Zibaldone

by Leopardi, Giacomo

  Z 4175

  1. Luigi Blasucci has noted (in an unpublished paper) that Leopardi gives the responsibility of this “system” to a fictional character, and that on Z 4257–58 he will embrace a much less radical view.

  2. Voltaire, Poème sur le désastre de Lisbonne, l. 120. This poem is conceived as a confutation of the axiom “Tout est bien.” The Lisbon earthquake in 1755 led to the publication of a huge number of pamphlets reflecting on the meaning, religious and philosophical, of the sudden destruction of a magnificent Enlightenment city.

  Z 4177

  1. Leopardi’s vision of a violent and cruel nature bears some resemblance to that of Sade (see Rigoni, “Leopardi, Sade e il dio del male,” in Il pensiero di Leopardi [B11]), or of Joseph de Maistre (Damiani)—an author repeatedly recommended to Leopardi by his legitimist uncle, Carlo Antici—in particular in a passage from the seventh dialogue of Les soirées de Saint-Petersbourg: “As soon as you leave the inanimate kingdom, you find the decree of violent death written on the very frontiers of life. You feel it already in the vegetable kingdom: from the immense catalpa to the humblest herb, how many plants die, and how many are killed! As soon as you enter the animal kingdom, the law suddenly becomes frighteningly obvious … There is no instant of time when some living thing is not devoured by another” (St. Petersburg Dialogues, trans. Richard A. Lebrun, Montreal/Kingston/London: McGill-Queen’s U.P., 1993, p. 216; a passage cited by Isaiah Berlin in his portrait of Maistre, The Crooked Timber of Humanity, London 1990, p. 111 and note). Leopardi had dealt with the vital sensibility of plants in a youthful essay “Sopra l’anima delle bestie” (“On the soul of animals”), perhaps referring to book VI of Polignac’s Anti-Lucretius, which was in the LL in translation (see Dissertazioni [B2], and Fenoglio, p. 177 [B11]). It has been suggested by Chiara Fenoglio that the metaphor of the “vast hospital” might be a recollection of the definition of the world as a “hospital of the wounded” given by Heraclitus in one of Fénelon’s Dialogues des morts (“Démocrite et Héraclite,” in Leçons, tome 1, p. 461).

  2. It is hard to tell which work by Voltaire features these expressions.

  3. See Z 30–31 and note, 3441–43.

  4. Petrarch, Rime 115, ll. 5–6, corresponding to no. 79 in Leopardi’s commentary on the Rime which came out in Milan with Stella in 1826. The Grecism at issue here consists of the verb of perception governing the predicative participle instead of the infinitive.

  Z 4178

  1. For Leopardi infinite space, time, and nothingness do not exist “except in thought or in language” (Z 4181–82). This is the conclusion of a lifelong speculation on infinity starting with the poem “L’infinito” (1819), which embodied this same idea, followed by the notes of Z 165–82 (the “theory of pleasure”), 472–73, 1744–47, 1927–30, where Leopardi clarifies his poetics of the indefinite.

  Z 4179

  1. Petrarch, Rime 270, l. 31; 359, l. 37; 166, l. 14.

  2. Casaubon’s Animadversiones, bk. 1, ch. 25, p. 44 (on Athenaeus 32c).

  Z 4180

  1. Casaubon, Animadversiones, p. 72.

  2. See, more radically, Z 4087.

  Z 4181

  1. See Z 56 and note 2.

  2. The problem of the eternity of matter had been addressed with the operetta morale “Frammento apocrifo di Stratone da Lampsaco” (1825), on which see Z 4248 and note 5. On the idea of “infinity” see Z 4141–43, 4177–78 and note, 4274–75, 4292.

  Z 4182

  1. Casaubon’s Animadversiones, bk. 3, ch. 4, p. 96, where he is concerned with the transformation of a rough breathing into an “s.”

  2. Petrarch, Rime 27, l. 7 and 119, l. 42. This second example is also mentioned on Z 4000.

  3. A genre that imitated the style of Domenico di Giovanni, called Burchiello, an Italian poet known for the obscure, paradoxical, and apparently absurd language used in his sonnets.

  4. Leopardi read Demetrius in Rhetores selecti, ed. Gale. The references in this text are to Homer, Odyssey 3, 278; Aristophanes, Clouds 178–79; Sophron, fr. 109 from the Women of Messenia (ed. Kaibel); Menander, fr. 268 (ed. Koerte). The last remark is an interlinear addition. A “frottola” is a poetic form of popular origin, consisting of nonsense rhymes, proverbs, and sayings, etc., often juxtaposed with no logical connection, e.g., Petrarch, Rime 105.

