in the 18th century metastasio was a very famous librettist. many of his libretti were set several times by different composers. another 18th century librettist was lorenzo da ponte, who wrote the libretti for three of mozart's greatest operas, as well as for many other composers. in the 19th century eugène scribe wrote a very large number of libretti that were set to music by composers such as meyerbeer, auber, bellini, donizetti, rossini and verdi. two french writers called henri meilhac and ludovic halévy wrote many opera and operetta libretti for the composers jacques offenbach, jules massenet and georges bizet. arrigo boito, who wrote libretti for, among others, giuseppe verdi and amilcare ponchielli, composed two operas of his own. hugo von hoffmansthal wrote libretti for richard strauss.