MARIA THERESIA AND THE ‘CHINESE’ VOICING OF IMPERIAL SELF: THE AUSTRIAN CONTEXTS OF METASTASIO'S CHINA OPERAS

Abstract

ABSTRACTPietro Metastasio's two librettos featuring ostensibly Chinese subject matter,Le cinesi(1735, revised 1749) andL'eroe cinese(1752), came into being during a period of crisis in the Holy Roman Empire, as the reigning Habsburg dynasty confronted a war of succession motivated by resistance to the Empress Maria Theresia's accession to the throne. This article investigates how Austria envisioned China and how this was used to voice notions of rightful political legitimacy at a time of grave threat to the continuance of a long-standing ruling house. It argues that idealized traits of the Chinese other such as loyalty, deference and wisdom furnished the basis for a reflexive critique that helped to bolster and renew a native imperial self. This stance of ‘dialogic monologism’ towards a foreign culture emerges in a detailed examination of the textual style of the two librettos, the musical characteristics of the settings performed in or near Vienna around the middle of the eighteenth century and the conditions of sponsorship of these performances.