William Tell was Rossini's longest opera—and his last. Maybe it was the writing of so long a work (its original performance took over six hours) that discouraged him from writing more. At any rate, though William Tell was a great critical success, he did not write another opera although he lived almost forty years more. Rossini himself authorized a version that was cut from five to three acts, and for a while it was even customary, in Paris, to give Act II alone, with another opera to fill out the bill. The story goes that one time the director of the Орerа told the composer that Act II of William Tell was on the bill for that night. "What?" exclaimed the bitter Rossini. "Аll of it?"
 

For many years it was customary to say that The Barber of Seville and William Tell were the only Rossini operas which had survived the composer many years in the repertoires of the great opera houses. Whether because of its length or because of the extremely demanding tenor role of Arnold, Tell can no longer be called "standard" repertoire, while other Rossini operas, like La cenerentola and The Italian in Algiers, are being revived with greater frequency. The fact is that The Barber has by far the best libretto of the lot. The William Tell story is serviceable enough, but little better than that.

In several countries, during the politically sensitive 1830’s, it was regarded as dangerously revolutionary. Accordingly, the libretto was revised, and in Milan the opera was called Guglielmo Vallace (that is, the Scottish Wallace)，in Rome Rodolfo di Sterlinga, in London and Berlin Andreas Hofer, and in St Petersburg Karl Smily (Charles the Bold). It seems odd that the censors should have been more frightened of the name of an almost completely mythical revolutionary than of some real ones. But many things that censor do seem odd.