating fact. But the artist elects the short view of humanity, whom he wants to instruct, not sharp-sighted omnipotence, from which he learns.

In my *Robbers*<sup>5</sup> I took as my subject the victim of an excessive sensibility. Here I attempt the opposite: a victim of artifice and cabal. Yet, however notable Fiesco's ill-fated project became in history, it can just as easily fail of this effect on the stage. If it is true that only feeling stirs feeling, then, it seems to me, the *political hero* would be no subject for the stage to the extent that he must subordinate his human self in order to be a political hero. It was therefore not my task to breathe into my story the living fire that prevails in a pure product of enthusiasm, but rather to spin a cold, sterile political drama from the materials of the human heart and in just this way to reattach it to the human heart--to compose the

#### *4 Fiesco's Conspiracy at Genoa*

*man* from his *politically canny intellect--*and to gather from an inventive intrigue situations for all humanity: *that* was my task. My relations with a bourgeois world have also made me better acquainted with the heart than with the privy council, and perhaps just this political weakness has become a poetical strength.

# Dramatis personae6

#### 1. ANDREA DORIA, DOGE OF GENOA.7 *Honourable elder, eighty years of age. Traces of fieriness. A principal characteristic: weightiness and rigorous, commanding terseness.*


NOBLEMEN. CITIZENS. GERMAN BODYGUARDS. SOLDIERS. SERVANTS. THIEVES.

THE PLACE IS GENOA, THE TIME 1547.

# Act One

*A hall in Fiesco's palace. Dance music is heard in the distance and the tumult of a ball.*

## Scene 1

*Leonora, masked. Rosa and Arabella rush onto the stage in disarray.*


ROSA. Take it for what it really was--a bit of gallantry--


#### *8 Fiesco's Conspiracy at Genoa*


#### *(Pause. Music is heard again.)*


excellence--this Fiesco, your Fiesco--woe betide you, if this doesn't lift your feelings--*will--deliver our Genoa from its tyrants*!


ROSA. Speak more softly. Someone's coming through the gallery.

LEONORA (*starting*). Fiesco's coming.14 Run! Run! The sight of me could give him a bad moment. (*She leaps into the next room. Her maids follow her.*)

## Scene 2

*Gianettino Doria, masked, in a green cloak. A Moor. The two in conversation.*

GIANETTINO. You have understood.

MOOR. Very well.

GIANETTINO. The white mask.

MOOR. Very well.

GIANETTINO. I repeat--the white mask.

MOOR. Very well! Very well! Very well!


#### Scene 3

*Calcagno, followed by Sacco. Both in black cloaks.*

CALCAGNO. I notice you're watching my every movement.

SACCO. And I observe that you're hiding them all from me. Listen, Calcagno, for some weeks now your face shows something at work in you that doesn't exactly have to do with our fatherland. I would think

that we, being brothers, could trade one secret for another and lose nothing in the bargain. --Will you be forthright?


has his eagle eye on Fiesco. He hopes that you, too, are halfway inclined toward a bold plot.

CALCAGNO. He has a fine nose. Come, let's go seek him out and fan his feelings for freedom with our own. (*Exeunt*.)

## Scene 4

*Julia, excited. Fiesco, in a white cloak, hurries after her.*

JULIA. Lackeys! Runners!

FIESCO. Countess, where are you going? What are you thinking?

JULIA. Nothing, nothing at all. (*Servants*.) My carriage to the door!

FIESCO. By your leave--no. There has been some offense.

JULIA. Pooh! Hardly. --Let me go! You're tearing my ruffle to pieces. --Offense? Who is there here who can give offense? Please go away.

FIESCO (*on one knee*). Not before you tell me who has been so bold--


FIESCO. Unpardonable.


*a scrim is raised to reveal a large, brightly lit ballroom where many Masks are dancing. On the sides, Guests at gambling tables and tables offering wine.*)

## Scene 5

*Gianettino, half-drunk. Lomellino. Cibo. Centurione. Verrina. Sacco. Calcagno. All masked. A number of ladies and gentlemen of the Nobility.*


#### *As above, Fiesco.*


upon the ear, than on the breast of a panting woman? Let Gianettino Doria rule over Genoa. Fiesco gives himself to love.

GIANETTINO. Time to go, Lomellino. It's almost midnight. It's time, I say. We're grateful for your hospitality, Lavagna. I was content.

FIESCO. That, Prince, is all that I desire.


## Scene 7

#### *The three black Masks. Fiesco. Pause.*


A MASK. It is our custom to *purchase* our time with *deeds*.

FIESCO. A manly answer and--this is Verrina!


#### *Fiesco. An unknown Mask.*

MASK. Do you have a moment, Lavagna?

FIESCO (*graciously*). An hour, if you like.

MASK. Then you would be so good as to accompany me outside the walls?

FIESCO. We're within ten minutes of midnight.

MASK. You would be so good, Count.

FIESCO. I'll order the carriage.

MASK. No need. I'll have a horse sent ahead. No more is needed. Only one of us will re-enter, I hope.

FIESCO (*startled*). And?

MASK. You'll have to answer in blood for certain tears.

FIESCO. And these tears?


I should think that the web of a master weaver would be too artful to be discerned by the fleeting glance of a beginner. --Go home now, Bourgognino, and take the time to *ponder* why Fiesco is proceeding *this*  way and not otherwise. (*Bourgognino leaves without speaking.*) Farewell, noble youngster. When these flames leap over onto the *fatherland*, let the house of *Doria* look to its walls.

## Scene 9

*Fiesco. The Moor enters cautiously and looks around narrowly.*


*casket*.) Here, fellow, is one thousand, and go tell your master--he's a tight-fisted murderer.

(*Moor looks him up and down.)*

FIESCO. You're thinking it over, fellow?

(*Moor takes the money, puts it down, picks it up again, looks at him with growing amazement.)*

FIESCO. What are you up to, fellow?


FIESCO. You're a droll rascal.


#### *24 Fiesco's Conspiracy at Genoa*

a second one. Between us: They call them the special delivery of Hell. When Mephistopheles feels a craving, it only takes a nod, and he gets the roast still warm from the oven.


## Scene 10

*Room in Verrina's house. Berta prostrate on a sofa, holding her head. Verrina enters in a dark mood.*

BERTA (*jumps up, startled*). Dear heaven! There he is.

VERRINA (*stops; regards her, surprised*). My daughter is startled at her father's entrance?

BERTA. Oh, flee! Or let me flee! You're terrible, Father.

VERRINA. To my only child?

BERTA (*looks at him, troubled*)*.* Not so. You must have another daughter.

VERRINA. Does my affection oppress you so?

BERTA. It crushes me, Father.


BERTA (*tears herself away*). Dear God! You know--?

VERRINA (*rooted to the spot*). What?

BERTA. My honour, my virgin honour--

VERRINA (*in a rage*). What?

BERTA. Last night--

VERRINA (*like a madman*)*.* What?

BERTA. By force*!* (*She sinks onto the sofa.*)


VERRINA. But I wouldn't know-- Daughter! Who?

BERTA. Be calm, be calm, my own, my own precious father.

VERRINA. In God's name-- Who? (*About to fall to his knees*.)

