About the work
Melodramma semiserio in three acts by Gaetano Donizetti to a libretto by Gaetano Rossi, first performed on 19 May 1842 at the Kärntnertortheater in Vienna. The source was the melodrama "La grâce de Dieu" by Adolphe d'Ennery and Gustave Lemoine; Donizetti added the now-famous entrance aria "O luce di quest'anima" only for the Paris premiere in November 1842.
Plot
The Savoyard peasant girl Linda flees to Paris to escape an overbearing landlord and falls in love with the seemingly poor painter Carlo, who is in fact a viscount. When she learns of his marriage arranged with another woman, she loses her mind. Only when Carlo returns and proves his love does Linda's sanity return.
Cultural significance
The opera was an immediate international success, spreading across three continents within a few years. After declining in the late nineteenth century, it was brought back to the stage by Arturo Toscanini at La Scala in 1902 and has been performed regularly again since the 1950s.