102. Beata viscera

An article in the newspaper Il Tirreno of January 1989 (Guidi 1989) asserted that in 1921 Puccini dedicated to Sister Maria Paolina Giusti (1897-1989) of the Augustinian Convent at Vicopelago near Lucca, a setting of the liturgical text “Beata viscera Mariae Virginis”, in recognition of the affectionate care she provided for Puccini’s own sister Iginia, the abbess of the convent, during her illness. However, all of that is certainly wrong.
The only extant manuscript for this choral composition is that “1° Soprano” part which was certainly written by a professional copyist for performance purposes. Magri 1999, pp. 208-211, speculates that Puccini composed it in 1875 when Iginia took her vows to be a nun. Magri’s speculation could be accurate, for in 1897 Puccini wrote to his sister Ramelde: “La Bohème si darà in autunno all’Imperiale di Berlino, a Vienna, a Londra. Chi l’avesse detto all’autore delle beate viscere ... [La Bohème will be given this autumn at Berlin’s Imperial Theatre, in Vienna, in London. Who would ever have thought that of the composer of beate viscere ...]” (letter of 20 May 1897, in ENOGP Ep. 2, No. 54, p. 45), which obviously hints to the composition of such a text in his early life.
The text survives as the Responsory in the Morning Office of the Christian liturgy and as the Communion in the Mass "Communes Festorum B. Mariae Virginis".