BERTA. A mask.

VERRINA (*reflects in agitation, then takes a step back*). No. Can't be. Even God wouldn't give me *such* an idea. (*A shout of laughter.*) Old fop! As if all venom were spewed by one and the same toad! (*To Berta, more composed.*) My height, or shorter?

BERTA. Taller.

VERRINA (*quickly*). Black hair, curly hair?

BERTA. Coal black and curly.


daughter--how should I put it--*also* found his daughter *so attractive?* Tell me, Berta: What did Virginius say to his mutilated daughter?

BERTA (*shuddering*). I don't know what he said.


VERRINA (*casts the sword aside*). No! There's yet justice in Genoa!

## Scene 11

#### *As above. Sacco. Calcagno.*


VERRINA (*terrible*). Lost! Be seated.

CALCAGNO (*shocked, as both seat themselves*). Verrina! I entreat you--

VERRINA. Hear what I tell you.

CALCAGNO. Sacco, it begins to dawn on me--

VERRINA. Men of Genoa-- You both know how ancient my name is. Your forebears carried our trains. My fathers fought the battles of the State. Their wives were exemplary daughters of Genoa. *Honour* was our sole capital, passed down from father to son. --Or does someone know otherwise?

SACCO. No one.

CALCAGNO. By my Redeemer, no one.

VERRINA. I am the last of my line. My wife lies buried. This daughter is her one legacy. Men of Genoa, you are my witnesses, you know how I brought her up. Will anyone come forward with a complaint that I neglected her?

CALCAGNO. Your daughter is an example for us all.

VERRINA. My friends, I am an old man. If I lose this child, I can hope for no more. My memory will be extinguished. (*With a terrible turn.*) I *have*  lost her. My line is disgraced.

BOTH (*much stirred*)*.* God forbid*.* (*Berta writhes, groaning, on the sofa.*)


## Scene 12

#### *As above. Bourgognino.*

BOURGOGNINO (*excited*). On your feet, my little girl. Good news! --Noble Verrina, I come to make you arbiter of my happiness. I have long loved your daughter and never dared ask for her hand because my whole fortune was afloat on unsure boards of Coromandel.27 My *Fortuna* has just sailed safely into port, bringing me, as they say, immense treasure. I am a rich man. Give me Berta; I'll make her happy. (*Berta covers her face. Long pause.*)


(*Bourgognino freezes. Verrina paces, deep in thought, then stands still.*)

VERRINA. If I understand your sign correctly, Eternal Providence, you want to free Genoa by my Berta. (*He goes to her, slowly unwinding the mourning band from his arm. Solemnly.*) Until the heart's blood of a Doria washes this blot from your honour, no ray of daylight shall fall upon your cheek. Till then-- (*he drapes the mourning band over her*) be blinded!

(*Pause. The others gaze at him in awkward silence.)*

VERRINA (*more solemnly, his hand on Berta's head*). Cursed be the breeze that caresses you. Cursed the sleep that refreshes you. Cursed every trace of humanity that you long for in your wretchedness. Go down

#### *30 Fiesco's Conspiracy at Genoa*

into the deepest vaults of my cellars. Whimper. Howl. Make time stand still with your sorrow. (*He continues, interrupted by shuddering*.) Let your life be the agonized writhing of dying vermin--the unyielding, grinding battle between being and not being. --May this curse lie upon you until the last breath has rattled from Gianettino's throat. --If not, may you drag him along after you in all eternity, until we discover where the two ends of its circle mesh.

*(Long silence. Horror on every face. Verrina looks firmly and searchingly at each one.)*


*As above, without Berta.*

CALCAGNO. Before we go any further, just one word, men of Genoa.


*(Curtain.)*

# Act Two

*Antechamber in Fiesco's palace.*

## Scene 1

*Leonora. Arabella.*


## Scene 2

#### *As above. Julia.*


#### *Calcagno enters.*

CALCAGNO. Imperiali went out all in a pet. And you in a state, Madonna?

LEONORA (*deeply wounded*). Unheard of! Unheard of!

CALCAGNO. Good heavens! You're not crying?

LEONORA. You friend of a monster-- Out of my sight!

CALCAGNO. Of what monster? You frighten me.

LEONORA. Of my husband. --Not so! Of Fiesco.

CALCAGNO. What must I hear?

LEONORA. Oh, just a prank. The usual for you men.

CALCAGNO (*clasps her hand fervently*). My Lady, my heart responds to injured innocence.

LEONORA (*gravely*). You are a man. --It's not for me.

CALCAGNO. Wholly for you--full of you. --If only you knew how much- -how very much--

LEONORA. Man, you're lying. --You're giving assurances before you act.

CALCAGNO. I swear to you--

LEONORA. A perjury. Stop it. You'll wear out the stylus of God, who records your lies. Men! Men! If your oaths should turn into as many devils, they could storm the heavens and take away the angels of light as their prisoners.

CALCAGNO. You're not yourself, Countess. Your bitterness makes you unjust. Should the entire race be held to account for the misdeeds of a single individual?

LEONORA (*gazes at him steadily*). Look! I worshipped that race in the person of an individual; should I not detest it in him, too?

CALCAGNO. Consider, Countess-- You entrusted your heart wrongly the first time. --I could tell you where it would be in safekeeping.

LEONORA. Your kind could lie the Creator clear out of his world. --I don't want to hear another word from you.

CALCAGNO. This sentence of condemnation--you'll revoke it in *my arms* before the day is out.

LEONORA (*attentively*). Go on. In *your*--


*The Moor. Fiesco.*

FIESCO. Who was it that just went out?

MOOR. Marquis Calcagno.

FIESCO. This handkerchief was left behind on the sofa. My wife has been here.

MOOR. She just went past me, very upset.


FIESCO (*turns away in disgust*). To have to hear all this from a rogue--


like madmen, the girls seemed about to lose their heads over my father's colouring, so taken were they with my dark-of-the-moon. Almighty gold, I thought. It can even bleach a Moor.


*Fiesco. Centurione, Cibo, Asserato burst into the room.*


*Fiesco. The unrest around the palace grows louder.*

FIESCO. What luck! What luck! The straw of the Republic has caught, and the flame has leaped over onto houses and towers. Right on! Right on! Let there be a general conflagration, and the gleeful wind whistle among the ruins.

*Moor in haste. Fiesco.*

MOOR. Pack after pack!


#### Scene 8

*Fiesco. Twelve Artisans.*


FIESCO (*smiling, counting them*). Twelve are an eminent army--


of government would be. Opinion was divided three ways. Genoese, what form would you have chosen?

FIRST CITIZEN. By the people, by the people.


FIRST CITIZEN. And Genoa should do the same and already has its man.

FIESCO. I don't want to know who. Go home now and think about the Lion. (*The Citizens go tumbling out.*) Just what I wanted. People and

Senate against Doria. People and Senate for Fiesco. --Hassan! Hassan! --I must catch this breeze. --Hassan! Hassan! --I must fan this hate, keep this interest alive. --Show yourself, Hassan! Whoreson of Hell! Hassan! Hassan!

## Scene 9

#### *Moor enters. Fiesco.*

MOOR (*wild*). My feet are on fire. What now?

