The Poems of Leopardi

Giacomo Leopardi wrote from the abyss, and made it sing. Born in 1798 in the provincial Italian town of Recanati, he spent his short life in relentless physical pain and intellectual isolation, yet produced poetry of startling beauty and terrifying honesty. He was the first European writer to articulate the specific anguish of modern consciousness: the hollow spaces between desire and fulfillment, the cruel indifference of nature, the unbearable weight of knowing oneself. His verses ache with longing for a world that never existed while simultaneously exposing the lie at the heart of that longing. Galassi's translation finally captures the fierce, clear music of Leopardi's Italian, preserving both his philosophical rigor and his devastating emotional directness. This is not comfortable poetry. It is poetry for those who have lain awake at 3 a.m., staring at the ceiling, understanding exactly what Leopardi meant when he wrote that happiness is impossible, and that the very act of wanting destroys peace.