PUCCINI
LA RONDINE
“Doretta’s Dream”, a song
wherein the dreamer, a young, innocent girl, rejects the riches offered to her
by a powerful king in favor of true
love:
PRUNIER:
Some may solve the riddle of Doretta’s dream, not I.
Try as I will to explain, it is still unclear.
Lo, behold! The king while
passing whispered with a sigh,
“Make me your lover!
Gold I can offer,
Jewels and splendor!
“Ah, lovely creature! So
fair, so tender!
No cause have you to fear.
Cry surrender
And your pangs of doubt will disappear.”
“No!” she answered, unpersuaded.
“True love cannot be traded,
And neither gold nor silver
Feed the starving heart.”
MAGDA: (spoken)
Why do you break off?
PRUNIER:
I’ve not decided on an ending.
Supply it yourself, and you can claim the
glory.
MAGDA:
The challenge is tempting.
Perhaps I can conclude Doretta’s story.
(The song continues.)
Have you heard what next occurred in our Doretta’s dream?
Who could forget how they met and they danced all night,
Or the wonder and delight of kisses long and sweet,
Bursting with fire,
Born of desire,
Enkindled by passion?
Love in flower! Fire of
rapture!
What music can recapture
The tenderness conveyed
When lips of lovers meet?
OTHERS: (Soken
softly)
(How delicious! How delicious!
So exquisite! So exquisite!)
MAGDA:
Ah! I’ve been dreaming all my
life!
Who cares for pomp and power
When roses are in flower
And the skies are fair?
Of love, dream on!
For I may find it there.
The song reignites smoldering
embers. Magda recalls a brief episode from a good many years ago
that has often come back to haunt her:
a memorable night when, in a mood of reckless adventure, she escaped from the eagle eye of her stern, straight-laced old Auntie, and took off by herself to a wildly romantic
place in Paris called Bullier:
MAGDA:
As always . . . A special dream
I never shall forget.
From the eagle eye of my old auntie!
Like only yesterday!
Perhaps it could happen again tomorrow.
Perhaps . . .
Oh, the sweet, happy hours
Of looking and belonging
In the crowded confusion
Of a night at Bullier!
How I came? There I was!
How I left? Ask me not!
Unseen, someone sang to a rhythm subdued but insistent,
And the voice in the dark of the night
Seemed to say to me:
“Your season of love is in flower.
Eyes open for danger, oh children beware!
For honeysweet smiles and caresses
You’ll pay later on with your tears of
despair.”
Seated after rounds of dancing,
I was happy though exhausted.
So dry and thirsty,
Yet my soul with delight was brimming over.
Doors opened, life grew larger
As my small world expanded . . .
Returning to Bullier
to relive the past, the dream indeed
seems to come true. Magda meets a young
man unspoiled by the glamorous but corrupt city:
RUGGERO:
Rather shy, unassuming,
You remind me of the girls back in Monteban,
As they dance to the throb
And the caress of our old-fashioned music,
So full of life and the joy of youth and
beauty.
MAGDA: (a bit ironic)
A flattering portrayal.
RUGGERO:
You laugh, but let me say it:
In the village where I’m from
The girls are lovely,
In harmony with nature.
No jewelry is needed.
Like yourself, they require
Only a plain and simple flower ---
Like your own.
MAGDA:
If I only could dance
The way they dance back in Monteban!
RUGGERO:
MAGDA:
For learning?
You may find me an ungifted pupil.
RUGGERO:
No, no! I will show you.
You’ll put them in the shadow.
MAGDA:
What a strange sensation ---
Living the past all over!
RUGGERO:
You’re saying? . . .
MAGDA:
I am overjoyed!
Lead on and I shall follow.
BOTH:
Giving in to the rapture of the rhythm,
Lost in dreams, I close my
eyes.
Present and past misfortunes
Melt into sunlit skies.
Sorrows vanish
Swift as the swallow flies.
Magda says goodby to
the rich banker to whom she has sold herself:
MAGDA:
And have you never thirsted for the fountain of love
As you stumbled through a barren desert?
Never found food and shelter
After long privation?
Can I refuse the gift that heaven offers?
Face up to it!
Our tawdry game is over.
Understand and forgive me.
You are hurt and I am sorry,
But love allows no stepping backward.
I shall follow my star!
Ruggero, the naive young man,
paints a glowing picture of their future life together:
Not far away, we’ll settle in the country,
A house and barn surrounded by
a meadow,
Sheltered by hills that catch the glow of morning,
Fading only when dusk has spread its shadow.
Our simple house that may seem like any other
Tender love will transform into a palace.
There hallowed by the spirit of my mother,
We’ll live untouched by the curse of greed
or malice.
Then some day, just a little
later maybe,
I see us both in thrall and overpowered,
Turned captive by the cooings of a baby.
As it sleeps, angels smiling
down from heaven
Will provide loving guidance and protection,
With a shower of blessings on the tiny dreamer.
Make it so! Make it so!
Magda knows, to her own sorrow, that this idyllic life can never be:
MAGDA:
I can only be your lover,
Your mistress, not the wife
So unworthy of your mother.
RUGGERO:
Those words are worse than
torture,
Worse than fire and damnation.
Can I live without the love
That has revealed a world beyond
My cramped horizon?
Am I now to see that world
Reduced to rubble?
MAGDA:
What surpasses the punishment
Of causing you to pay for my mistakes?
I am guilty;
I knew what I was doing.
Your mother’s house I shall never, never
enter.
RUGGERO:
No! Reconsider. No,
no!
Why bring further sorrow?
MAGDA:
Your mother I’ll not dishonor.
I know that I must leave you
Because I love you.
Your life I’ll not destroy.
RUGGERO:
No! We can still be happy.
We can start all over. No!
Love, how can you abandon what has barely started?
And why should life continue when we’re torn apart?
Recall the glow of rapture
That first time we found each other.
Love, do not break my heart.
MAGDA:
Grieve not in desperation
Even though we’ve parted.
Your life is far from over.
Love, remember me.
Recall the glow of rapture,
The good times we had together.
My heart I leave here with you.
RUGGERO:
Do not leave me.
Love can pull us through it.
MAGDA:
You seek your own destruction.
RUGGERO:
No! Stay with me!
Love will make us stronger.
MAGDA:
You invite your own destruction.
Love, you alone know me truly, heart and soul,
For they are your alone,
Yours now and forever.
Now let me for a moment
Be a mother soothing her beloved son.
You will in time recover;
Peace will emerge from sorrow.
Go back home to a calmer, brighter future.
No rest for the swallow
Whose flight continues,
RUGGERO:
MAGDA:
Headed homeward,
Where no golden dreams dare follow.
With a last tender, lingering look at Ruggero, who has collapsed in grief, she slowly departs.