FIESCO. What I command.


(*Shrieking*.) Murder! Murder! Murder! Block the passages! Bar the gates! (*He drags the Moor out by the throat. Servants rush over the set*.)

## Scene 10

*Leonora, Rosa run in, frightened.*

LEONORA. Murder, they cried, murder! It came from here.

ROSA. Some pointless uproar, like every day in Genoa.

LEONORA. They cried murder, and I clearly heard the people saying "Fiesco." Wretched deceivers. They tried to keep me from seeing, but my heart outwitted them. Quick, go after them. Look and see, then come tell me where they're taking him.

ROSA. Calm yourself. Bella has gone.

LEONORA. Bella will receive his dying glance. Happy Bella! Wretched woman that I am, his assassin! If Fiesco had been able to love me, he would never have thrown himself into the world, never have thrown himself onto the daggers of envy. --Bella's coming! Oh, go away! Don't tell me anything, Bella!

# Scene 11

#### *As above. Bella.*

BELLA. The Count is alive and unhurt. I saw him galloping through town. I never saw our Gracious Master more handsome. His black stallion bore him magnificently, its haughty hooves frightened the pressing crowd back away from its princely rider. He caught sight of me as he flew past, smiled graciously, gestured this way, and tossed back three kisses. (*With malice.*) What shall I do with them, Signora?

LEONORA (*enchanted*). You silly chatterbox! Bring them back to him.

ROSA. There, you see? You're blushing again to the eyebrows.

LEONORA. He throws away his heart on strumpets, and I chase after a single glance? --Oh, women! Women!

*(All leave the scene.)*

*The palace of Andrea Doria. Gianettino, Lomellino enter hastily.*


#### Scene 13

#### *Andrea. Gianettino.*


that I come before you as your uncle; it's the Duke you've deserved to hear from, and his Signoria.


*(Gianettino stares silently at the floor.)*

ANDREA. Unhappy Andrea! In your own bosom you have hatched the *worm* that will devour your achievement. I built the Genoese a house that I intended to scorn the passage of time--and I throw the *first torch* into it: this one here. You vandal, you may thank my grey head, which wishes to be laid in the grave by family hands--thank my godless love, that I don't toss the insulted State the head of this insurrectionist from the blood-soaked boards of the scaffold. (*Exit at speed*.)

*Lomellino, breathless, frightened. Gianettino glowers after the Duke, speechless.*


LOMELLINO. I don't yet know--

GIANETTINO. Sit down. Write.

LOMELLINO. What am I to write? (*Sits down*.)

GIANETTINO. The names of our twelve candidates. --Francesco Centurione.

LOMELLINO (*writes*). As thanks for his vote, he gets to lead the funeral procession.

GIANETTINO. Cornelio Calva.

LOMELLINO. Calva.

GIANETTINO. Michele Cibo.

LOMELLINO. That'll cool off the Procuratoria.

GIANETTINO. Tommaso Asserato and three brothers. (*Lomellino hesitates*.)

GIANETTINO (*with emphasis*). And three brothers.

LOMELLINO (*writing*). Go on.


*Antechamber in Fiesco's palace. Fiesco with letters and bills of exchange. Moor.*

FIESCO. Four galleys in port, then.

MOOR. Lying safely before anchor in the Darsena.43

FIESCO. Just when they're wanted. The express letters are from where?

MOOR. Rome, Piacenza, and France.44

FIESCO (*breaks the seals, reads rapidly*). Welcome, welcome to Genoa. (*Very content*.) *Princely* accommodation for the couriers.

MOOR. Hm! (About to go.)

FIESCO. Wait! Wait! Here's plenty of work for you.


#### *Fiesco alone.*

FIESCO*.* My regrets, Calcagno. --Did you think I would have exposed so sensitive an article as my marriage bed, had *my wife's virtue* and *my own worth* not been warranty enough for me? Nevertheless, welcome into the family. You're a good soldier, and that should secure me your arm in destroying Doria. (*Pacing with long strides*.) Now, Doria, with me onto the battlefield! All the machinery for this great exploit is in motion. All instruments tuned for a shuddering concert. All I need do now is rip off the mask and show the Genoese patriots Fiesco. (*Sound of approaching footsteps*.) Company! Who comes now?

## Scene 17

*Enter Verrina, Romano with a picture, Sacco, Bourgognino, Calcagno. All bow.*


BOURGOGNINO. I've well begun to.

FIESCO. Verrina, they tell me this young knight is to become your son-inlaw. I applaud your choice. Though I've spoken with him only once, I would be proud to have him as my own.

VERRINA. This judgment makes me vain about my daughter.

FIESCO (*to the others*). Sacco? Calcagno? --Such rare presences in my halls! Almost enough to make me ashamed of my wish to be useful, if Genoa's noblest ornaments do not call upon it. --And here I welcome a fifth guest, unknown to me, yet commended enough by this worthy circle.


*(Long, expressive pause as all observe the picture.)*


*Fiesco. Verrina. Bourgognino. Sacco. Calcagno.*


VERRINA. Who said that! --To work, Genoese!


VERRINA. When do we meet again?

FIESCO. Tomorrow at noon I'll hear your opinions.


## Scene 19

#### *Fiesco, pacing thoughtfully.*

FIESCO. What a commotion in my breast! ---What a secret flight of thoughts. Like suspect brothers setting out on some black deed, who walk on tiptoe and fearfully turn their burning gaze to the ground- thus do wanton phantoms flit past my inner eye. --Stop! Stop! Let me hold a light up to your face. --A good thought steels a man's heart and shows itself heroically in broad daylight. --Aha! I know you! --That's the livery of the Eternal Liar.50 --Be gone! (*Pause, then more animated.*) *Republican Fiesco? Duke Fiesco?* --Careful. --This is the steep precipice that closes off the borderland of virtue, where Heaven and Hell take separate ways. --Just here heroes have foundered and heroes have sunk, and the world besets their name with curses. --Here, too, heroes have hesitated, heroes have halted and then gone on to become demigods-- (*Gathering speed.*) That they should be *mine*, the hearts of Genoa? That terrible Genoa should let itself be twitched first here, then there by lead

strings in *my* hands? --Oh, the sly sin that conceals every devil behind an angel. --Disastrous ambition! Ancient enticement! In your embrace angels kissed away Heaven, and Death sprang from your labouring loins. (*Shakes himself, shuddering.*) You snared angels with your siren song of eternity. You fish for men with lures of gold, women, and crowns! (*After a thoughtful pause, firmly.*) To capture a diadem is *great*. To toss one aside is *god*-*like.* (Resolutely*.*) Perish, Tyrant! Be free, Genoa, and I (*with devotion*) your *happiest* citizen!

# Act Three

*Frightful wilderness.*

## Scene 1

*Verrina, Bourgognino come through the night.*


BOURGOGNINO. I shall hear it and make it *my own*.

