Der Sieg der Form über Substanz

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Don Iolio Contrario in a detail from Birgit von Sachsen-Rampton’s portrait

Otto Büchstein’s obscure tragicomic opera La Vittoria della Forma sulla Sostanza is an obscure and now largely forgotten portent of the forthcoming mechanization of the enlightened world. It was hampered on premiere by what theatre-goers found to be a plainly fantastical plot, but more critically was wounded by a brace of especially turgid arias either side of the interval.

It was translated into English by a theatre-loving commercial attorney, Francis Coward-Chance, whose flimsy grasp of Italian was surpassed only by his turgid English.

Synopsis

Argumentative young Venetian fellow-about-town Don Iolio Contrario is employed as an operations manager by his father Don Figaro Contrario in his struggling spice brokerage.

Being obsessed with cost control and anxious to be seen as a great financial innovator, Don Figaro has invested in a “homunculus”, a steam-powered computation machine which will take over the role of the brokers at a fraction of the cost, and with far greater speed and accuracy. But, Don Iolio says, surely you know, spice broking is a complex business, and no mechanical contraption could possibly replace the skill judgment of an experienced broker? The machine will be hopeless, and a far greater burden on his operation than any benefit it could possibly bring: “Quella macchina parlante ottusa!”

Don Figaro, a vain and stupid man, is exasperated at his errant son and chides him for his romantic and impractical world-view. By way of punishment he consigns Don Iolio to work in the boiler-room among the brokers. “There you will see how valuable these good-for-nothing spice merchant are! They waste my money! They opccupy my valuable resources! My new homunculus will not get sick! It will take no vacations! It will take no lunch-breaks!”

Disregarding Don Iolio’s warnings, Don Figaro rushes in, impulsively, securing the homunculus, so he thinks, before his devious rival Don Inago Montega can get it. But Don Inago has tricked Don Figaro into a buying the machine, for which Don Figaro takes out a long-term loan, from Don Inago, at usurious prices. Don Inago has configured it to perform badly and to cripple Don Figaro's business.

Don Iolio descends into the brokerage’s dungeon workhouse. There he meets and falls in love with an enchanting brokeress. She tells him her name is Iolande Impulsivia. In fact, Iolande is the wayward daughter of Don Inago, his father’s bitterest enemy. She has run away from her dreadful scheming father.

With great fanfare Don Figaro takes delivery of the machine, which to everyone’s surprise, works - but only because Iolande and Don Iolio are standing behind the machine ensuring it works and checking everything. It is her brilliant accounting and dextrous handling of exceptions and unexpected use-cases which creates the illusion that machine is a success.

Don Inago sees the machine is working, to his horror, and tries to renege on his loan. Don Figaro orders another machine, but to pay for it, must make Don Iolio and Iolande redundant. I have solved the problem of employees. Little does Don Figaro know!

In a wrenching aria Sono Condannato a Essere un Esperto in Materia , Iolande, cast adrift from the Brokerage, drifts aimlessly around the canals of Venice with her Iron Mountain box, pondering whether there is any future to her life at all.

At the same time Don Iolio, locked in his father’s operations room, ineffectually rails against the stupidity of his father’s fashionable ideas (his song is Il mondo ha una merda per i cervelli).

Meantime the machine, without Iolande to prop it up, is a disaster and drives Don Figaro to the brink of ruin. Finally he comes to understand his folly (O! Consulente di Gestione Scioccca! and sends out Don Figaro to find her, but she is floating face down in the canal at St Mark's Square.

See also

• Otto Büchstein
• Substance and form
• Don Iolio Contrario
• Outsourcing