I lived from 1791-1863. I was from Italy, and am in the European category.
Belli grew up during the turbulant years of napolean's ocupation of Rome. although much of his earlier work was to convention by form and diction, by 1816, he began a series of over 2000 sonnets, using the freely expressive language of the Roman dialect.
His vivid and often ribald verse provides a rich picture of the Rome of his day, from compassionate portraits of lower-class figures to unbridled lampoons of corrupt officials of the church.
Belli wrote: "Our common people have no art: no art of speaking, nor poetical, just as any common people never had. Everything springs spontaneously from their own nature, always alive and strong, because left free to develop non-artificial qualities...".
Because of his outraged reaction to the revolutionary violence of 1848, on his death bed he asked that his anticlerical works all be burned, his confessor, however saw to it they there were all published.
The first major English translations of his work were compiled in 1981.
A monument to Belli now stands in the popular Trastevere district
An Intelectual Moralist, his works steeped with satirical portrayals of the Italian society of his day.
His vivid and often ribald verse provides a rich picture of the Rome of his day, from compassionate portraits of lower-class figures to unbridled lampoons of corrupt officials of the church.
Belli wrote: "Our common people have no art: no art of speaking, nor poetical, just as any common people never had. Everything springs spontaneously from their own nature, always alive and strong, because left free to develop non-artificial qualities...".
Because of his outraged reaction to the revolutionary violence of 1848, on his death bed he asked that his anticlerical works all be burned, his confessor, however saw to it they there were all published.
The first major English translations of his work were compiled in 1981.
A monument to Belli now stands in the popular Trastevere district
An Intelectual Moralist, his works steeped with satirical portrayals of the Italian society of his day.
Popular poetry
- Jeri, a la Pulinara, un colleggiale
Doppo fatta una predica in todesco,29 lines - L'ommini de sto monno sò l'istesso
Che vaghi de caffè ner macinino:29 lines - Quella stradaccia me la sò lograta:
Ma quanti passi me ce fussi fatto29 lines - Be'? So' pputtana, venno la mi' pelle:
Fo la miggnotta, si, sto ar cancelletto:29 lines - Cos'è er braccio de Dio! mannà un fischietto
Contr'a quer buggiarone de Golìa,29 lines - Quattro angioloni co le tromme in bocca
Se metteranno uno pe cantone29 lines - Dio doppo avé creato in pochi giorni
Quello che c'è de bello e c'é de brutto,29 lines - L'anno che Gesucristo impastò er monno,
Ché pe impastallo già c'era la pasta,29 lines - Cor zu' bravo sbordone a manimanca,
Du' pellegrini a or de vemmaria29 lines - La donna, inzino ar venti, si è contenta
Mamma, l'anni che ttiè ssempre li canta:29 lines
