Corneille &apos;s alexandrines , in point of fact , may be found to follow the original text surprisingly closely , and le festin de Pierre contrived to hold the stage successfully in competition with all but the most popular of Moli&amp;egrave;re &apos;s plays until 1730 or thereabouts . it reached the climax of its career in the year 1727 , with the not inconsiderable total of 11 performances ; soon after this triumph , however , the average number of performances per year dropped sharply from about 7 to about 3 , and after 1780 it disappeared almost completely from the repertoire . it was not until 1813 that the lost scenes of the Amsterdam edition were rediscovered and published by the grammarian , M.-J Simonnin ; not until 1841 that the original Dom Juan was restored to the stage at the Od&amp;eacute;on ; and even then , not until some six years later that the Corneille version was finally ousted from the Com&amp;eacute;die Fran&amp;ccedil;aise . the date 1841 , therefore , is usually taken to mark the critical turning-point in the fortunes of Moli&amp;egrave;re &apos;s play . it would be inaccurate , however , to think of this renewal of interest as an unheralded and quasi-accidental effect , produced entirely by the rediscovery of the missing portions of the original text . the very fact that some 28 years were fated to elapse between the discovery and the first performance of the restored original suggests that the process of rehabilitation involved a slow and gradual development . if the history of the play throughout the latter part of the eighteenth century is monotonously uneventful , the same is by no means true of the first half of the nineteenth century . the restoration of Dom Juan was preceded by a revival of interest in le festin de Pierre , and both plays , in fact , benefited significantly from the fascination which their common hero was destined to exercise upon the romantic imagination . in this connection , the influence of Byron &apos;s Don Juan throughout the eighteen-twenties is obviously of capital importance ; but even before this period - in fact , as early as 1805 - we can trace the beginnings of a new attitude , and a new receptiveness on the part of both critics and public . indeed , the year 1805 probably deserves rather more attention than most historians of the play have been prepared to grant it , since not only does it mark the first really striking revival which had been enjoyed on the stage by the Corneille version since 1730 , but the first serious renewal of interest in the original text , and at the same time , the first sign of indirect influence on the fortunes of Moli&amp;egrave;re &apos;s masterpiece through the creation of a later work on the same theme : in this instance , Mozart &apos;s Don Giovanni . if Moli&amp;egrave;re &apos;s heroic seducer was unfortunate in the manner of his reception by the Parisian audience , his operatic counterpart was scarcely less so ; and the trials and tribulations of Don Giovanni at the Grand Op&amp;eacute;ra furnish an admirable illustration of the obdurate tenacity of French musical conventions , which , in the post-revolutionary period , were certainly as rigid as those of the Com&amp;eacute;die Fran&amp;ccedil;aise , and even more fettering to would-be dramatists of the new generation . in this brief study , however , what interests us is not the direct significance of these musical conventions in themselves , but their indirect influence upon the fate of Moli&amp;egrave;re &apos;s Dom Juan . the musical public of Paris in 1800 was unable to digest German opera in any form ; any opera written in Germany had of necessity to be arranged in the French , or , slightly later , in the Italian tradition , if it was to succeed at all ; and it was in fact the eventual discovery that both le nozze di Figaro and Don Giovanni , despite their having been written by a German composer , were fundamentally Italian operas , and so might be thankfully handed over to the opera buffa , that finally established Mozart &apos;s operatic reputation in France . the one traceable attempt to produce a Mozart opera ( die Entfu&quot;hrung ) in the German tradition was so disastrous and lamentable a failure that not an echo of it remains throughout the century . die Entfu&quot;hrung was produced at the Th&amp;eacute;&amp;acirc;tre de la Cit&amp;eacute; by a visiting German company , the Mozart-Theater , on 25 brumaire An 10 . it was repeated on 27 and 28 brumaire , and never given again . the fiasco was anything but unexpected : les bouffons allemands se sont arrang&amp;eacute;s , sans doute , pour n&apos;avoir que des Allemands pour auditeurs , remarked