 In a bid to regain his previous success Mascagni produced "Parisina" with the help of the librettist Gabriele D’Annunzio who adapted Byron's 1816 poem of the same title.The composer was drawn to the libretto, which was initially meant to be the second part of a trilogy.The first was "Francesca da Rimini" and the third was to be "Sigismondo", which was never even started.