Now dad wrote The Three Musketeers and The Count of Monte Cristo. His name was Alexandre Dumas fils - “fils” meaning “son,” because he was the son of the more famous Alexandre Dumas.

One of her lovers was so inspired by her life that he decided to commit her story to paper. Marie died of tuberculosis when she was 23. But her independent life didn’t last long. She was incredibly successful, sought-after.

Her name was Marie Duplessis, and she was a courtesan living in Paris in the middle of the 1800s. The person behind today’s opera was real. Sometimes, though, the story isn’t just a story - there’s a real person in there, who lived and died and had a life worthy of an opera. Here on Aria Code, we’re always talking about the story, and how it connects to the world the opera was written in and the world we live in today. TURTURRO: I think great music, and music that has lasted, is a sort of emotional transportation. Today, it’s “Addio del passato” from La Traviata by Giuseppe Verdi. GIDDENS: Every episode, we pull back the curtain on a single aria to see what’s behind the scenes. SCHILLINGER: It’s about a unique mind, a unique sensibility, a unique heart that has been buffeted by the realities of her time and by that terrible illness. GIDDENS: From WQXR and the Metropolitan Opera, this is Aria Code. I don’t want to die, I want to live.” And you can also, at the exact same time say - “I am ready to die.” That living conflict is exactly what life is!

Verdi opera aria