L'avvocato di Madama Butterfly. Un'analisi storico-giuridica

Madama Butterfly is one of the most famous operas by Giacomo Puccini. Set in Japan in 1904, it depicts the tragic love story between B.F. Pinkerton, an officer in the US Navy, and Cio-cio-san (also called Madama Butterfly), a young Japanese girl from Nagasaki. The libretto (written by Giacosa and Illica – one of whom happened to be a lawyer) is quite interesting from a jurist’s perspective as it mentions a number of legal issues. The pivotal point in the opera is the marriage between the officer and the young Japa- nese lady. Questions arise about the law applicable to the marriage itself (including the formalities required), that applicable to the matrimonial life, and, more importantly, whether Pinkerton was allowed to unilaterally divorce by abandoning the conjugal house, an option in his view permitted by Japanese law (but of course not allowed under the law of the USA). In the opera, the validity of this option is taken for granted, but a legal, technical analysis leads to a different conclusion.