Giacomo Leopardi

Giacomo Leopardi, Count (June 29, 1798 – June 14, 1837) was a major Italian Romantic poet, often considered alongside Dante and Petrarch as Italy's greatest poets.

Emergence of the poet

It was during this time (July 1817) that he started writing the Zibaldone, his immense collection of thoughts and verses, which eventually numbered more than 4,000 pages. He also began his correspondence with the Abate Pietro Giordani, whom he had met by sending Giordani a copy of his translation of the Aeneid. His friendship with Giordani, at the time one of the leading literary figures in Italy, proved to be the turning point in Leopardi's life, as it introduced him personally to the intellectual life beyond the narrow confines of Recanati. The correspondence with Giordani, carried out over many years, reveals the growth of Leopardi's intellect, but the proportional depth of his unhappiness with his personal circumstances.

Related Topics:
Zibaldone - Pietro Giordani - Aeneid

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Leopardi's first public acclaim came from two early patriotic canti, written in 1818. The first, All'Italia, is a lengthy (and by modern standards, perhaps bombastic) recounting of Italy's past glories and a call to reclaim them. Its success was not for literary reasons alone, as Italy at the time was highly fragmented politically and partially under foreign occupation. Similarly, in his ode, Sopra il monumento di Dante, the great poet's ghost is called up and shown how low the land has fallen.

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In 1819 Leopardi tried to run away from home, but his father discovered his plan and stopped him. His isolation, physical suffering (which included temporary blindness), and the oppression of being confined in his household led him into depths of despair. But out of this dark period the poet, now in his twenty-first year, began to write with greater depth and maturity. In 1819, he wrote six of the early Idilli, including L'Infinito and Alla luna, all of them considered masterpieces of lyric poetry, and the following year wrote another patriotic poem, Ad Angelo Mai.

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In 1821, he completed La vita solitaria, often considered the last of the early Idylls, and five long poems that Carducci referred to as Canzoni-Odi and that were published in 1824. He also developed his philosophical theory about pleasure (piacer, figlio d'affanno - pleasure is son to worry, to anguish, and it requires great labor to achieve).

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