Playing to the Gods

by Peter Rader

• • •

  The first thing she fell in love with had been his mind. D’Annunzio, like Duse, had been a child prodigy, publishing five volumes of poetry by the time Eleonora became aware of him. She read his stanzas with keen interest. His words were sensual and beckoning, such as these opening lines from Canto novo (1882):

  O strange little girl with the wandering eyes,

  mysterious and deep like the sea,

  beautiful child, in my poor songs

  you will not stop smiling!

  D’Annunzio seemed to use language that penetrated the hidden world of Duse’s imagination—a realm that no one had truly entered.

  In 1894, while in London the year before the showdown with Bernhardt, Duse had read d’Annunzio’s fourth novel, Il trionfo della morte (The Triumph of Death). Like many readers of the best seller, Eleonora had been swept up by its erotic plot of two doomed lovers who find themselves in Venice sharing a gondola one early morning; later they make wild, rapturous love in a room at the romantic Hotel Danieli.

  D’Annunzio’s vivid writing bordered on the pornographic—one of the reasons he was so popular. Even more titillating was the fact that his novel apparently detailed actual intimacies from his past, a kiss-and-tell account of his relationship with a now-discarded woman. Eleonora should have taken this as a warning. But she couldn’t help herself; she was falling in love with his words.

  That diabolical—divine d’Annunzio?

  That’s how she opened a restless letter to Boito, who had mailed the novel to her in London.

  That book—I have finished it!— Ahi! Ahi! Ahi!!!

  —Each of us . . . poor women—think that it’s she who’s found all the words—

  That diabolical d’Annunzio knows them all! I would rather die in a ditch than fall in love with a soul like that!

  Though d’Annunzio’s depraved themes were often repulsive to her, she had succumbed. “I detest d’Annunzio,” she wrote, “but I adore him.”

  D’Annunzio pursued his goals with a vengeance—a quality Duse admired greatly in others and one to which she aspired. He was likewise unapologetic about his dark side. As described by a reviewer in the New Republic, d’Annunzio was “the very personification of Italian decadence, a creature of unembarrassed and unbridled appetite—for fame, for luxury, for thrills of all kinds. He dubbed himself L’Immaginifico, the Great Creator or Image-maker, and offered himself as a Nietzschean sort of Renaissance man.”

  He was spiritual, too. Though the Tantric arts were largely unknown in Europe at the time, d’Annunzio seems to have stumbled upon the mystical practice of liberation through the world of the senses. A privately printed English translation of the Kama Sutra had been in circulation since 1883, and it’s quite possible that d’Annunzio got his hands on a copy.

  “He accepts, as no one else of our time does, the whole physical basis of life, the spirit which can be known only through the body,” wrote British poet Arthur Symons, d’Annunzio’s English translator. “He becomes the idealist of material things, while seeming to materialize spiritual things.”

  Eleonora succumbed to d’Annunzio like all of his other conquests: by falling under the spell of his oratory. Their first encounter had taken place in Rome backstage at a theater in 1887. Her performance that evening had been an aphrodisiac for d’Annunzio. “O Greatest of Lovers,” the twenty-four-year-old poet is reported to have said, falling to his knees to kiss the hem of her skirt as Eleonora leaped back in alarm.

  While Duse, then twenty-nine, had her share of stage door admirers, none seemed as entitled and determined as d’Annunzio. Duse had toured Italy and gone overseas to South America at this point, but she wasn’t quite rich and famous enough for d’Annunzio, a narcissist and shameless self-promoter who had cockily faked his own death at sixteen in order to draw attention to his first volume of poetry. At twenty, d’Annunzio had married a Roman duchess with whom he would have three children, before leaving for his next infatuation: a Sicilian princess. At twenty-five, after his backstage encounter with Eleonora, he published his first novel, Il Piacere (The Child of Pleasure in the English translation). Duse read the book multiple times when it came out, the better to know his mind, and she certainly took note of the following lines:

  Intellectuals such as he, brought up in the religion of Beauty, always preserve a certain kind of order, even in their worst depravities. The conception of Beauty is the axis of their inmost being: all their passions turn upon that axis.

  She, too, worshipped at the altar of Beauty. Could this be the Italian writer she’d been seeking?