VERRINA. Not for that reason, my Son. Verrina will spare your heart that. Oh, Scipio, a heavy burden weighs upon my breast--a thought as hideous as night that shuns the day--monstrous enough to burst a man's breast. --Do you understand? I intend to *execute* it *alone*, but *bear*  it *alone* I cannot. If I were a proud man, Scipio, I could say that it is a torment to be the *one great man*. --Even the Creator found *greatness* too much and made spirits into his trusted friends. --Hear, Scipio--

BOURGOGNINO. My soul is entirely open to yours.

VERRINA. Hear and make no reply. Not a word, young man. Do you hear? Not one word should you answer. *Fiesco must die*!

BOURGOGNINO (*dismayed*). Die? Fiesco?

VERRINA. Die! --I thank you, God. Now it is said. --Fiesco must die, Son, and by my hand. --Now go. --There are deeds that submit to no human judgment--that recognize only Heaven as their arbiter. --This is such a one. Go. I want neither your praise nor your blame. I know what it will cost me and that is enough. But listen--you could go mad just thinking about it--listen: Did you see him yesterday preening before the mirror of our consternation? --The man whose smile misled all Italy--do you think he'd tolerate another such in Genoa? --Go. Fiesco will bring down the tyrant. That is certain. And Fiesco will become Genoa's most dangerous tyrant. That is more certain still! (*Rapid exit. Bourgognino gazes after him, astonished and speechless, then follows him slowly*.)

#### Scene 2

*A hall in Fiesco's palace. In the middle of the back wall a large glass door opens a prospect over the sea and Genoa. Dawn.*

FIESCO (*at the window*). What to make of this? --The moon is down. --Morning rises fiery from the sea. --Wild fantasies have consumed my sleep--have coiled all my being tightly around a *single* feeling. --I need to stretch myself in the open air. (*He opens the glass door. Sea and city flaming in the dawn light. Paces the room with long strides.*) That I'm the greatest man in all Genoa? Shouldn't smaller souls then gather under the great one? --Or am I offending against virtue? (*Stands still*.) Virtue? --The exalted head knows other temptations than the ordinary one. --Should it be bound by the same virtue as the other? --The armour that constrains a pygmy's puny body--should *it* have to fit a giant's limbs?

#### *(The sun rises over Genoa.)*

This majestic city. (*Rushing toward it with open arms.*) *Mine! --*And then to rise flaming over it like regal day? --Hover over it with monarchic power? --And plunge all this seething desire-- all these unappeasable longings into that bottomless ocean? --Why, yes! Even if the deceiver's wit does not ennoble the deception, nonetheless the prize ennobles the deceiver. It is shameful to empty a purse--cheeky to embezzle a million, but indescribably great to steal a crown. The ignominy *diminishes* as the sin *grows greater*. (*Pause. Then expressively.*) *To obey! --To rule!* --Immense, vertiginous gap. --Throw into it all that man considers most valuable: your battles won, conquerors-- artists, your deathless works--your pleasures, Epicureans--your seas and islands, you explorers. *To obey and to rule! --Being and Nothingness!* One who sets out over the bottomless moat of the last seraph to reach the Unbounded and Eternal will be able to measure this leap, too. (*Exalted gestures.*) To stand on that frighteningly lofty height--and smile down into the racing maelstrom of humanity, where the wheel of Fortune, that blind deceiver, turns perfidiously--to drink first from joy's cup--to pull that armoured giant, *Law*, far below, along on lead strings--to see wounds struck unpunished while its shortarmed anger bangs helplessly on the parapets of majesty--to master the unruly passions of the people, like so many plunging horses, by a light touch on the reins--to lay the vassals' prideful ambition in the dust with *one* breath--one breath--even while the prince's creative staff lifts his princely fever dreams into life. --What a picture! It flings the astonished spirit over its own boundaries! --*One* moment as *prince* and the marrow of all existence is consumed. It is not the *arena* of life--its *substance* is what determines its worth. Pick thunder apart into its separate syllables and you can sing children to sleep with it; forge them into a *single* sudden noise, and that monarchical sound will shake the eternal heavens. --I am resolved! (*Walking heroically up and down*.)

#### Scene 3

*Fiesco. Leonora enters, visibly anxious.*

LEONORA. Forgive me, Count. I'm afraid I'm disturbing your morning.

FIESCO (*steps back, very abashed*). Indeed, my Lady. This is quite a surprise.

LEONORA. Only to lovers does this never happen.


FIESCO. Just two days, Countess, and you can pass judgment on me.


FIESCO. Leonora, grant me one small, childish request.


#### Scene 4

*Moor, panting. Fiesco.*

FIESCO. Why so out of breath?

MOOR. Quick, my Gracious Lord--

FIESCO. Something caught in our net?

MOOR. Read this letter! Am I really here? I think Genoa has grown twelve streets shorter, or my legs that much longer. You're turning white? Oh, yes. It seems it's heads they're drawing cards for and yours is the ace of spades. How does that agree with you?


as a joke if the Countess Lavagna hadn't had a touch of jaundice. Her Grace, said I, is inquiring after only *one* state of health--


#### *All Conspirators.*


#### *(All remain silent.)*

BOURGOGNINO (*leaning over Fiesco's chair; with meaning*). The tyrant*s*.


themselves by storm. (*He leaps up. The others follow. Bourgognino throws his arms around him.*)


Patroclus, too, had to die, And was a better man than thou.53

BOURGOGNINO (*has read the writings*). This is horrible!

CALCAGNO. Twelve at one shot!

VERRINA. Tomorrow in the Signoria!

BOURGOGNINO. Give me those sheets. I'll ride straight through Genoa, holding them *so*, and the cobblestones behind me will explode and the dogs howl bloody murder.

ALL. Revenge! Revenge! Revenge! This very night!

FIESCO. Now you are where I wanted to have you. As soon as evening comes, I'll invite the most eminent malcontents to an entertainment: every name on Gianettino's hit list, and, in addition, the Sauli, Gentili, Vivaldi, and Vesodimari,54 all mortal enemies of the house of Doria,

#### *74 Fiesco's Conspiracy at Genoa*

whom that assassin forgot to live in fear of. They'll embrace my attempt on him with open arms, I do not doubt.


VERRINA. I'll assume responsibility for the harbour*.* (*Exit.*)

BOURGOGNINO. I for the soldiers. (*Exit.*)

CALCAGNO*.* I'll find out the password*.* (*Exit*.)

SACCO. I'll make the rounds of Genoa. (*Exit.*)

### Scene 6

*Fiesco. Then the Moor.*


#### Scene 7

*The Moor slowly picks up the purse, gazing after Fiesco in surprise.*

MOOR. Is that how we stand? *I'll not delay you here in Genoa any longer*. Translated from the Christian into my Heathen, it says: *When I'm Duke, I'll have my good friend hanged on a Genoese gallows*. Fine. He's afraid that I, knowing his little ways, will make his honour hostage to my big mouth, once he's Duke. Careful, my Lord Count. That might be worth considering. And now, old Doria, I dispose over your hide. --You're *done* if I don't warn you. If I go there now and denounce the plot, I'll have rescued nothing less than the life and the duchy of the Duke of Genoa; nothing less than this hat brim-full of gold can be his thanks. (*He is about to go, then stops abruptly*.) Not so fast, friend Hassan. Are you on your

way to doing something stupid? --If the whole massacre didn't happen and something *good* came of it? --Pooh! Pooh! What kind of dirty trick is my greed playing on me! --What makes for more trouble? If I do in Fiesco here? --Or if I deliver Doria there to the knife? --You figure it out, devils of mine. --If Fiesco brings it off, Genoa can rise. Rubbish! That can't be. If this Doria wriggles through, everything stays the same, and Genoa will have peace. --That's even more disgusting! --But what a spectacle, when the heads of the rebels go flying into the hangman's chophouse! (*Crossing to the other side.*) But all that jolly butchery tonight when Their Graces choke to death on the smarts of a Moor! Ugh! We'll let a Christian find his way out of this tangle; the riddle is too thorny for a heathen. --I want to consult an expert. (*Exit.*)

## Scene 8

*Salon of the Countess Imperiali. Julia* en négligé*. Gianettino enters in disarray.*

GIANETTINO. Good evening, Sister.


