indarno

by JLS
--for the GC

I am fascinated by Kramer's wordplays.

"was tickled to see my name being taken, I hope not in vain." He writes. More on this later. But let's just focus on 'in vain'.

There is a famous one-act opera, by Puccini, as it happens, "Gianni Schicchi", that features those memorable lines:

ma se l'amassi indarno
andrei sul Ponte Vecchio
ma per buttarmi in Arno.

--- the lyrics are by one Forzano, who as it happens, was born in the Mugel area, not far from what "Lauretta" is referring to. I was discussing that lyric just yesterday with my opera club.

What a fascinating word, 'indarno' -- it comes in so handy for Forzano. Perhaps as handy as having Lauretta speak in 'dialect', and say that, things going well, she'd rather go to "Porta Rossa", to 'buy the ring' -- compErar l'anello --. The lengthening of the verb, with that intrusive 'e' allowing the thing to scan rather well.

In any case, the online site I usually consult for Italian etymologies,

http://www.etimo.it/?term=indarno

Notes two, improbable, or unprobable, in my view, theories: it comes from the Slavic language, or from the old German. In any case, it just sounds SO MUCH LIKE 'Arno', that one may object that it's like rhyming 'love' with 'love'.

And yes, the paraphrase that etymological source gives is "in vain".

-----

And so on.

* This from

http://josvg.home.xs4all.nl/cits/sb/sb413.html

is not too clarifying, but points to a pointer, as it were:

"The word "indarno" [as in "O mio babbino caro"] is NOT used in modern-day Italy, and at first sight it may seem *incorrect*. But "indarno" did exist in Puccini's time [1918 -- plus the play is set in 1229 'Firenze'], so it is _in place_ here." [Thanks to Jack Divita for pointing this out; thanks to Giovanni Battisti for the original comment.]" Talk of poetic license.



ObGrice: "The logical form of "Indarno p" --. Render it, and provide 4 English paraphrases with contrasting implicata".