Boito, Arrigo, << BOH ee toh or BOY taw, ahr REE goh >> (1842-1918), was an Italian composer, author, and poet. He was an aristocratic scholar who greatly influenced Italian music of his time. However, he completed only one opera, Mefistofele (1868), a work based on the story of Faust, a scholar who sells his soul to the devil, Mefistofele. From 1862 until he died, Boito worked on Nerone, an opera produced in 1924 after his death.
Boito wrote librettos (words) for his own operas and for those of other composers. His most notable librettos were for Amilcare Ponchielli’s La Gioconda (1876) and for two operas by Giuseppe Verdi, Otello (1887) and Falstaff (1893). Boito also wrote novels, essays, and poetry, and translated librettos into Italian. Much of his verse deals with romantic medieval subjects. Boito was born on Feb. 24, 1842, in Padua. He died on June 10, 1918.