  Z 4183

  1. Casaubon, Animadversiones, p. 110 (on Athenaeus 91d).

  2. Casaubon, Animadversiones, pp. 58–59, who cites Seneca: “eating meat without the company of a friend is the life of a lion or a wolf” (Epistulae 19, 10).

  3. Leopardi here writes comessazione, a Latinism signifying making merry after a banquet, usually involving a walk by night with music.

  4. The last two sentences are a ms. marginal addition. In the passage cited Casaubon recalls the ancient saying “in convivio plurimum omnes loquimur” [“at a banquet, we all speak a great deal”].

  Z 4185

  1. Regarding Leopardi’s wish to promote a “middling civilization” see Z 114–15, 404, 408–409, 420–23, where he expounds this concept. On the idea of “returned barbarism” see Z 314 and note. Cf. Muñiz, “Sul concetto di decadenza storica in Leopardi,” in Il pensiero storico (B7), pp. 375–90.

  Z 4186

  1. Cf. Z 56 and note 2.

  2. On this crucial problem cf. Z 416 and note, 3799.

  Z 4187

  1. Cf. Z 104 and note 1.

  Z 4188

  1. This and the following quotation from Monti, Proposta, vol. 3, part 2, at the pages cited.

  2. The quoted translation by Annibale Caro corresponds to Virgil, Aeneid 4, 276–78.

  3. Casaubon, Animadversiones, p. 137. The saying of Bion Borysthenes, a disciple of Theophrastus (Fragmenta philosophorum Graecorum, ed. F. Mullach, Paris 1881–1883, vol. 2, p. 427, fr. 43), is also transcribed on Z 4469 and ended up in the Pensieri 53.

  4. Casaubon, Animadversiones, p. 144 (on Athenaeus 94d).

  Z 4189

  1. This quotation from Melchiorre Gioia, Filosofia della statistica, Milan 1826, tome 1, p. 160, is in Antologia, vol. 22, 1826, p. 84. There follows a brief résumé by the (anonymous) reviewer, and then a verbatim quotation (from “Anyone” to the end of quotation). The reference to the Journal des Voyages is in Gioia’s book, but the latter cites pp. 109–12 and not just p. 111.

  2. Leopardi’s irony is because of his recognition of his own belief—in earlier times—in Nature’s “harmony” (Z 1597 and note), and perhaps of his doubts (Z 870–71). See also Z 4175–77, 4204–205.

  3. This doctrine, as propagated by the German doctor Franz Anton Mesmer, was based upon the theory of animal magnetism. Leopardi might have learned of it through the articles published in 1817 by his friend Francesco Orioli in the “Opuscoli scientifici,” held by the LL (Polizzi, “per le forze eterne…,” pp. 24–27 [B11]). See also the review of Orioli’s essays in Biblioteca Italiana, tome 11, July 1818, p. 121; and an account by E. Basevi, “Del magnetismo animale,” in Antologia, tome 22, no. 66, June 1826, pp. 1–21.

  Z 4190

  1. See Z 304–305, 2709–11, 4135–36.

  2. Leopardi had composed a “Hymn to Neptune” in 1816, and in his note 7 he had cited Statius, Thebaid 6, 305.

  3. Monti, Proposta, vol. 3, part 2.

  4. The differences between all the ancient philosophical schools seem irrelevant to Leopardi compared with the radical discontinuity between ancient and modern civilization: see Z 4171–72 and note. What is common to all of them is that they are “practical,” not “theoretical” (see Z 522 and note). The parenthesis is an interlinear addition from 1827.

  5. Leopardi mistakenly writes “Catullus” instead of “Tibullus.”

  6. Sallust, Bellum Iugurthinum 35, 10.

  7. Leopardi read Aristophanes in the ed. by Aemilius Portus, Comoediae XI, Geneva 1607; the Argumenti antiqui, i.e., the summaries, preceded the texts of the comedies, and in this thought Leopardi is concerned with The Frogs and Peace.

  8. The lin
e from Aristophanes, Clouds, is also cited without any further qualification in Dio Chrysostom, read in Frédéric Morel’s edition Orationes LXXX, Paris 1604 (Pacella).

  Z 4191

  1. See Z 2845–61.

  Z 4192

  1. The double negation at the very end of this thought was added on the same line but after the date. It reminds us of the triple negation at the end of the diary (Z 4525).

  2. Pierre Bayle, Dictionnaire historique et critique, under “Manichéens”: “La Raison humaine … c’est un principe de destruction, et non pas d’édification.” Leopardi did not own a copy of Bayle’s work but this particular aphorism was well known and much cited (e.g., in a letter to Karl Bunsen, 3 August 1825, Epistolario, p. 917, and again in a letter to his publisher A. F. Stella, 23 August 1827, ibid., p. 1370). Cf. Damiani, L’impero, pp. 86–93 (B11). See Z 304–305, 2705–709, 4135–36, 4189–90.

