Abstract

James Russell Lowell and "Il Pesceballo"

It is based upon a once-famous ballad which recounts the unhappy adventures of a hungry man of restricted means, who ordered a single fishball, hoping against hope that bread might be added thereunto. As to the author of the ballad, there is no doubt. It was college teacher C.M. Lane, who humorously elaborates a little mishap that had once befallen him. The libretto of "Il Pesceballo" is written in Italian, and it is accompanied by a delightfully humorous English translation-literary doggerel, so to say. As to the author of the Italian, there is no doubt. It was college teacher F.J. Child, who has here given final form to an "Italian Opera" with which he had amused himself several years before, in Lenox, Massachusetts, during a college vacation.