he was in danger of being supplanted in the public's affections by rising star Gilbert Louis Duprez. Donizetti returned to Naples, arriving by February 24, where he began planning for the production of Poliuto. However, he had also hoped for a permanent supervisory appointment at the Collegio di San Pietro a Maiella. Instead, it went to the composer, Saverio Mercadante. Therefore, on 25 May 1838, Donizetti responded to an invitation from the Paris Opéra to compose two new works, specifying that the contract would require a libretto from Scribe with specific performance dates and a rehearsal periods included. With Donizetti committed to produce his next opera for Naples, musicologist William Ashbrook notes that the composer wrote Poliuto "with more than half an eye to its potential for it being recast as a French grand opera", something he had also done when writing L'assedio di Calais two years earlier, but which failed to gain attention outside Italy. Since Nourrit was staying in Naples at the same time, determined to "take on a [singing] technique which was so different from that which he had been taught", he was grateful to the composer for lessons in that technique. Writing to his wife, he expresses his joy "at being born to a new artistic life" in singing Italian opera under the composer's direction, and he adds that Donizetti is "pulling strings to get me engaged here" It is known that the tenor greatly influenced the composer in his choice of subject and in the progress of the new opera, such that Donizetti tailored the title role for the tenor who had then been engaged for the autumn season in Naples. However, he is also regarded as influencing Cammarano's contribution in adapting Corneille's play from what Ashbrook describes as "a spiritual drama, with its carefully observed unities" into a Romantic melodrama. This was achieved by adding elements such as Poliuto's jealousy, which did not exist in the original and, most especially, altering the play's narrative perspective of the action (which was originally seen through the eyes of Pauline's confidante, Stratonice) into directly-shown dramatic action, especially evidenced at the end of act 2 with Poliuto's overthrow of the altar. The composer began work by 10 May on the music for the opera, which appears to have been planned for the autumn season. However, by the middle of June, a glitch in the proceedings had appeared in