Giacomo Leopardi, (born June 29, 1798, Recanati, Papal States—died June 14, 1837) Italian poet, scholar, and philosopher whose outstanding scholarly and philosophical works and superb lyric poetry place him among the great writers of the 19th century.

A precocious, congenitally deformed child of noble but apparently insensitive parents, Giacomo quickly exhausted the resources of his tutors. At the age of 16 he independently had mastered Greek, Latin, and several modern languages, had translated many classical works, and had written two tragedies, many Italian poems, and several scholarly commentaries. Excessive study permanently damaged his health: after bouts of poor vision, he eventually became blind in one eye and developed a cerebrospinal condition that afflicted him all his life. Forced to suspend his studies for long periods, wounded by his parents’ unconcern, and sustained only by happy relationships with his brother and sister, he poured out his hopes and his bitterness in poems such as Appressamento della morte (written 1816, published 1835; “Approach of Death”), a visionary work in terza rima, imitative of Petrarch and Dante but written with considerable poetic skill and inspired by a genuine feeling of despair.

Two experiences in 1817 and 1818 robbed Leopardi of whatever optimism he had left: his frustrated love for his married cousin, Gertrude Cassi (subject of his journal Diario d’amore and the elegy “Il primo amore”), and the death from consumption of Terese Fattorini, young daughter of his father’s coachman, subject of one of his greatest lyrics, “A Silvia.” The last lines of this poem express the anguish he felt all his life: “O nature, nature, / Why dost thou not fulfill / Thy first fair promise? / Why dost thou deceive / Thy children so?

Leopardi’s genius, his frustrated hopes, and his pain found their best outlet in his poetry, which is admired for its brilliance, intensity, and effortless musicality. His finest poems are probably the lyrics called “Idillii” in early editions of his poetry, among which is “A Silvia.” One English translation of his prose works is James Thomson’s Essays, Dialogues, and Thoughts (1905). Among many translations of Leopardi’s poetry are R.C. Trevelyan’s Translations From Leopardi and J.-P. Barricelli’s Poems.