  • • •

  As improbable as it sounds, Duse and d’Annunzio became lovers when a pair of gondolas happened to cross paths one misty Venice morning in 1895. It may as well have been a scene from his book. Indeed, Duse and d’Annunzio made a beeline for the Hotel Danieli, just like the lovers from The Triumph of Death, and neither set foot outside the room for days. D’Annunzio would later write about it.

  “I have felt your soul and discovered mine,” Duse had said dreamily, according to his account. This was the moment d’Annunzio would claim to have found his muse: “Your presence alone is enough to give my spirit an incalculable fertility,” he told her. “I suddenly felt a torrent of music rush through the silence.”

  Just as Boito had guided the young Eleonora into a deeper understanding of the mystical source of inspiration, it was Duse who now initiated d’Annunzio into The Grace. It happened just before an address d’Annunzio was slated to give at the close of the inaugural Venice Biennale, his first public speech. While d’Annunzio was pleased with what he had written, when the moment came to face the crowd, he was overcome by stage fright. The panic came suddenly and with grotesque ferocity. D’Annunzio imagined the audience to be a colossal and repugnant reptile, “a gigantic creature with a thousand eyes” that were the glittering jewels worn by the aristocratic women throughout the crowd.

  Eleonora took his hand backstage and spoke words that transformed him: his fear was merely a gatekeeper to the unseen realm where art flows without effort. Push through the fear, she urged, let go of the script; allow the truth to channel through you.

  D’Annunzio would one day become the most compelling orator in Italy—a role model for Benito Mussolini—and this is where it began. He spoke haltingly at first, but soon his words flowed like a torrent. He felt a “communion between his own soul and the soul of the crowd, a mystery was happening, something that was almost divine.” It was Duse’s Grace.

  • • •

  D’Annunzio was ready, finally, to write for the stage; an idea had come to him while sailing the Greek islands. He whispered the thought to Duse after a night of lovemaking, and they made a pact on the spot—he would write the play for her, she would “create” it on the stage.

  The Duse-d’Annunzio pact transcended the one play, however. They would soon concoct dreams of an annual Italian theater festival on Lake Albano modeled on Wagner’s Bayreuth, which had been launched in 1876. And while each was free to take other lovers, they would commit to artistic exclusivity in their relationship—he would write plays for her alone, and she would act only in his plays.

  This absurdly lopsided agreement is a testament to d’Annunzio’s power of persuasion. He was untested as a playwright; she, at the top of her craft. It was unthinkable that Duse, who had helped bring Ibsen, Sudermann, and many other modern playwrights to the stage, would abandon them for d’Annunzio. Yet this is precisely what she agreed to do.

  At the core of their partnership was a mutual desire to elevate theater to the sublime. For this, Eleonora was willing to sacrifice her own style in service of her poet’s words. That’s how much she trusted him.

  There was only one problem. D’Annunzio felt that Duse, in her comparative purity, was the wrong vehicle for his oft-depraved, operatic themes. He needed a Tantric priestess. He needed Bernhardt.

  • • •

  Duse felt heartsick at the thought of a prolonged separation
from d’Annunzio, less than a year into their impassioned affair. But they had no choice. D’Annunzio always lived well beyond his means and she was paying the bills for both of them. When the offer came in 1895 from Sarah’s former manager, José Schürmann, for an extended American tour, Duse agreed, albeit reluctantly. She took some comfort in knowing that their separation would give d’Annunzio the ability to focus on the play that he had promised her.

  While in America, Duse wrote daily to d’Annunzio, who responded a few times then suddenly stopped, which hurt her deeply. “I ask and require that my soul not suffer,” she stated in one letter. In another, the tone became more dramatic: “So unspeakable is this suffering, this great sadness caused by your silence—that I cannot live in it.”

  One of the reasons for d’Annunzio’s silence was that he was in the throes of writer’s block and felt guilty about it, even slightly ashamed. He had promised Eleonora a play, and it already had a title, The Dead City, but little else.

  D’Annunzio was secretly intimidated by Duse, which made him resent her. He had never written a play, nor collaborated with an artist of her stature.

