Set in the Paris of the 19th century, La bohème recounts the life of a group of penniless bohemians who struggle to make ends meet. Then love makes its appearance and becomes the centre of everything, with the couple formed by the poet Rodolfo and the seamstress Mimì. It is love at first sight, a tender idyll which they helplessly fail to manage when she falls victim to a terrible illness. In the end, everything straightens out and love has its way, but by then, at the gates of death, it’s too late for a happy ending.

In La bohème, Puccini captures the beauty and sadness of young love and through romantically emotive melodies and unequalled moments like the aria Che gelida manina, he explores such themes as poverty and death but also solidarity and comradeship.