{{Short description|Italian poet (1753–1828)}} {{Infobox person | name = Ippolito Pindemonte | image = Ippolito Pindemonte.png | image_size = | caption = | other_names = Polidete Melpomenio | birth_date = {{Birth date|1753|11|13}} | birth_place = [[Verona]], [[Republic of Venice]] | death_date = {{Death date and age|1828|11|18|1753|11|13}} | death_place = Verona, [[Kingdom of Lombardy–Venetia]] | education = | occupation = [[Poet]] | spouse = | parents = | children = | module = {{Infobox writer |embed=yes | language = {{cslist|Italian|[[Latin]]|Greek}} | period = {{cslist|[[18th century in literature|18th century]]|[[Age of Enlightenment]]}} | genres = {{hlist|[[Poetry]]|[[pamphlet]]|[[treatise]]}} | subject = | movement = {{cslist|[[Neoclassicism]] and [[Pre-romanticism]]}} | notableworks = Italian translation of the ''[[Odyssey]]'' }} }}
'''Ippolito Pindemonte''' (November 13, 1753 – November 18, 1828) was an [[Italian literature|Italian]] poet. He was an exponent of Italian [[neoclassicism]] and [[pre-romanticism]], with poems of the [[pastoral]] genre and related to [[graveyard poets]] style.
== Biography == Ippolito Pindemonte was born in Verona on 13 November 1753 into an [[Aristocracy|aristocratic]] family. His brother Giovanni Pindemonte was a prominent dramatist.{{sfn|Stebbing|1832|p=410}} He was educated at the Collegio di San Carlo in [[Modena]] and became a close friend of the mathematician and translator Giuseppe Torelli (1721–1781) and the scholar Girolamo Pompei.{{sfn|Stebbing|1832|p=397}}
He travelled to Rome in 1780 where he entered the [[Pontifical Academy of Arcadia|Arcadia]] as ''Polidete Melpomenio''. He wrote a first tragedy, ''Ulisse'', in 1777, which was followed by others, and by various poems and translations. In 1788–90 he visited [[Switzerland]], [[France]], [[England]], and [[Germany]], drawing on his experiences for a novel, ''Abaritte'' (1790).
He was deeply affected by the [[French Revolution]], residing in Paris for ten months during 1789. A brief flirtation with revolutionary ideas led to ''La Francia'' (1790), but he rejected the results of the [[reign of Terror]] and fled to Italy.{{sfn|Stebbing|1832|p=403}} He withdrew from politics and spent much of the rest of his life in his villa near Verona.
== Work == A [[Romanticism|Romantic]] poet, he was principally influenced by his friend [[Ugo Foscolo]] and [[Thomas Gray]], and was associated with the [[Della Cruscans]]. He devoted much of his life to a translation of the ''[[Odyssey]]'', which was published in 1822.<ref>{{cite book |last=Pindemonte |first=Ippolito |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZvZJAAAAcAAJ&q=Ippolito+Pindemonte |title=L'Odissea di Omero Tradotta da Ippolito Pindemonte con Aggiunta della Batracomiomachia e di Alcuni Inni Tradotti da Altri Autori |publisher=Nicolò Bettoni |year=1829 |volume=II |location=Milan |language=it |oclc=1040674154}}</ref>
During his career he tried various styles of poetry in his efforts to achieve formal perfection, from the narrative of ''Gibilterra salvata'' (1782) to the discursive ''Epistole in versi'' (1804) and ''Sermoni'' (1819).
He finds his own [[Pre-romanticism|pre-Romantic]] voice best in rustic poetry, publishing a first ''Saggio di poesie campestri'' in 1788. Though he abandoned his ''Cimiteri'' when he learnt of the imminent publication of ''[[Dei Sepolcri]]'' (which [[Ugo Foscolo|Foscolo]] dedicated to him), the unfinished poem was published with Foscolo's in a single volume in 1807.
From 1805 to 1819 he worked on his remarkable translation of the ''Odyssey'' (1822), which, rather than epic verve, displays the combination of melancholy and classical grace characteristic of pre-Romantic poetry.
Pindemonte is also the author of the short poem ''La melanconia'' ("Melancholy"), set to music by [[Vincenzo Bellini]] in the arietta ''Malinconia, Ninfa gentile''.
==Pindemonte and Villa Mosconi Bertani== Ippolito Pindemonte has been resident for many years in [[Villa Mosconi Bertani]] where he was involved in the design of the romantic park, a typical [[English garden]] also inspired by the ideas of [[Jean-Jacques Rousseau]] and the design of [[René de Girardin]].
==Works== *{{cite book|last=Pindemonte |first=Ippolito|title=Sermoni d'Ippolito Pindemonte|publisher=Società Tipografica |location=Modena|year=1819|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1BQuAAAAYAAJ}}
==Notes== {{Reflist}}
== Bibliography == * {{cite book|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kOg9AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA395|title=Lives of the Italian poets|author-link=Henry Stebbing (editor)|first=Henry|last=Stebbing|volume=3|chapter=Ippolito Pindemonte|pages=395–410|location=London|year=1832|publisher=E. Bull}}
== See also ==
* [[Vicariate of Valpolicella]]
==External links== {{Commons}} * {{DBI|first=Corrado|last=Viola|title=PINDEMONTE, Ippolito|volume=83|url=https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/ippolito-pindemonte_(Dizionario-Biografico)}} * {{CathEncy|wstitle=Ippolito Pindemonte}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pindemonte, Ippolito}} [[Category:1753 births]] [[Category:1828 deaths]]
[[Category:Poets from the Austrian Empire]] [[Category:Translators from the Austrian Empire]] [[Category:Italian poets]] [[Category:Italian male poets]] [[Category:Italian translators]] [[Category:Writers from Verona]]