Eleonora Duse (1859–1924) was an Italian actress. Ranked among the greatest actresses of all time, she is best known for her tragic roles, particularly in plays by the Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen and the Italian playwright Gabriele D’Annunzio.
Born near Venice to a family of actors who played in the same touring troupe, Duse made her first stage appearance at the age of four in a dramatization of Victor Hugo‘s Les Misérables. By age 14, when she played Juliet at Verona, critics already recognized her talents.
Duse quickly rose to fame in Italy, then triumphed (1892–93) throughout the European capitals, mainly acting in plays by Ibsen, contemporary French dramatists, and the works of her lover, D’Annunzio. Duse financed D’Annunzio’s career, and he wrote for her several plays. D’Annunzio told the story of their love in his novel Il fuoco (1900; The Flame of Life.)
Credited by many with furthering the movement toward realistic acting, Duse is said to have eschewed the heavy makeup conventional at the time. She was also noted for her being most eloquent in repose.
In 1909, Duse quit the stage for reasons of health, but returned to the stage in 1921 after years of retirement because of financial losses incurred during World War I. In 1923, she appeared in London and Vienna before embarking upon her last tour of the United States. The tour ended in Pittsburgh, where she collapsed on-stage and died.
Notable biographies include Jeanne Bordeux’s Eleonora Duse: The Story of Her Life (1925) and William Weaver’s Duse: A Biography (1984.) Duse was the subject of the biographical film Eleonora Duse (1947.)
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I did not use paint, I made myself up morally.
—Eleonora Duse
Topics: Integrity
If the sight of the blue skies fills you with joy, if a blade of grass springing up in the fields has power to move you, if the simple things of nature have a message that you understand, rejoice, for your soul is alive.
—Eleonora Duse
The weaker partner in a marriage is the one who loves the most.
—Eleonora Duse
I have the greatest of all riches: that of not desiring them.
—Eleonora Duse
Topics: Appreciation, Gratitude, Blessings
To help, to continually help and share, that is the sum of all knowledge; that is the meaning of art.
—Eleonora Duse
The one happiness is to shut one’s door upon a little room, with a table before one, and to create; to create life in that isolation from life.
—Eleonora Duse
When we grow old, there can only be one regret – not to have given enough of ourselves.
—Eleonora Duse
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