At once the most light-hearted and most disturbing of Mozart and Da Ponte's Italian comic operas, Così fan tutte has provoked widely differing reactions from listeners for more than two centuries. Bruce Alan Brown offers several paths toward a closer understanding of the work, providing a detailed account of the libretto's complex origins in myth and Italian literary classics. The Handbook also reveals surprising new information on the role played by Mozart's rival Salieri. It contains a full synopsis, performance history, illustrations from key productions, and a bibliography,