  The problem was a stylistic one. He felt blocked because, as much as he may have wanted to compose something sparse and modern for her, it was not in his nature. D’Annunzio was a Symbolist, like Edgar Allan Poe. As his resistance to writing grew, so did his grudge. He detested the ordinary realism of Ibsen. For d’Annunzio, Art must be larger than life, the larger the better. That’s when it occurred to him: he was writing for the wrong actress.

  • • •

  Sipping tea after lovemaking in the early spring of 1897, Eleonora told d’Annunzio that she was finally ready to perform in Paris—which would be the perfect place to launch his play. D’Annunzio blinked. He, too, had decided to premiere The Dead City in Paris, but not with Eleonora. Months prior, he had secretly signed a deal with Sarah Bernhardt.

  From a career standpoint, it was not unreasonable that d’Annunzio would want to premiere his play in France with the actress whose theatrical style he thought would do it greater justice—his flowery words were more suited to Sarah’s poses than to Eleonora’s pauses. D’Annunzio’s novels also enjoyed greater success, at the time, in France, where his translator, Georges Hérelle, had the good sense to make discreet edits here and there to d’Annunzio’s purple prose.

  It was during the winter of 1895, with Duse still in America, that d’Annunzio arrived in Paris to meet Sarah. This was his first visit to the capital. Count Primoli, Duse’s friend and admirer, had brokered the introduction to Bernhardt—the same aristocrat who had presented Duse to Dumas. In his mind, Primoli was, again, simply introducing a worthy writer to a worthy actress. How could he have known of d’Annunzio’s intent to betray Eleonora? D’Annunzio later called his scheme “a frightful conspiracy,” a description that left it unclear whether he felt guilt or glee.

  It should have come as no surprise that d’Annunzio and Bernhardt would be drawn to each other. There were, after all, more than a few similarities in their characters. Both were vain, with mirrors everywhere and legendary wardrobes. D’Annunzio’s boasted suits by the hundreds, dozens of dressing gowns, and seven distinct pairs of white shoes (to say nothing of those in other colors). Both he and Sarah enjoyed extravagances they couldn’t afford. And both took great pride in their ability to command headlines with publicity stunts and bawdy tales of their respective romantic exploits. Indeed, to Eleonora’s dismay, the press had begun to cover their relationship. The high-profile affair between two of Italy’s leading artists, both of them still married to others, became the gossip of the day.

  D’Annunzio enjoyed it. He actually thrived on a certain amount of scandal. Duse was mortified. She felt exposed, a feeling she preferred to have only onstage, never off. Sarah, for her part, was dying to know why her rival’s lover had made a discreet appointment to see her in the winter of 1895. But she made him wait; she always did. D’Annunzio fidgeted restlessly in the waiting room. When the last dab of rouge was exactly where it needed to be, Sarah signaled her maid to open the door and then dismissed her. D’Annunzio swooped in and bowed to kiss Bernhardt’s hand. Despite Sarah’s fifty-odd years, she came from the world of courtesans, with the skills to pick a bustier that would accentuate her bosom.

  “You are sublime,” d’Annunzio whispered. “Yes, Madame, you are positively d’Annunzian.”

  Sarah frowned—d’Annunzian? What impudence!

  She bade him sit across from her, which he did, perched on the edge of the settee. Sarah rested her chin on her folded hands and stared at him without expression. It was a tactic she often used to unnerve her guests. As described by friend and biographer Madame Berton: “Few men, or women either, for that matter, could withstand the hypnotic appeal of those glorious blue eyes, which at fifty retained all the sparkle and fire of youth, together with the mysterious inscrutability of approaching age.” Bernhardt’s magnetism was undeniable, and this is why d’Annunzio had wanted her for his theatrical debut. He considered Sarah a “more sincere” actress than Eleonora. What he meant was that though Eleonora may have been the greater artist, Sarah’s acting appeared more genuine to him, more believable—as fantastical as that may seem. D’Annunzio was not alone. In 1895, much of the public still favored the exaggerated but familiar conventions of the Symbolic style of acting.

  As a Symbolist-Decadent writer, d’Annunzio was one of them. He pitched Bernhardt the idea for The Dead City, and she pounced. D’Annunzio had yet to write a word, but Sarah, delirious at the prospect of humiliating her rival, was more than willing to sign the contract—which d’Annunzio conveniently had in hand—for French rights to the play.