JULIA. I'm going to lose patience with you.

GIANETTINO. Sister, when did Fiesco last visit you?

JULIA. Odd. As if I made a note of such bagatelles.

GIANETTINO. I really have to know.

JULIA. Fine. He came by yesterday.

GIANETTINO. And seemed *at ease?*

JULIA. As usual.

GIANETTINO. Still the same old *fantast*?

JULIA (*insulted*). Brother!

GIANETTINO (*raising his voice*). Hear me! Still the same old fantast?

JULIA (*stands up, angered*)*.* What do you take me for, Brother?


#### Scene 9

#### *Lomellino enters.*


#### *78 Fiesco's Conspiracy at Genoa*

Extraordinary crimes freeze the blood, and he's nothing. Do you know the tale about the head of the Medusa? The sight turns you to *stone*. And what one can't get done before stone warms up again!

LOMELLINO. Have you said anything to the Lady?

GIANETTINO. Certainly not! One has to be careful with her on the subject of Fiesco. But when she's once tasted the fruit, she'll not make a fuss about the price. Come. I'm expecting troops from Milan this evening and must leave orders at the gates. (*To Julia.*) Well, Sister? Will it take you much longer to bang away your anger?

JULIA. Go. You're an unmannerly guest.

*(Gianettino, leaving, bumps into Fiesco.)*

## Scene 10

*Fiesco enters.*

GIANETTINO (*starting back*). Ha!


lovely Countess. --Your Laura knows how to deceive our eyes, but not our hearts. --Let me be your chambermaid. (*She sits down; he adjusts her garment*.)


*As above. A German from the bodyguard.*

GIANETTINO (*testy*). Yes?


FIESCO (*mischievous*). Oh, you'll die laughing, Countess. (*He leads her off*.)

*(Curtain.)*

## Act Four

*It is night. Courtyard of Fiesco's palace. The lanterns are being lit, weapons are being brought in. One wing of the palace is illuminated.*

## Scene 1

*Bourgognino leads in Soldiers.*

BOUGOGNINO. Halt! --Four sentries to the main courtyard gate. Two to each entrance to the palace. (*Guards take their posts.*) Anyone who wishes to enter will be admitted. No one may leave again. Any use of force will be struck down. (*Takes the rest of the troops into the palace. Sentries walk up and down. Pause.*)

#### Scene 2


SENTRIES (*there*). Stand back.

CENTURIONE (*stops short, then crosses toward the left entrance*).

SENTRIES (*on left*). Stand back.


SENTRY. Can't say.

CENTURIONE (*wraps his cloak around himself, very uneasy*). Strange! SENTRIES AT COURTYARD GATE (*call out*). Who goes there?

## Scene 3

#### *As above. Cibo enters.*

CIBO (*entering*). Friend of Lavagna.

CENTURIONE. Cibo, where do we find ourselves?

CIBO. What?

CENTURIONE. Look around, Cibo.

CIBO. Where? What?

CENTURIONE. All the entrances guarded.

CIBO. There are weapons lying here.

CENTURIONE. No one will explain.

CIBO. That's curious.

CENTURIONE. What's the hour?

CIBO. After eight.

CENTURIONE. Foo! It's bitter cold.

CIBO. Eight is the appointed hour.

CENTURIONE (*shaking his head*). There's something wrong here.

CIBO. Fiesco's planning some joke.

CENTURIONE. Tomorrow we elect a Doge. --Cibo, something's wrong here.

CIBO. Shh! Shh! Shh!

CENTURIONE. The right wing is full of lights.

CIBO. Don't you hear something? Don't you hear something?

CENTURIONE. A low murmuring in there and now and then--

CIBO. A muffled rattling, as if of armour rubbing together--

CENTURIONE. Horrible! Horrible!

CIBO. A carriage! It's stopping at the gate!

SENTRIES AT COURTYARD GATE (*call out*). Who goes there?

### Scene 4

*As above. The four Asserati.*

ASSERATO (*entering*). Friend of Fiesco.

CIBO. It's the four Asserati.

CENTURIONE. Good evening, countryman.

ASSERATO. We're going to the play.

CIBO. Good luck to you.

ASSERATO. Aren't you also going to the play?

CENTURIONE. Please go first. We want to catch a breath of fresh air.

ASSERATO. It starts soon. Come. (*They go forward.*)

SENTRY. Stand back!

ASSERATO. What's intended here?

CENTURIONE (*laughs*). Try tending toward the palace.

ASSERATO. There's some misunderstanding.

CIBO. Manifestly. (*Music in the right wing.*)

ASSERATO. Do you hear the concert? The comedy seems to be about to begin.

CENTURIONE. It seems to *me* it's already begun, and we're playing the fools in it.

CIBO. I'm not all that wild about it anymore. I'm leaving.

ASSERATO. Weapons, yet!

CIBO. Pooh! Stage props.

CENTURIONE. Are we supposed to stand here like fools on the banks of Acheron?56 Come! Off to the coffee house! (*All six hurry toward the gate.*)

SENTRIES (*cry loudly*). Stand back!

CENTURIONE. Death and destruction! We're prisoners!

CIBO. My sword says: Not for long.

ASSERATO. Put up! Put up! The Count is a man of honour.

CIBO. Sold out! Betrayed! That play was bait, and the trap has slammed shut behind the mouse.

ASSERATO. God forbid! I dread to know what will come of this.

## Scene 5


CIBO. His intimates! Now we'll get some clarity.

SACCO (*in conversation with Verrina*). As I told you, Lescaro57 has the watch at the St. Thomas Gate. Doria's best officer and blindly loyal to him.

VERRINA. That's good.

CIBO (*to Verrina*). You come just in time to help us all out of a dream.

VERRINA. How so? How so?

CENTURIONE. We've been invited to a play.

VERRINA. Then we're going the same way.

CENTURIONE (*impatient*). The way of all flesh. *That* one I'm acquainted with. You surely see that the entrances are guarded? Why guard the entrances?

CIBO. Why the weapons?

CENTURIONE. We're standing around as if under the gallows.

VERRINA. The Count himself is coming.

CENTURIONE. Let him be quick about it. My patience is running out. (*All Noblemen walk up and down in the background.*)

BOURGOGNINO (*from the palace*). What news from the harbour, Verrina?

VERRINA. Everybody safely on board.

