What's the story Violetta is the toast of Paris. She is a fascinating courtesan, and fashionable men about town would kill for a glance. None of them is as persistent as Alfredo Germont, who visited her house every day when she was ill: Violetta has consumption, and it’s getting worse. She agrees to leave dirty Paris with him, stop selling herself to the highest bidder, and live quietly in the countryside. True love, fresh air: the money is running out, but they’re happy. Until Alfredo’s father comes to break them up: his daughter’s posh marriage is threatened because Alfredo is shacked up with this notorious woman. Agonised Violetta leaves Alfredo, who despises her. Too late, when she is dying, father and son rush back to see her.

Why should we care? Giuseppe Verdi (1813-1901) was acclaimed for operas with historical settings, but in La traviata (1853) he embraced a daring, even sordid contemporary subject: ‘a subject for our own age!’ It was based on a recent autobiographical novel and play by Alexandre Dumas called La dame aux camélias. The story of Dumas’ affair with a notorious courtesan who loved fast and died young, also had a more personal resonance for Verdi. He lived with the singer Giuseppina Strepponi, who like Violetta weathered a shady past and severe illness. La traviata looks the difficulties of their scandalous relationship in the face. Violetta freely admits her love only when she has already agreed to leave Alfredo. Guarding your heart like a hand of cards is a habit that is hard to break. La traviata may not be a documentary, but squares up to a mercenary world of hard drinking and gambling where love is for sale, slightly soiled. When Violetta steps on aristocratic toes or loses her pulling power, she is left out with the rubbish. The scene where Alfredo’s father forces her to end the relationship may be the cruellest in all opera: vicious emotional blackmail that then asks for sympathy. ‘Piangi, piangi,’ he demands, ‘weep, weep’. Violetta’s determination to live and love despite everything is inspiring. She is a product of her world but far too good for it.

What does it sound like? The rhythm is often dominated by a sensual waltztime, fast for fun, slow for sadness at the end of the night. This is the sound of delirious pleasure-seeking, of good-time boyz and girls. The prelude is a musical portrait of Violetta, her hectic lifestyle and hidden yearning. Violetta leads the revels with what sounds like champagne fizz or the fever galloping through her body, but always keeps her dignity clenched tight. Only Alfredo prises her defences open: his audacious declaration of love insinuates itself into Violetta’s music after he leaves towards the end of the first act. Hope slides in, shimmering like the orchestra’s harp, which is dangerous in a world where it’s safer to expect disappointment. But later, when Alfredo humiliates her in front of everyone, he’s the one who is left gasping, both morally and musically broken. The dying Violetta waits for Alfredo, with only a sorrowful oboe to mirror her desolation as she says goodbye to the past.

Other stuff Violetta is based on Marie Duplessis. Her affair with Dumas began after he saw her coughing blood; like Alfredo he ended it when she continued to see other lovers. She died in 1847, aged only 23. At an auction after her death, Dumas bought back his first gift to Marie and the letter in which he ended their relationship. Marie was known as ‘la dame aux camélias’ because of her trademark flowers: white camellias when she was open for business, red at that time of the month when she wasn’t available. The premiere of La traviata, in Venice in 1853, was a disaster: the singers weren’t up to Verdi’s music. When La traviata was first produced in Victorian Britain, it was denounced in The Times, and Covent Garden decided not to translate the unwholesome libretto. Verdi, who created an enduring myth in La traviata, said ‘To copy the truth may be a fine thing, but to invent the truth is better, far better.’

Exploring further - links La dame aux camélias by Alexandre Dumas (Oxford). The original story on which Verdi based his opera. Camille by Neil Bartlett (Oberon). Play based on Dumas’ play and novel. La traviata (English National Opera guide). Background material, plus the libretto. Violetta and her Sisters, edited by Nicholas John (Faber). Fascinating collection of the myths surrounding Violetta in art and history. Opera, or the Undoing of Women, by Catherine Clément (Virago). Why do operatic heroines have to die? Clément investigates. La traviata (1982), film directed by Franco Zeffirelli with Teresa Stratas and Plácido Domingo. Told in flashback, like a ghost story. Camille (1936), film directed by George Cukor, with a legendary performance by Greta Garbo.