Cesare Bronte

Is it just a coincidence that in a drama entitled La Gloria by the Italian author Gabriele D' Annunzio there exists a character named Cesare Bronte (without the diaeresis)? The tragedy, written in 1899, was not at all successful when performed that year for the first time on the Italian stage, despite including the most famous actress of the time, Eleonora Duse, in the cast. It gained some success in 1912 and 1928, but La Gloria is still one of the least popular of all D' Annunzio's plays and is rarely performed. The only interesting parts in it are the first two acts in which the author introduces the character of Cesare Bronte, an old soldier on his death-bed, who is pervaded (in Act II) by a sudden frenzy of passion for a woman, Camnena by name, whom he knows betrayed him even before his death. The key to the drama is the character's desperate attempt to gain the woman's attentions once more, but without any success. It is this somehow pitiful effort by the once respected and loved Cesare Bronte that reminds us of the same pitiful situation in which Branwell found himself in his last months of life when, ill and friendless, he tried in vain to attract Lydia Robinson's attention to his miseries. Perhaps D' Annunzio had read some of the Bronte biographies, or had heard of the sad story of the family. Whatever the reason, he certainly chose an interesting and puzzling surname for his dying hero. Maddalena De Leo, Ascea Marina (SA), Italy