BOURGOGNINO. The palace is also stuffed full of soldiers.

VERRINA. It's nearly nine o'clock.

BOURGOGNINO. The Count is slow.


BOURGOGNINO. But *when* is Fiesco to die?

VERRINA. When Genoa is free, Fiesco dies.

SENTRIES. Who goes there?

### Scene 6

*As above. Fiesco.*

FIESCO (*entering*). A friend. (*All bow. The Sentries present arms.*) Welcome, my worthy guests. You will have complained of your host's tardiness. I apologize. (*Softly to Verrina.*) All done?

VERRINA (*to his ear*). Perfectly.

FIESCO (*softly to Bourgognino*). And?

BOURGOGNINO. Everything in order.

FIESCO (*to Sacco*). And?

SACCO. All's well.

#### FIESCO. And Calcagno?

#### BOURGOGNINO. Not back yet.

FIESCO (*aloud to the Watch at the gate*). Gates closed. (*He takes off his hat and approaches the gathered Company with easy presence*.) My Lords! I took the liberty of inviting you to a play. Not, however, for your entertainment, but to give you a role in it. My friends, we have endured Gianettino Doria's defiance and Andrea's presumptuousness long enough. If we want to save Genoa, friends, we have no time to lose. To what end, think you, the twenty galleys that occupy our country's harbour? To what end such alliances as these Dorias have concluded? To what end the foreign arms they have brought into the heart of Genoa? --Grumbling and cursing are now no longer enough. To save *all* we must dare *all*. A desperate evil requires a bold remedy. Can there be anyone present in this company so phlegmatic as to acknowledge a master who is no more than his equal? --(*Murmuring*.)-- There is not one among us whose ancestors did not stand around Genoa's cradle. What, then, by all that is sacred, what excellence do those two citizens enjoy that they should impertinently take flight over our heads? --(*More agitated grumbling*.)-- Each of you is solemnly called upon to defend Genoa's cause against its oppressors. --Not one among you can forfeit a hair's breadth of *his* rights without thereby betraying the soul of the entire State--

#### *(Agitation among his hearers interrupts him. Then he continues.)*

You feel-- Everything has been gained now. I have already opened the way to glory before you. Will you follow? I am ready to lead you. These preparations--that you have but fleetingly regarded and with horror--these preparations must inspire a renewed spirit of heroism in you. Those shudders of alarm must take on warmth and become a glorious eagerness to make common cause with these patriots and with me, and to bring these tyrants down resoundingly. Success will favour our daring, for my preparations are good. Our undertaking is just, for Genoa is suffering. The intention makes us immortal, for it is dangerous and tremendous.

CENTURIONE (*in a stormy burst of feeling*). Enough! Genoa will be free! With this battle cry, against the gates of Hell.


BOURGOGNINO. And today yet on Doria's throat, God willing.

CENTURIONE. Two swords are still lying there.

CIBO. What? What?

CENTURIONE. Two did not pick up a sword.

ASSERATO. My brothers cannot bear the sight of blood. Spare them.


WATCH AT THE COURTYARD GATE. Who goes there? (*Knocking.*)

CALCAGNO (*calls in fright*)*.* Open up! A friend! For God's sake, open up.

BOURGOGNINO. It's Calcagno. What's this "for God's sake"?

FIESCO. Open for him, soldiers.

*As above. Calcagno enters, breathless, frightened.*


#### SENTRIES. Who's there?


#### Scene 8

*Fiesco, as if coming from the palace. Three Germans, who bring in the Moor, bound.*

FIESCO. Who called me into the courtyard?

GERMAN. Bring us to the Count.

FIESCO. The Count is here. Who asks for me?


*Fiesco, Conspirators. The Moor defiantly in their midst.* 


BOURGOGNINO. Explain, would you? We're rooted to the spot.


*A Servant enters. As above, without the Moor.*

SERVANT. The Countess Imperiali has asked for Your Honour three times.

FIESCO. I say! The play is going to have to start! Tell her I will be there immediately. --Stay! --You will ask my wife to come into the concert hall and to wait for me there behind the tapestries. (*Exit Servant*.) I've written out all your roles, how each one is to accomplish his, so there's nothing more to say. --Verrina will go ahead of us to the harbour. When

he has captured the ships, he'll *give the signal for breaking out with cannon.* --I must go. I'm called away by a matter of importance. You will hear a bell and all come into my concert hall together. --Meanwhile, go in--and enjoy my Cyprian wine.

*(They disperse.)*

## Scene 11

*Concert hall. Leonora. Arabella. Rosa. All anxious.*


#### *Julia, Fiesco, in conversation.*


#### *96 Fiesco's Conspiracy at Genoa*

the end is only going to be *besieged* by your oaths; which (I confess it with shame) so much wants to be *conquered*, so often receives the enemy traitorously at the first inattentiveness of virtue? That all our womanly arts do battle solely for this defenceless prize, just as on the *chessboard* all the knights cover the defenceless king? If you take him by surprise- checkmate! And you can safely toss the whole board over. (*After a pause, earnestly.*) You now have the picture of our resplendent poverty. --Be magnanimous.


*The Conspirators, who enter together. Ladies from the opposite side. Fiesco. Leonora and Julia.*

LEONORA. My husband, that was far too severe.


was unexpected-- And, you see (*more biting as he continues*), *that's* why I found it necessary to give the importuning eyes of your household something to amuse them, *that's* why I decked myself out (*pointing at her*) in this Harlequin's passion, *that's* why (*indicating Leonora*) I abandoned this jewel. And, happily, my quarry ran straight into my spread nets. --I thank you for your kindness, Signora, and return my costume jewellery. (*He returns her silhouette to her with a bow*.)


## Scene 14

*Leonora. Fiesco.*


LEONORA. Greatness, Fiesco? --That your genius should be so ill-disposed toward my heart! --Let us say I trust your luck, that is, you prevail. --So much the worse for me, the most pitiful of my sex! Unhappy if it miscarries, unhappier still if it succeeds! There is no choice here, beloved. When he fails of the dukedom, Fiesco is lost. My husband is lost, when I embrace the Duke.

FIESCO. I don't understand.


CONSPIRATORS. The time has come!


*(Curtain.)*

# Act Five

*After midnight. Broad street in Genoa. Lamps burn here and there at a few houses, then go out one by one. In the background, the St. Thomas Gate, still closed. In the distance, the sea. A few figures cross the square, carrying closed lanterns; then the Watch and a Patrol. Everything is quiet. Only the sea laps somewhat noisily.*

#### Scene 1

*Fiesco enters, armed, and stops before the palace of Andrea Doria; then Andrea.*


*(He rushes into the farthest lane. Drums sound on all sides. Sharp skirmish at the St. Thomas Gate. The gate is sprung and opens the prospect onto the harbour, where ships lie at anchor, lit by torches.)*

## Scene 2

*Gianettino Doria, wrapped in a scarlet cloak. Lomellino. Preceded by Servants carrying torches. All in haste.*

GIANETTINO (*comes to a halt*). Who ordered the alarm sounded?

LOMELLINO. A cannon boomed on the galleys.

GIANETTINO. The slaves will be breaking their chains. (*Shots at the St. Thomas Gate*.)