  It was payback in Sarah’s mind for Duse having usurped her manager José Schürmann. Bernhardt assured d’Annunzio that she’d produce The Dead City right away. She could already see the headlines: DUSE’S LOVER GIVES PLAY TO BERNHARDT.

  The plot of d’Annunzio’s play could not have been a more perfect case of art imitating life—for it featured one of d’Annunzio’s favorite themes: the “eternal triangle” between a man and two women. A wife who is blind—both metaphorically and literally—discovers that her husband is cheating on her.

  • • •

  Duse was already fuming over an entirely separate matter when she learned of this betrayal. She had been preparing to go on a tour of Germany and Russia and, as always, had recruited a paid female companion to accompany her. For this trip, she had hired Giulietta Gordigiani, a young and gifted pianist who was quite alluring. D’Annunzio, true to form, tried to seduce her.

  While Eleonora tolerated many of d’Annunzio’s infidelities, this flirtation with her employee, Giulietta, had enraged her. To make matters worse, d’Annunzio had begun pressuring Duse to announce the Italian premiere of his yet-to-be-written The Dead City. Unlike Sarah, Duse was reluctant to commit to an unfinished play she had not read. When she repeated her intention to premiere the play in Paris, d’Annunzio was forced to come clean. Eleonora slammed the door and left seething for her tour of Northern Europe.

  In Berlin, Eleonora met with Robi Mendelssohn, a friend who was related to composer Felix Mendelssohn. Duse’s male friends would invariably fall in love with her; Mendelssohn, an amateur cellist and professional banker, was no exception. Eleonora would eventually entrust Mendelssohn with managing her investments, but for now, she simply needed to divert his unwanted attention. She did so by introducing Mendelssohn to her traveling companion: Giulietta Gordigiani. The ruse worked; the two would soon marry.

  Leaving Giulietta with Mendelssohn in Berlin was also a way of keeping her away from d’Annunzio. But that meant proceeding to Russia alone, a state Duse found unbearable. Lonely, she wrote to her aristocratic ex-lover Arrigo Boito: “I want to see you soon, soon.” They hadn’t spoken in months. There was desperation in her need for companionship. She proposed that he come meet her on the road: “make love to me and hold me tight and close all night.”

  Boito
knew, like all of Europe, of her affair with the married d’Annunzio, a man and writer he considered beneath her. Yet Boito, who still had feelings for Duse, was pleased by her gesture of rapprochement. At her request, he agreed to write a new play for her. Despite their failure with Antonio e Cleopatra, Boito embarked once again on an adaptation of Shakespeare—a comedy this time, based on As You Like It.

  D’Annunzio, for his part, had been using Eleonora’s rage as a source of inspiration for The Dead City, channeling her passion into his heroine—a woman betrayed by the man she loved. The intensity of her fury had unlocked his writer’s block. D’Annunzio seemed to thrive when she was in anguish.

  For Duse, it led to illness. She caught a nasty flu in Russia and had to cancel all her Moscow performances. Confined to bed, alone and vulnerable, she finally wrote to d’Annunzio with forgiveness:

  I still have hope for you. . . . Speak to me again and give me The Dead City. . . . The heart, it knows you.

  By the time Duse returned to Italy, both Boito and d’Annunzio had finished their respective plays. Boito mailed his, and Duse read it first in Genoa. Not unexpectedly, she found it unimpressive; Boito’s work tended to be cerebral and dispassionate.

  Next, Eleonora met with d’Annunzio in Rome. Knowing of the competition from Boito, d’Annunzio had wisely arranged to travel to Rome and read his play to her in person—which put him at an immediate advantage. D’Annunzio’s mellifluous voice transformed his sometimes overwrought words into what seemed like poetry, and Eleonora was won over; she signed a contract to appear in The Dead City, accepting even that Sarah would have first crack at the play in Paris—Duse would be licensing only the Italian rights.

  D’Annunzio, having managed to win over the two biggest divas of the day, collected checks from both Bernhardt and Duse. Meanwhile, the rejected Boito dashed off a bitter telegram to Eleonora, which she shared with d’Annunzio, before declaring with typical offstage melodrama that it was impossible “to live without making someone else suffer.”