VERDI

THE MARAUDERS

(I Masnadieri)

ACT ONE

The scene is a tavern. Carlo, our hero, is seated alone, incongruously poring over a book and brooding about the lamentable contrast between the glorious heroes of antiquity and the paltry leaders of today.

Oh, for past days of glory! Heroes and giants.

How are the mighty fallen!

Now only pimps and parasites . . .

A troubled young man -- stirred by the revolutionary forces of the time, rebellious, restless, born into high privilege, now alienated from his rich and powerful family. In fact, he has been kicked out of the house -- out of the castle, that is to say -- by his angry, bewildered and disappointed father, Count Moor, who had such high hopes for him. Since then, he has drifted into bad company -- a gang of dissolute fellows who, unlike himself, seem interested only in living it up and having fun, to hell with the consequences.

Lift the glass and flash the knife;

Hail the manly bandit life!

For Carlo, this life has worn thin. Ready and eager to return home, to straighten things out with his father, above all to get married to Amalia, the girl whom perforce he had to leave behind, he has already sent an impassioned letter to his father expressing remorse for his past behavior, pleading for forgiveness and vowing to make a fresh start. The answer, on which every-thing depends, should be arriving any day . . .

CARLO: (after reading the letter)

Ruthless tiger of the jungle!

Can his heart be made of granite?

Thus he answers my plea for mercy.

Can a father be so uncaring? . . .

Enraged and embittered, Carlo is pushed over the edge by his father’s in-transigence. Defiant, ready to take it out on the entire loathsome human race, he agrees to lead the gang as they embark more ambitiously on a career of crime.

CARLO:

On to vengeance! In defiance,

Tear asunder the bonds of nature.

Drawn to carnage, to spoils of plunder,

Leave behind a trail of blood . . .

But you may have noted that the response to his plea for pardon came not directly from his father but from his brother -- his younger brother Francesco, who has everything to gain by widening the rift between Carlo and his father. Among the highborn, a younger son’s lot is not enviable, and in Francesco the wounds have long festered. Shoved into the background, since childhood he has looked on resentfully while his preferred older brother enjoyed all the advantages, everything that Francesco has wanted for himself, including the girl, who has made her own preference abundantly clear.

But with Carlo out of the picture, a new day would surely dawn. Francesco would be in line for inheriting both wealth and title, and there is reason to hope that this could happen sooner rather than later. Obsessed, consumed by grief and guilt for the rupture with his elder son, the old Count is frail, feeble, probably near the end of his painful journey. But why sit back and let nature take its leisurely course? Why not give a helping hand? A sudden shock, a devastating blow might do the trick. He summons faithful servants . . .

Inform him that Carlo was slain on the field,

Where his body was left for the vultures and maggots.

The old Count’s grief over Carlo is shared by Amalia, his fiancée. An orphaned cousin, she has grown up in the family and in recent years has willingly assumed the role of nurse and caretaker to the ailing old man whom she has come to look upon as a father, and who now sits dozing in an armchair, quietly, but not peacefully.

COUNT:

Tears of mourning console and comfort.

What son of mine is left to weep? . . .

Reunited with my Carlo,

I would share eternal sleep . . .

ACT TWO

Francesco’s plan has succeeded. His servant Arminio has delivered the fabricated news that Carlo was slain on the battlefield. The apparently tragic, senseless slaughter of his beloved son, for which the old Count blames himself entirely, has the intended effect. The Count succumbs to the sudden blow.

The present scene is the sepulcher bearing his newly carved name. It is here that Amalia seeks refuge from the boisterous celebration taking place inside the castle, and here that she receives startling and overwhelmingly joyful news from a penitent though terrified servant.

AMALIA:

Carlo living! Oh, day of wonder!

Music sweeter than song of paradise.

Angry heaven is looking kinder,

Taking pity on bitter pain.

He’s alive! And the long night is over . . .

Trouble is looming for the bandits. Inevitably, the life of reckless violence has got them into deep water. Rolla, one of their members, has been arrested. In order to snatch him from the gallows, a spectacular diversion is required. Carlo leads the rescue, demonstrating his capacity, however misdirected, for daring and leadership, and leaving in his wake a burning village and an angry mob.

Though Carlo seems to have embraced the lawless life wholeheartedly, ashes of his early moral fervor persistently smolder, his anger at the world fuelled by self-loathing.

Alone, gazing at the sunset over the valley, he reflects on the cruel gap between the sublime beauty of nature and the degraded squalor of the wasted life he is leading -- a life which propels him daily further away from everything that he once held dear, most especially from his adored Amalia, for whom he is now so unworthy.

Oh, nature! Sublime in beauty!

Full of wonder beyond conceiving.

And I deface it, contemptible and vile!

Joy so abundant, but I find only hell

Within this fruitful paradise . . .

ACT THREE

The scene is a clearing near the castle, close to an old family vault, sur-rounded by forest. Amalia, in desperation, is attempting to flee from the predatory Francesco, only to encounter a band of marauders. Although she has been told that Carlo is alive somewhere, the last place on earth she would expect to find him would be among these thugs . . .

From the bandits we get a vivid reminder of the life to which Carlo is irrevocably bound:

Our pleasure is plunder, disorder, upheaval,

The work of the devil, all manner of evil.

We brothers have no time for boredom or sorrow;

The banquet today and the hangman tomorrow.

Despite the rapture of seeing Amalia again, Carlo has to face the bitter fact that they must remain divided. He is no longer the person that she loved and revered. Nor can he bear letting her know the person he has become. Tempted by suicide, he rejects this cowardly exit, little suspecting that he is on the brink of a truly mind-boggling discovery. His father, too, is still alive, though starved and imprisoned.

ACT FOUR

Monster though he is, Francesco is not entirely without conscience, which asserts itself most unwelcomely in the shape of bad dreams. Waking up in terror, he describes to his servant Arminio an apocalyptic vision of fire, corpses, Mt. Sinai, the balancing scales of justice, the wrath of God. He is so disturbed that he takes the unusual step of sending for his pastor, who has little of comfort to offer as the world starts to close in upon him.

Left alone with his traumatized, half-demented father who recognizes him only fitfully, Carlo longs for his father’s blessing, which the old man graciously bestows, with a gentle reminder that he will receive mercy only to the extent that he shows it.

The bandits return, bringing in tow not Francesco, who has escaped, but Amalia. The confrontation is unavoidable. Carlo can no longer conceal the direction his life has taken or who he is: the leader of a criminal gang, even now hunted down by the law.

Beyond recovery, the bond is broken.

Goodbye forever to youthful illusion.

Arrest, imprisonment, and then the scaffold --

I offer only a journey to hell.

Amalia is unswayed. For better or for worse, her life is with him. Together they can create a new life. But this is precisely what the bandits cannot allow. Bonds that are forged in blood cannot be broken. For Carlo, there is no way out, no release. Amalia will be dragged down to his own depths of degradation, unless he grants her own request, an ultimate pledge of love that will unite them in the only way now possible . . .