‘Monstrous Abominable Pleasures’: Climate Determinism, Anti-Popery and English Resistance to Early Eighteenth-Century Italian Opera

Italian opera encountered resistance, sparked debate and provoked polemics in England even before it came to be staged almost exclusively by foreign musicians. To be sure, there was never such a thing as a united English front against Italian opera, which is self-evident from the fact that there was sufficient patronage to introduce and support it despite persistent criticism. In fact, rather than resulting in the genre’s failure in London, the constant stream of critical and satirical writings, which furnished material for society conversation, enhanced the effectiveness of Italian opera as entertainment both on and off the stage, enabling it to permeate far beyond the realms of the theatre and the social elite who patronised it.