"L'infinito" (; ) is a poem written by

Giacomo Leopardi Count Giacomo Taldegardo Francesco di Sales Saverio Pietro Leopardi (29 June 1798 – 14 June 1837) was an Italian philosopher, poet, essayist, and philologist. Considered the greatest Italian poet of the 19th century and one of the greatest a ...

probably in the autumn of 1819. The poem is a product of Leopardi's yearning to travel beyond his restrictive home town of

Recanati Recanati () is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the province of Macerata, in the Italian region of Marche. Recanati was founded around 1150 AD from three pre-existing castles. In 1290 it proclaimed itself an independent republic and, in the 15th c ...

and experience more of the world which he had studied. It is widely known within Italy.

Themes

The poem, though vague and ethereal in its composition, conveys elements of the philosophical and classical worlds, the latter visible in the selection of the word , from ancient Greek rather than using a more conventional to convey the isolatedness of this hill. This personification of natural environment is prominent throughout the poem and is typical of another theme or movement often associated with Leopardi:

romanticism Romanticism (also known as the Romantic movement or Romantic era) was an artistic and intellectual movement that originated in Europe towards the end of the 18th century. The purpose of the movement was to advocate for the importance of subjec ...

. There is also a keen sense of mortality throughout the poem, conveyed in the dying of seasons and drowning of thoughts, akin to Leopardi's belief that he would not live long, a belief that came true when he died at 38. According to Leopardi,

space and time In physics, spacetime, also called the space-time continuum, is a mathematical model that fuses the three dimensions of space and the one dimension of time into a single four-dimensional continuum. Spacetime diagrams are useful in visualizing ...

are finite and contain only things that are not infinite: he understands spatial infinity as a negation of physical reality: in his poetry, spaces are interminable, silences are superhuman, stillness is profound. Just as in the Masonic vision, infinity exists in man's interiority or is a mere product of human imagination.

Original text

Literal English translation

''Always dear to me was this solitary hill,
'' ''and this hedgerow, which from so great a part
'' ''of the farthest horizon excludes the sight.
'' ''But sitting and gazing,
'' ''I frame within my thought limitless
'' ''spaces beyond that

edge Edge or EDGE may refer to: Technology Computing * Edge computing, a network load-balancing system * Edge device, an entry point to a computer network * Adobe Edge, a graphical development application * Microsoft Edge, a web browser developed by ...

and superhuman
'' ''silences, and deepest quiet,
'' ''so that my heart almost takes fright.
'' ''And as I hear the wind
'' ''rustling through these plants, I compare that
'' ''infinite silence to this voice:''
''and eternity comes over me,
'' ''and the dead seasons, and the present
'' ''and living one, and its sound. Thus amid this
'' ''vastness my thought drowns:
'' ''and to be shipwrecked is sweet to me in this sea.''

Alternate translation

''This lonely hill was always dear to me,
'' ''and this hedgerow, which cuts off the view
'' ''of so much of the last horizon.
'' ''But sitting here and gazing, I can see
'' ''beyond, in my mind’s eye, unending spaces,
'' ''and superhuman silences, and depthless calm,
'' ''till what I feel
'' ''is almost fear. And when I hear
'' ''the wind stir in these branches, I begin
'' ''comparing that endless stillness with this noise:
'' ''and the eternal comes to mind,
'' ''and the dead seasons, and the present
'' ''living one, and how it sounds.
'' ''So my mind sinks in this immensity:
'' ''and foundering is sweet in such a sea.'' (translated by Jonathan Galassi)

Sonnet translation

''I’ve always loved this solitary hill,
'' ''I’ve always loved this hedge that hides from me
'' ''So much of what my earthly eyes can see.
'' ''For as I sit and gaze, all calm and still,
'' ''I conjure up my thoughts; my mind I fill
'' ''With distances that stretch out boundlessly
'' ''And silences that somehow cannot be
'' ''Heard by my heart, which feels a sudden chill.
'' ''It seems these rustling leaves, this silence vast
'' ''Blend into one. Eternity draws nigh.
'' ''The present sounds and seasons, those long past
'' ''Become one sea of endless lives and deaths.
'' ''My thought is drowned, and yet it does not die:
'' ''It plunges into sweet, refreshing depths.'' (translated by Z.G., with the title "Boundless Depths")

Modern usage

The poem is recited in the film ''

One Hundred Steps ''I cento passi'' (English: ''One Hundred Steps'' or ''The Hundred Steps'') is an Italian biographical crime drama film released in 2000, directed by Marco Tullio Giordana about the life of Peppino Impastato, a left-wing political activist who o ...

'' (2000) by the protagonist Impastato, drawing a parallel between Impastato and Leopardi.

References

{{Authority control 1819 poems Italian poems Works by Giacomo Leopardi