Love as Persuasion in Monteverdi’s ‘L’incoronazione di Poppea’: New Thoughts on the Authorship Question

Abstract

Focusing primarily upon Poppea’s transgressive rhetoric, which manoeuvres both inside and outside ideologies of the feminine in Monteverdi’s L’incoronazione di Poppea, this article has two main objectives: first, to situate the gender confusion at the heart of the Poppea–Nerone relationship within the context of the sexually double nature of Renaissance rhetoric and, secondly, to locate these findings within the much broader issue of ‘Who wrote the music to L’incoronazione di Poppea?’ Arguing for an alternative composer or composers for the Finale, I suggest that the patriarchal retribution witnessed here in the form of Nerone’s musical empowerment, when coupled with the affective nature of the final love duet, ‘Pur ti miro’, postulates a rhetorical outlook significantly at odds with the opera as a whole.

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