With rhymes about the human fate. Philosophy in the poetry of Giacomo Leopardi

Aleksandra Koman

doi:10.18778/1505-9057.59.06

Authors

Aleksandra Koman Mgr, Pedagogical University of Cracow, Faculty of Philology, Institute of Modern Languages, Laboratory of Italian Literature, Podchorążych 2, 30-084 Cracow https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5352-1665

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.18778/1505-9057.59.06

Keywords:

Leopardi, philosophy, poetry, philosophical discourse, literary discourse, figures of speech, imagination, cognition, truth

Abstract

Giacomo Leopardi is one of those authors whose texts oscillate on the border between literature and philosophy. It is true that Leopardi does not use traditional forms of philosophical expression, but the fact is that most of the considerations of the Italian thinker are expressed by the simultaneous conduct of two discourses: literary and philosophical. Leopardi experimented almost every form of literary expression, but he went down in history mainly as a poet, who contained a significant part of his highest beliefs in poetry. The practice of philosophizing through poetry is nothing new in literature, and the various connections between literature and philosophy are almost ancient, but the ongoing discussions in the world of Italian critics about the relationship between Leopardi and philosophy suggest that the reflective lyrics of the famous poet from Recanati are an noteworthy case. This article is a reflection on the use of figures of speech in the process of explaining the worldview by Leopardi, with particular emphasis on metaphor, and on the overall impact of the poetic medium on the presentation and shaping of adopted ideology.

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Author Biography

Aleksandra Koman, Mgr, Pedagogical University of Cracow, Faculty of Philology, Institute of Modern Languages, Laboratory of Italian Literature, Podchorążych 2, 30-084 Cracow

Aleksandra Koman – obtained her BA and MA in Italian Philology at the Pedagogical University of Cracow (specialisation: translation as intercultural communication). She is currently in her third year of a PhD programme in literary studies. She is preparing a doctoral dissertation on theatrical interpretations of Italian literature in Krakow after October 1956, the aim of which is to find an answer to the question about the conditions for the reception of Italian literature in the Polish People’s Republic. Her interests focus on Italian literature of the 20th century, comparative theatre studies and the reception of Luigi Pirandello’s plays in Poland.

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