Il trovatore has more to say to people of today than one might think. Its characters, people in search of answers and their own identities, live their lives under the dark shadow of vengeance and the struggle with each other and the world. Verdi's opera – Italian Romanticism to the very core – was created in the 1850s, years seething with unrest, around a story that takes place in the 15th century. More often than not, however, the past overtakes the present: we ourselves are repeating history, because we believe that certain things can never happen again.