LOMELLINO. Firing there.

GIANETTINO. The gate open. The guard in uproar. (*To the Servants.*) Quick, rascals. Light the way to the harbour. (*They hurry toward the gate*.)

*As above. Bourgognino with Conspirators coming from the St. Thomas Gate.*

BOURGOGNINO. Sebastiano Lescaro is a gallant soldier.

CENTURIONE. Defended himself like a bear until he fell.

GIANETTINO (*steps back, aghast*). What was that? --Halt!

BOURGOGNINO. Who goes there with the torch?

LOMELLINO. Enemies, Prince. Slip away here to the left.

BOURGOGNINO (*challenges heatedly*). Who goes there with the torch?

CENTURIONE. Stop! The password!

GIANETTINO (*draws defiantly*). Submission and Doria.


BOURGOGNINO (*pulls the sword from the corpse*). Genoa free and my Berta-- Your sword, Centurione, and bring this bloody one to my bride. Her prison has been sprung. I will come after and give her the bridegroom's kiss. (*They rush away to different sides.*)

## Scene 4

#### *Andrea Doria. German Soldiers.*


*Leonora in men's clothing. Arabella following her. Both creep out anxiously.*

ARABELLA. Come, my Lady. Oh, do come--


embrace a Roman woman. (*She dons the hat and throws the mantle around her.*) I am Portia.


*(Sacco enters with Conspirators.)*

SACCO (*challenges*). Who goes there? Doria or Fiesco?

LEONORA (*exalted*). Fiesco and Freedom! (*She throws herself into a lane. A throng surges over the scene. Bella is crowded back.*)

## Scene 6

*Sacco with a Pack of fighting men. Calcagno meets him with another Pack.*

CALCAGNO. Andrea Doria has fled.

SACCO. That won't recommend you to Fiesco.

CALCAGNO. Like bears, those Germans. They planted themselves in front of the old man like a blank wall. I never even caught sight of him. Nine of ours are down. I took a glancing blow on the left earlobe. If they'll do *that* for *foreign* tyrants, what the devil won't they do to protect *their own princes*?

SACCO. We've collected a huge following and taken all the gates.

CALCAGNO. I hear there's heavy fighting around the Citadel.


#### Scene 7

*The Moor. A band of Thieves with fuses.*

MOOR. So that you know, rascals. *I'm* the one who thickened this soup. --And then they won't give me a spoon. Well and good. A hunt suits me just fine. We'll give them a round of fire and plunder. Over there they're throwing punches for a dukedom; we're going to stoke the churches so that the freezing apostles can warm up again. (*They break into the adjacent houses.*)

#### Scene 8

*Bourgognino. Berta disguised.*


BERTA. Fifteen.


BERTA. I should think so.

BOURGOGNINO (*quickly*). And do you know his divine daughter?

BERTA. Berta is her name.


BOURGOGNINO (*stands still, surprised*). Oh, my sword! I know that voice--

BERTA (*falls into his arms*). Oh, my heart! You know it very well.

BOURGOGNINO (*cries*). Berta! (*Storm is sounded beyond the walls. A throng. They lose themselves in an embrace*.)

### Scene 9

*Fiesco enters in hot temper. Cibo. Followers.*

FIESCO. Who set these fires?

CIBO. The Citadel is taken.

FIESCO. Who set these fires?

CIBO (*signals his followers*). Patrols after the offender! (*A few go off.*)

FIESCO (*angrily*). Do they want to make me out to be an arsonist? Buckets and spray right away! (*Followers go off.*) And Gianettino has been taken?

CIBO. That's what they say.


#### Scene 10

*Fiesco. Sacco. The Moor. Soldiers.*


FIESCO. None.

MOOR (*confidentially*). Then try sending me to the galleys.

FIESCO (*signals the others*). To the gallows.

MOOR (*resisting*). I'll turn Christian.

FIESCO. The Church declines your heathen pox.

MOOR (*wheedling*). Then at least send me soaked into Eternity.

FIESCO. Sober.

MOOR. But don't hang me on any Christian church.

FIESCO. A knight keeps his word. I promised you your own gallows.

SACCO (*growls*). No more dawdling, you heathen. We have other things to do.

MOOR. But--suppose the cord snaps?

FIESCO (*to Sacco*). We'll double it.

MOOR (*resigned*). So be it. --And the Devil can equip himself for a special case. (*Off, with Soldiers, who hang him in the distance.*)

## Scene 11

*Fiesco. Leonora enters at the back in Gianettino's scarlet cloak.*

FIESCO (*becomes aware of her, moves forward, moves back, and murmurs grimly*). Don't I know that crest and cloak? (*Hurries closer, excited.*) I know that crest and cloak! (*Furious. Falls upon her and strikes her down.*) If you have three lives, stand up *again* and walk. (*Leonora falls with a broken sound. Victory march. Drums, horns, oboes.*)

#### Scene 12

*Fiesco. Calcagno. Sacco. Centurione. Cibo. Soldiers appear with music and banners.*


*(Conspirators stopped dead, gathered in shuddering groups.)*

FIESCO (*weakly propped up, muffled voice*). Have I murdered my wife, Genoese? --I beg you, don't cast such ghastly sidelong glances at what

Nature's playing here. God be praised! There are fates no *man* need fear, because he is *but human*. One denied the beatitude of the gods will know no devil's torment. --And this aberration would be yet worse. (*With terrible calm.*) Thank God, Genoese, this cannot be*.*

## Scene 13

#### *As above. Arabella enters, wailing.*


ARABELLA. From running after--

FIESCO (*more violent*). Silence! After what?

ARABELLA. In among the throng--

FIESCO (*furious*). And your tongue turn into a crocodile-- Her dress?

ARABELLA. A scarlet cloak--

FIESCO (*lunging at her*). Into the ninth circle of Hell65 with you! The cloak--?

ARABELLA. Was lying on the ground here--

A FEW CONSPIRATORS (*murmur*). Gianettino was murdered here--

FIESCO (*staggers back, dull and exhausted; to Arabella*). Your Lady has been found. (*Arabella goes off, still fearful. Fiesco sweeps the crowd with a searching glance, then in a soft, hovering voice that rises gradually to frenzy.*) True it is. --Too true. --And I am the butt of this unbounded knavery. (*Striking out like a cornered animal.*) Back off, all you human faces. --Oh, (*insolently baring his teeth at the heavens*) if only I had *His* universe between my teeth. --I feel like clawing all of Nature into a snarling beast, making it look like my pain. (*To those who stand around him shuddering.*) Lord! --How it stands there, this wretched breed, and crosses itself and congratulates itself that it is not like me. --Not like me! (*A hollow, trembling diminuendo.*) I alone have-- (*More rapid and wild.*) Me? Why me? Why not these, too, along with me? Why should I not be able to dull my pain on the pain of a fellow creature?

