Opera poster for Isabeau. Isabeau is a leggenda drammatica or opera in three parts by Pietro Mascagni, 1911, from an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica. It was a retelling of the medieval English legend of Lady Godiva, Mascagni described it in an interview as his attempt to "return to the romanticism which inspired so much of Italian opera." Created by Giuseppi Palanti (1881 - 1946), who was typically an oil painter but also did lithography.