  Z 4193

  1. This thought anticipates what Leopardi will more explicitly say on Z 4289, that “There is still much to be recovered from ancient civilization” in the sense that it precedes the establishment of positive truths. See also Z 4477–78 and note 2. In the parenthesis, Leopardi appears to gesture toward the Hobbesian objection to neo-Roman theories of liberty, namely that it is confusing to suppose that there is any connection between the establishment of free states and the maintenance of individual liberty. The objection was subsequently taken up by Constant and articulated in Isaiah Berlin’s notion of “negative liberty” (possibly entailing a misreading of Constant). For the whole question, see Quentin Skinner, Liberty Before Liberalism, Cambridge: Cambridge U.P. [1998], 2010, pp. 59–99; the characterization of Hobbes above is taken from p. 60. See also Z 2668–69 and 4041–42.

  2. Photius, Myriobiblon, col. 309. Other examples of this Greek construction on Z 4208.

  3. Cited from Suetonius, Caesares, ed. La Harpe.

  4. Saxo Grammaticus was a Danish chronicler (1150–1204) who composed a Danorum regum historiae, or Gesta Danorum, a work of interest on account of the descriptions it contains of early Scandinavian literature. Leopardi learned of this author through Andrés.

  Z 4194

  1. Eusèbe Salverte, “Des dragons et des serpens monstrueux, qui figurent dans un grand nombre de récits fabuleux ou historiques,” loc. cit., pp. 301–26, 623–35.

  Z 4196

  1. Piero Treves, in his anthology Lo studio dell’antichità classica nell’Ottocento, Milan and Naples: Ricciardi, 1962, p. 501, note 2, remarks that this psychological portrait of Tiberius “is perhaps the first attempt at an historiographical revision of the literary tradition relating to the second Emperor” and makes reference to other writers between 1846 and 1887 who reevaluated Tiberius along these lines: a case of “missing reception,” since the Zibaldone was still unpublished.

  2. Photius, Myriobiblon, col. 60. All the interpolations are by Leopardi.

  3. Segesta is a town on the northwest coast of Sicily.

  4. Photius, Myriobiblon, col. 61. Leopardi records the same construction on Z 4193, 4208, 4210.

  Z 4197

  1. The translation into French is by La Harpe.

  2. The verse from Menander is quoted in Stobaeus, Sententiae, discourse 104 (“De illis qui fortunati sunt indigne”), ed. Basel 1549, p. 563 (4, 42, 3 Hense), and in Suetonius (ed. La Harpe), at the places indicated.

  3. This note is an addition to Z 4197, where Leopardi cross-refers to this page. For Suetonius, the character of Tiberius manifested itself from the earliest period of his principate, when “he still sought to ingratiate himself with the people, simulating moderation.”

  4. Poliorcetics is the art of siege warfare and fortification.

  Z 4198

  1. Leopardi will later use the heading “Social Machiavellianism” (cf. Z 4440, 4469, 4501, 4502).

  2. Cf. D. Scaramucci, “Aeronautilia, cioè navigazione per aria,” in Antologia, tome 6, June 1822, pp. 91–118. See Z 1738 and note.

  Z 4199

  1. A disenchanted view of technical progress is also in the operetta morale “Proposta di premi fatta dall’accademia dei Sillografi” and in the “Palinodia” in verse to Gino Capponi (in the Canti).

  Z 4200

  1. Photius, Myriobiblon, col. 145. All the interpolations are Leopardi’s. The English translation given here is made from the Greek. The Latin version that follows is by Schott. Artaxerxes’s nickname means “mindful.”

  2. Photius, Myriobiblon, col. 169. Eunapius’s work is a continuation of the Chronological history of Dexippus.

  3. Petrarch, Rime 214, 33.

  4. Caro’s Gli amori pastorali di Dafni e Cloe [The Pastoral Loves of Daphnis and Chloe] (first ed. Parma 1786) are cited from the second volume of the collection Erotici greci volgarizzati, also cited on Z 4145.

  5. Here provveduto has an active meaning. See Z 4121.

  6. Monti, Proposta, vol. 3, part 2, p. 193.

  7. Photius, Myriobiblon, col. 204. Schott’s Latin reads: “reficit.”

  Z 4201

  1. Giovanni Andrea dell’Anguillara, Le metamorfosi d’Ovidio, Milan 1805, vol. 1, p. 243.

  2. See Z 4200 and note 4. Caro in fact writes, on the last page of bk. 1, “ne insertarono ghirlande”; the other two quotations are literal.