CALCAGNO (*fearful*). My esteemed Duke--

FIESCO (*bears down on him with cruel pleasure*). Oh, welcome! Here, thank God, is one whom this thunderbolt has also flattened! (*Embraces Calcagno furiously.*) Thunderstruck like me, my brother! Congratulations on your damnation! She is dead! *You*, too, loved her! (*He forces him down on the corpse and presses his head against it.*) Despair! She's dead! (*Staring to the side.*) Oh, that I stood at the gates of damnation, that my eye could look down shuddering on the manifold torture devices of purposeful Hell, my ear suck in the whimpering of crushed and contrite sinners! --If I could see it, my torment, who knows, would I then perhaps be able to bear it? (*Shuddering as he approaches the corpse.*) *My wife lies here, murdered.* --No. That says too little. (*With greater emphasis.*) *I, wretch, have murdered my wife. --*Pooh! That won't raise the pulse of Hell. --First it contrives to whirl me onto the highest, slipperiest, giddiest rooftop of joy, cajoles me onto the very doorstep of Heaven--and *then* plunges, then--oh, if only my breath could breathe the plague in among souls--then, then, I murder my wife. --No. Its malice is finer *yet*. --Then (*contemptuous*) two eyes fail to see, and (*with terrible emphasis*) *I*--*murder--my wife!* (*A biting laugh*.) That is the masterpiece.

*(All the Conspirators clutch their weapons, moved. Some wipe away tears. Pause.)*

FIESCO (*exhausted, more quietly, as he scans the circle*). Is anyone sobbing? --Yes, by God, *those who throttled a prince weep*. (*Melting into quiet sorrow*.) Speak! Are you weeping over death's high treason here or are you weeping over my mind's plunge headlong into unmanliness? (*Before the dead woman, grave and affecting.*) Where rock-hard murderers melt into warm tears, Fiesco's despair cursed and swore. (*Sinks down upon her, weeping.*) Leonora, forgiveness. --Rage won't bring repentance down from Heaven. (*Softly, sorrowfully.*) Years in advance, Leonora, I savoured

the festive moment when I would bring the Genoese their Duchess. --I saw your cheeks redden with charming modesty; your bosom rise, princely and lovely, under the cloth of silver; heard your soft voice fail becomingly for joy. (*More vivid.*) Ha! With what intoxication the proud cheering swelled in my ears; how the triumph of my love was reflected in diminishing envy-- Leonora-- The moment has come. --Your Fiesco is Genoa's Duke. --And Genoa's most threadbare beggar would not give up his contempt in return for my torment and my scarlet. (*More touching*.) A wife shares one's sorrow. --*Who* will share my glory? (*He weeps harder and hides his face on the corpse. Compassion on all faces.*)


## Scene 14

#### *Andrea Doria. Lomellino.*


*Verrina coming from the harbour. Berta and Bourgognino.*



BERTA. For heaven's sake! What's my father contemplating?

BOURGOGNINO. Did you understand your father?

BERTA. To flee, oh, God. Flee in the wedding night!

BOURGOGNINO. That's what he said. --And we obey.

*(They go toward the harbour.)*

## Scene 16

*Verrina. Fiesco in ducal regalia. They run into one another.*

FIESCO. Verrina! Excellent. I was just looking for you.

VERRINA. That was also my errand.

FIESCO. Does Verrina notice no change in his friend?

VERRINA (*reserved*)*.* I wish none.

FIESCO. But do you find none?

VERRINA (*without looking at him*). I hope not. No.

FIESCO. I ask if you find none?

VERRINA (*after a fleeting glance*). I find none.


FIESCO (*startled*). God forbid. For a duchy *that* would be too Jewish a price.

VERRINA (*murmurs darkly*). Has freedom fallen so out of fashion that one tosses republics after just anyone?

FIESCO (*compresses his lips*). Say that to no one but Fiesco.


let virtue lend its hand to your knavery, when you let Genoa's patriots practice unchastity with Genoa. --Fiesco, if *I too* had been so benighted as *not* to notice this swindle, Fiesco! By all fear of Eternity, I would plait a rope of my own entrails and strangle myself, so that my escaping soul would spit gouty scum at you. Princely roguery surely buckles the gold balance that weighs human sin, but you have called out Heaven, and the Last Judgment will preside over your trial. (*Fiesco, astonished and speechless, measures him wide-eyed.*)


FIESCO. Be still.

VERRINA (*more pressing*). Fiesco-- Let all the crowns of the planet be laid down here as prize, all its tortures be laid down there as bugbear, I'm to kneel before a mortal man--I shall *not* kneel--Fiesco. (*He kneels.*) Never have I knelt before. --Throw this Purple aside.

FIESCO. Stand up, and don't annoy me anymore.


#### Scene 17

*Calcagno. Sacco. Cibo. Centurione. Conspirators. Folk. All hurried and anxious.*


*(All stand in frozen groups.)*

*(Curtain.)*

# Notes to the Text


#### *126 Fiesco's Conspiracy at Genoa*

Schiller's play abounds with animal imagery. Fiesco's address to the artisans, an Aesopian fable in which he easily convinces them of the pitfalls of democracy and the necessity of choosing a leader, is clearly inspired by Shakespeare's use of the body politic metaphor, for example in *Coriolanus* (Act I, Scene 1), where Menenius calms the people with his Fable of the Belly.


# Select Bibliography

#### Primary sources


#### Secondary sources


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# **Fiesco's Conspiracy at Genoa**

# Friedrich Schiller

# Translated by Flora Kimmich Introduction by John Guthrie

Within two years of the success of his fi rst play *Die Räuber* on the German stage in 1781, Schiller wrote a drama based on a rebellion in sixteenth century Italy, its ti tle: *The Conspiracy of Fiesco at Genoa. A Republican Tragedy*. At the head of the conspiracy stood Gian Luigi de' Fieschi (1524-1547), Schiller's Count Fiesco, a clever, courageous and charismati c fi gure, an epicurean and unhesitant egoist, politi cally ambiti ous, but unsure of his aims and principles. He is one of Schiller's mysterious, protean characters who secures both our admirati on and disgust. With Fiesco as tragic hero Schiller examines the complex entanglement of morality and politi cs in his own ti mes that was to preoccupy him throughout his career.

The play was a moderate success when performed in Mannheim in 1784; it was more popular in Berlin where, during Schiller's lifeti me, it was performed many ti mes in a version by Carl Plümicke, which however radically altered the play's meaning. There have been some noteworthy producti ons on the German stage and television, even if it has remained somewhat in the shadow of Schiller's other works. In the English-speaking world it is all but unknown and very seldom performed. This translati on aims to remedy that oversight.

John Guthrie teaches modern German literature and language and is a Fellow of Murray Edwards College, Cambridge. He has writt en books on Lenz and Büchner, Droste-Hülshoff 's poetry and Schiller's dramas, including *Schiller the Dramati st. A Study of Gesture in the Plays* (2009).

Flora Kimmich translates from French and German. Her translati on of Gustav Droysen's classic *History of Alexander the Great* – the fi rst into English – was published in 2012 by the American Philosophical Society. She is also the translator of *On History* by Jules Michelet, published by OBP.

*Cover image*: Bernhard Neher (der Jüngere), 'Die Verschwörung des Fiesco zu Genua' (fresco), photograph by Rolf-Werner Nehrdich, courtesy of the Zentralinsti tut für Kunstgeschichte, Munich. *Cover design*: Heidi Coburn

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