Le Satire: The Story Behind Le Corsaire

In this essay I will be discussing the story behind Le Corsaire, the people who created it and the social and cultural situations that affected it.

The Corsaire was written by Lord Byron in 1814, which was the peak of the Romantic era of art and poetry. It is a poem which the ballet Le Corsaire is loosely based on. Le Corsaire is a ballet typically presented in three acts, with a libretto created by Jules Henri Vernoy de Saint Georges. It was originally choreographed by Joseph Mazilier to composed by Adolphe Adam, and was first performed by the ballet of the Theatre Imperial de l’Opera in Paris on the 23rd of January 1856. Mazilier and Vernoy de Saint George decided that all they needed from the poem was the names of the characters and the exotic location, so they transformed Medora into an active, feisty heroine instead of the stay at home mistress of the pirate Conrad. They made Gulnare bright, but much more accepting of her fate, rather than the adventurous rebel of the original story. The ballet quickly became a huge success, being adapted and staged in many different places including London, Turin, Milan, Boston and St Petersburg.

Le Corsaire (meaning the pirate) follows the adventures of

In Kansas, a civil war broke out, known as Bleeding Kansas. In May 1856, a pro slavery group attacked the town of Lawrence, destroying and stealing property. By the end of 1856, nearly 200 Kansans had been killed and property worth $2 million had been damaged or destroyed. This could have influenced why the Paris Opera Ballet chose to create this ballet, as some of the main characters are slave girls, (Medora and Gulnare) and the ballet starts with Lankendem selling these girls in the market place. Because the subject and plot of the ballet was relevant to what was going on at the time, the audience would have been able to relate to it as it would have drawn parallels with their own