The Poems of Giacomo Leopardi (Dodo Press)

Giacomo Taldegardo Francesco di Sales Saverio Pietro Leopardi (1798-1837) was an Italian poet, essayist, philosopher, and philologist. He was born in Recanati, in the Marche, at the time ruled by the papacy, of a local noble family. His father was the count Monaldo Leopardi and his mother was the marquise Adelaide Antici Mattei. Up until 1815, Leopardi was essentially an erudite philologist. After this period he began to dedicate himself to literature and the search for beauty, as he affirms in a famous letter to Pietro Giordani of 1817. He lived at various points in Milan, Bologna, Florence and Pisa. The Zibaldone di Pensieri is a collection of personal impressions, aphorisms, profound philosophical observations, philological analyses, literary criticism and various types of notes which was published posthumously in seven volumes in 1898 with the original title of Pensieri di Varia Filosofia e Bella Letteratura (Various Thoughts on Philosophy and Literature).