DA PONTE, LORENZO ( b. Ceneda, Italy, 10 March 1749; d. New York, 17 Aug. 1838 )
An Italian poet and librettist. In all, he wrote 36 libretti. The most famous are those written for Mozart; Le nozze di Figaro, based on the play by Beaumarchais, Don Giovanni and Cosi fan tutte. These are commonly regarded as amongst the finest libretti in the whole opera repertoire. Da PonteΓÇÖs work brought the very best out of Mozart as a composer for the stage. He is largely responsible for the view we have of Mozart as a mature opera composer, infinitely perceptive of human behaviour and psychology, and radical in his development of the operatic genre towards a dramatic portrayal of the realities, not just the mythologies, of the human predicament.
Having studied for the priesthood, da Ponte became court poet to Joseph II of Austria. After the emperor's death in 1790 he left Vienna and subsequently worked in London. In 1805 he left England for America, where he held a chair in Italian at Columbia University. While there he wrote an autobiography which suggests that some of the characterisation of his Don Giovanni is self-portrait.
In 1833 he established the Italian Opera House in New York.