  3. A variety of deep red apple also mentioned by Boccaccio in Decameron 3, 4.

  4. The Greek adjective signifies “good” but also “foolish.”

  Z 4202

  1. Photius, Myriobiblon, cols. 319–20. The interpolations are Leopardi’s.

  Z 4203

  1. Photius, Myriobiblon, col. 340.

  Z 4204

  1. A kind of mimic dance with song.

  2. Athenaeus, Deipnosophistae, 175d. King Juba of Mauritania was the author of a history of the theater, probably the first written in Greek, during the reign of Augustus. None of Juba’s writings have survived.

  3. See Z 1597 and note.

  Z 4205

  1. An example of positivized diminutive discussed on Z 4041.

  Z 4206

  1. The odd phrase, literally “back you and wall,” alludes to an anti-Austrian (or more broadly, anti-Germanic) story that was told in Lombardy at least as early as the Napoleonic Wars and went on being told with various embellishments up to the First World War and beyond. Austrian officer orders back a new recruit/platoon of soldiers/throng of Italian patriots. Recruit/platoon/patriots protest they cannot go further back because there’s a wall. Bone-headed officer shouts “Zurück! Addietro! Tu e muro!” The barked command is picked up by the Milanese dialect poet Carlo Porta (“quant a quest sont todesch zorocch tì e mur”), and, coherently, Leopardi will use that purposeful crustacean, the crab, to depict the Austrian occupiers in his political satire Paralipomeni della Batracomiomachia, written in the early 1830s.

  Z 4207

  1. On this subject see Z 601–606, 1635–36, and 4111.

  Z 4208

  1. As Muñiz (Letture di Leopardi [B12]) has pointed out, Leopardi takes the French phrase from an article by Simonde de Sismondi in the Revue Encyclopédique (January 1826, tome 29, p. 21). Leopardi has in mind the cultural reaction of traditionalist thinkers in Restoration Europe such as Bonald, Maistre, and Lamennais, and, more generally, the “idealistic” and generally “religious” inclinations of French Romantic culture.

  2. Cf. Leopardi, “La ginestra,” ll. 52–58 and 72–86.

  3. Ovid, Metamorphoses 4, 445–46.

  4. In the passages cited Leopardi underlines two other examples of the Greek construction recorded on Z 4193, 4196, and 4210. The following paragraph is written after the subsequent one, but resituated here by means of a crosslet and the phrase “See below.”

  5. Stephanus of Byzantium and Parthenius are cited in the Latin marginal notes of André Schott to Conon’s Narrationes; see Photius, Myriobiblon, col. 430.

  Z 4209

  1. Leopardi gives his own translation of this Greek passage, proceeding then to offer various ways of saying the same thing in
Italian, which have not been translated here.

  2. This note is a ms. unattached marginal addition, where Leopardi probably alludes to Varia historia 2, 33, a passage not cited by Schott, in which Aelian does not recount the story of the two young men of Catania, but simply recalls the river Anapus.

  Z 4210

  1. In the passage of Photius Leopardi underlines the same construction recorded above, Z 4193, 4196, and 4208.

  2. Leopardi says here that the first expression (to hit with the flat of the sword) is the opposite of the second, in which the verb (to take up) means metaphorically to kill.

  3. This passage is cited from Aelius Aristides, Orationum tomi tres, ed. W. Canter, Geneva 1604 (note that the author of this oration is doubtful; see S. A. Stertz, in The Classical Quarterly, New Series, 1979, no. 29, pp. 172–97). In the passage cited the case is again made for “Fare with an accusative of time, for passare” (Z 4167).

  Z 4211

  1. Schott translated the adverb with “adeo procul.”

  2. There follow Leopardi’s translation, then Schott’s Latin translation.

  3. Plato, Phaedo 256a. See also Z 4164, last paragraph.

  4. See Z 4210, first paragraph, and note 1.

  Z 4212

  1. Leopardi here translates the Greek passage into Italian.

  2. In fact Pope Zachary lived in the eighth century; he was Pope from 741 to 752.

  3. That is, Eutychius Proclus, a grammarian of the second century CE and the tutor of the emperor Marcus Aurelius.

  Z 4213

  1. In the words said by Helladius Leopardi found confirmation of what he had already asserted on Z 4020 and 4125.

  2. Horace, Odes 4, 8, 8.

  3. Plutarch, Moralia 305e. The passage from Stobaeus has already been quoted by Leopardi on Z 4152–53.

  Z 4214

  1. In English in the original.

  Z 4215

  1. The reference to Pliny is a marginal addition. There follows a crossed-out reference to “Aelian history of animals.”