Diva can no means be considered a biography of the fabulous opera soprano, Maria Callas, as it covers primarily the brief period of time in which she is involved with Aristotle Onassis, then the richest man in the world with only an occasional flashback to her childhood, her volatile relationships with the mother who exploited her young daughter’s voice and the sister who out-competed Calla’s for the love of the mother. Married young to a much older man, Battista Meneghini, she’d never experienced true passion. She found this once she was introduced to Onassis by Elsa Maxwell, a socialite/promoter.
I was eager to read a novel about Callas. I’ve listened to her for years on records and their more modern equivalents since I discovered opera while living a five-minute walk from La Scala. However, I found the prose rather simplistic and somewhat stilted, particularly the dialogue. Although the book takes place in Paris, Milan, Greece, New York, but I rarely got a sense of them being distinctive places, except for a description of a New York City autumn. Goodwin did do a good job on capturing Calla’s personality, her drive, and how she was essentially a self-made woman. Like her, Onassis was self-made, going from a child selling cigarettes to a wealthy man living for the most part on his ultra-luxurious yacht, and how he used people to achieve his personal goals. He bought cachet when he sought ultra-wealthy, titled people to give panache to his own life.
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Diva (St. Martin’s Press, January 23, 2024) is available through:
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