National Opera in Croatia and Finland, 1846-1899

CROATIA and Finland, though on opposite sides of Europe, share a surprising number of features. Both are situated at geographic and cultural crossroads—Finland between Scandinavia, Northern Europe, and Russia, and Croatia between the Mediterranean, Central Europe, and the Balkans. During the nineteenth century, both were constituent parts of empires—Finland was a grand duchy of the Russian Empire while Croatia was a part of the Habsburg domain. Both countries have water as a significant part of their physical geography—Croatia with its islands and Adriatic coastline and Finland with its lakes and coasts along the Gulf of Bothnia and the Gulf of Finland. Central to this essay, both struggled with the concept of national identity during the nineteenth century, and that struggle had strong linguistic and musical manifestations. Vernacular languages and folk music styles were paramount in the creation of national characters among nineteenth-century Europeans. One of the most overt displays of the blend of language, music, and other aspects of a nation's uniqueness—such as its history or legends—was in the realm of opera.

Many nations in Slavic Europe produced operas during the nineteenth century that became national institutions. In Russia, Mikhail Glinka set a model for the genre with Zhizn'za tsarya (A Life for the Tsar, 1836), and his efforts were continued by Modest Musorgsky and Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky with Boris Godunov (1868-69, rev. 1871-72, 1873, 1896) and Evgeny Onegin (1877-78), respectively. Czech composers Bedrich Smetana and Antonín Dvorák created works that became intrinsic parts of Czech culture in Prodaná nevesta (The Bartered Bride, 1866) and Rusalka (1901). Stanislav Moniuszko did the same for Poland with his opera Halka (1847, rev. 1858), and Franz Erkel for Hungary with Bánk bán (1861). Each of these works exemplifies many of the ideals one would expect in nineteenth-century national opera—the promotion of a national identity through libretto, language, and music.

Four operas, two from Croatia and two from Finland, offer specific examples of the role of national opera in two parts of Europe's geographic periphery. In Croatia, Ljubav i zloba (Love and Malice, 1846) by Vatroslav Lisinski (1819-1854) was the first modern opera in the Croatian language. In Finland, Kung Karls Jakt (King Charles's Hunt, 1852) by Fredrik Pacius (1809-1891) was the first opera to be written in that country, with a libretto in Swedish. Subsequently Pohjan neiti (The Maid of the North, 1899) by Oskar Merikanto (1868-1924) was the first opera to be written in the Finnish language. Returning to Croatia, Nikola Subic Zrinjski (1876) by Ivan Zajc (1832-1914), the most frequently performed Croatian opera, demonstrates a dual historic- and folk-based approach to opera in the Croatian language.

The central commonality among these four operas is that they all have libretti in the vernacular languages of their country of origin. This focus on the written language was a fundamental part of nation-building in the nineteenth century. Benedict Anderson, in his thought-provoking Imagined Communities, remarks that "the nineteenth century was, in Europe and its immediate peripheries, ¹ a golden age of vernacularizing lexicographers, grammarians, philologists, and litterateurs. The energetic activities of these professional intellectuals were central to the shaping of nineteenth-century European nationalisms." ² Histories were being written, and newspapers and printed literature were on the rise. Folk epics appeared that celebrated ancient customs of various European nationalities. All of these activities took place in vernacular languages, and history and folk tales became quite popular as source material for opera libretti. As Tom Nairn observes, the vernacular was the conduit for the promotion and dissemination of national ideology: "The new middle-class intelligentsia of nationalism had to invite the masses into history; and the invitation-card had to be written in a language they understood." ³ Nairn's remark applies wholly to the realm of opera. Libretti in the vernacular served as invitations for...