one critic , knowing perfectly well ( as indeed did all his confr&amp;egrave;res ) that what mattered in opera was , of course , the words , the d&amp;eacute;cor and the ballets - anything , in fact , but the music : nos Fran&amp;ccedil;ais ne sont pas assez fous de musique pour aller chercher , aux d&amp;eacute;pens de tous les autres agr&amp;eacute;mens , un degr&amp;eacute; de plus de fermet&amp;eacute; et de pr&amp;eacute;cision dans l&apos;ex&amp;eacute;cution de ces sifflemens allemands &amp;hellip; . a rigorous treatment at the hands of qualified French adaptors was , therefore , the first essential : action , dialogue , vocal and orchestral parts - everything had to be arranged to meet the conventional requirements . the first Mozartian opera to be subjected to this curious treatment was le nozze , which appeared , arranged by Notaris , at the acad&amp;eacute;mie de musique on 20 March 1793 , and ran dispiritedly for five performances . Notaris , obviously , had not arranged enough , and too much Mozart had , reprehensibly , been allowed to subsist ; consequently , the next effort set about remedying the fault . on 20 August 1801 , die zauberflo&quot;te appeared at the Th&amp;eacute;&amp;acirc;tre de la R&amp;eacute;publique et des Arts in an unrecognizable version entitled les myst&amp;egrave;res d&apos;Isis , music by Lachnith , libretto by le citoyen Morel , ci-devant Chedeville , and achieved a considerable success . in 1805 , this version was transferred to the Acad&amp;eacute;mie Imp&amp;eacute;riale de Musique , where it was revived again in 1812 , 1816 , 1823 and 1826 . to the honour of French music , it should perhaps be added that , within a few years , these two fripons musicaux , Lachnith ( le rapetisseur des grands hommes ) and Morel ( ouvrier en marqueterie ) had become synonymous with all that was most reactionary and abysmal in the French musical tradition . les myst&amp;egrave;res d&apos;Isis , in fact , achieved its popularity by discarding the original music almost entirely , and by incorporating into the score - amongst other things - a substantial portion of a Haydn symphony : on a chang&amp;eacute; le sentiment de la musique de la Fl&amp;ucirc;te enchant&amp;eacute;e , on en a ralenti les mouvemens pour approprier les airs au style s&amp;eacute;rieux . les paroles sont pitoyables &amp;hellip; l&apos;arrangeur a coup&amp;eacute; , taill&amp;eacute; , sabr&amp;eacute; les plus beaux morceaux de cet op&amp;eacute;ra , qu&apos;il trouvait sans doute trop long . comment , avec tant de richesses , n&apos;a-t-on fait qu&apos;une mis&amp;eacute;rable compilation ? such was the situation when , on 17 September 1805 , the Acad&amp;eacute;mie Imp&amp;eacute;riale de Musique decided to experiment with Don Giovanni . obviously , the Grand Op&amp;eacute;ra could no more accept that masterpiece as written by Mozart and Da Ponte than the Th&amp;eacute;&amp;acirc;tre Fran&amp;ccedil;ais could countenance Dom Juan without the adoucissements introduced by Corneille . in this instance , the task of making the necessary arrangements was entrusted to one Christian Kalkbrenner , chorus-master at the Grand Op&amp;eacute;ra . the outcome of his labours , together with those of his collaborators on the libretto , Mons Thuring , g&amp;eacute;n&amp;eacute;ral de brigade , and Mons D Baillot , sous-biblioth&amp;egrave;caire de la Biblioth&amp;egrave;que Imp&amp;eacute;riale de Versailles , was a drame lyrique en trois actes , which once again not merely altered Mozart &apos;s music completely beyond recognition , but somehow made room within the score for several arias of M Kalkbrenner &apos;s own ingenious composition , together with the usual lengthy passages of incidental music to accommodate those full-scale interludes of ballet and mime which the Parisian operatic audiences demanded as their right . Gardel provided some excellent choreography ; but the real pi&amp;egrave;ce de r&amp;eacute;sistance was the d&amp;eacute;cor , with Mount Vesuvius in full eruption at the back of the stage , and streams of lava pouring down towards the auditorium . the few reputable music-critics who knew and respected their Mozart protested as loudly as they knew how , but all to no avail ; and for many years , Kalkbrenner &apos;s Don Juan was linked with Lachnith &apos;s myst&amp;egrave;res d&apos;Isis , and remained a by-word , a glaring symbol of the depths to which French operatic taste could descend . les airs de basse-taille sont donn&amp;eacute;s aux femmes , chang&amp;eacute;s de ton , raccourcis , allong&amp;eacute;s , d&apos;un air on fait un trio ; enfin ce n&apos;est plus que le simulacre de la musique de Mozart &amp;hellip; wrote F&amp;eacute;tis some two years later , and as late as 1823 , Castil-Blaze could still recall the incident with the acutest indignation . however , the reputable music-critics were not asked their opinion . public taste in music was guided exclusively by men of letters , and , during the whole Napoleonic era , the major dramatic critics were wont to look upon opera as their exclusive prerogative . above all , it was Julien-Louis Geoffroy , the feared and influential oracle of the Journal des D&amp;eacute;bats , who could make or mar a composer &apos;s reputation with a single article , although - as he thankfully admitted - music was an art which he understood no more than morris-dancing . the story of the resplendent premi&amp;egrave;re , the gradual disintegration and eventual catastrophic d&amp;eacute;b&amp;acirc;cle of this first French production of Don Giovanni can be followed in detail through the reviews in the contemporary press . what appears evident from the various comments which have survived is that Kalkbrenner &apos;s manipulations of the score had put all the critics except Geoffroy in a quandary . Geoffroy &apos;s position was simple and unassailable . he was suspicious of Mozart &apos;s reputation ( he despised Germans , anyway ) and heartily disliked whatever music of his he happened to have heard . cet Allemand , he pronounced , n&apos;a rien fait dans le genre de l&apos;op&amp;eacute;ra-comique which could ever rival Gr&amp;eacute;try , while his so-called serious operas were pitiful compared with les excellentes compositions de Gluck et de Piccini . to honour his professional obligations , however , he attended the premi&amp;egrave;re of Don Giovanni . he found the overture detestable ( pourquoi coudre une symphonie &amp;agrave; un op&amp;eacute;ra ? ) , compared the music of act 2 bitterly and unfavourably with Duni &apos;s peintre amoureux de son mod&amp;egrave;le and with Paisiello &apos;s R&amp;egrave; Teodoro , elevated Kalkbrenner &apos;s intercalated aria , O nuit , sois favorable &amp;hellip; above anything written by the original composer , protested loudly that , even though the words were in French , the music was so insistent and ill-disciplined that he could not hear them , and concluded dolefully : il y a trop de musique dans Don Juan ; c&apos;est un festin o&amp;ugrave; l&apos;extr&amp;ecirc;me abondance rassasie promptement &amp;hellip; . les Allemands ont g&amp;acirc;t&amp;eacute; notre Moli&amp;egrave;re . less committed critics , however , were faced with two unpleasant alternatives . here was undoubtedly a bad opera ; yet this opera was supposedly by Mozart , and Mozart enjoyed une r&amp;eacute;putation colossale among the musical &amp;eacute;lite . either , therefore , they had to condemn it , and thus denounce themselves musically as ignorant philistines ; or else obey the fashion and applaud what they knew instinctively to be poor material , without having the necessary knowledge ( in the early stages , at any rate ) to trace the evil to its source - not Mozart at all , but Kalkbrenner . thus , when it became apparent , after two or three performances , that Gardel and the lava-streams were not going to be enough , unaided , to keep this extravagant ( and expensive ) venture afloat for long , there was ill-disguised relief all round . succ&amp;egrave;s incomplet , announced the journal de Paris , while Geoffroy moralised contentedly : si cet essai pouvait nous gu&amp;eacute;rir de notre admiration exclusive pour les &amp;eacute;trangers , il auroit produit un effet tr&amp;egrave;s-heureux . quarrels and dissensions ensued among the cast , most of whom hurriedly and shamefacedly handed over their parts to understudies on various pretexts , and on November 10th , Don Giovanni was quietly removed from the repertoire , and les myst&amp;egrave;res d&apos;Isis substituted . there was , admittedly , an attempt to bring it back for an occasional Sunday performance shortly before Christmas , but by March 1806 , little remained of this ambitious and unfortunate venture save a certain amount of smoke in the upper regions of the stage : v&amp;eacute;suve va beaucoup mieux , il ne donne pas tant de fum&amp;eacute;e ; il n&apos;y a que les acteurs qui vont de plus en plus mal . les Allemands ont g&amp;acirc;t&amp;eacute; notre Moli&amp;egrave;re . this is the key-note of criticism in relation to Don Giovanni . on the other hand , to say so was one thing , but to prove it was a rather more hazardous business . in fact , it could only be done by putting on simultaneously a production of le festin de Pierre , and by letting the audience make its own comparison . 