Diego Valeri
Diego Valeri was an Italian poet, born on January 25, 1887, in Piove di Sacco, Italy. He received his doctorate in letters from the University of Padua and later studied at the Sorbonne in Paris. Valeri taught Italian, Latin, and French literature at the University of Padua, where he became head of the department. His early poetry was significantly influenced by the city of Venice and notable poets like Giovanni Pascoli and Giosuè Carducci. His first collection, *Monodia d'amore*, celebrates the beauty of Venice, while his second work, *Le gaie tristezze*, reflects on personal loss. Over time, his style evolved, moving from sentimental verse to more controlled and meditative poetry, heavily influenced by Petrarch. Valeri also wrote in French, with notable works such as *Jeux de mots*. He passed away on November 28, 1976, leaving behind a legacy that contrasts with his modernist peers and continues the classical lyric tradition through his exploration of themes like love and time.
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Diego Valeri
Nonfiction Writer
- Born: January 25, 1887
- Birthplace: Piove di Sacco, Italy
- Died: November 28, 1976
- Place of death: Rome, Italy
Biography
Diego Valeri was born in Piove di Sacco, Italy, on January 25, 1887. He received his doctorate in letters from the University of Padua in 1908 before winning a scholarship to study at the Sorbonne in Paris in 1909. He returned to Padua and taught Italian and Latin in classical lycea, and then French literature at the University of Padua, where he became head of the department. Perhaps the greatest influences on his early poetry were the city of Venice, the eulogists Giovanni Pascoli and Giosuè Carducci, and the crepuscolari (twilight poets).
Monodia d’amore, Valeri’s first poetry collection, published in 1908, celebrates Venice’s sensual beauty and romance-inspiring aura. His second book, a eulogistic response to his brother Ugo’s death titled Le gaie tristezze (the joyful sorrow) imitates both the aforementioned eulogists’ style and the twilight poets’ language and emphasis on the dark side of the psyche. While Venice remained an inspiration in Valeri’s more mature work, his literary inspiration came largely from Petrarch. The evidence of this influence lies in Valeri’s movement away from highly sentimental, exclamatory verse and idealized images to controlled, concise, meditative verse and concrete images.
This change is notable beginning in Poesie vecchie e nuove (poems old and new) published in 1930, which also demonstrates the Petrarchan influence in the unified quality of the verse as well as the foci on love and time. Later works continue to emphasize time and the landscape of Venice, which some critics note becomes increasingly more human in its portrayal. In addition to the poetry, essays, translations, and critical work Valeri wrote in Italian, he also composed poems in French such as those in his collection Jeux de mots (word games), published in 1956.
Valeri died on November 28, 1976. His posthumous publications are Poesie scelte, 1910-1975 (1977), Invito al Veneto (1977), Poesie inedite o come (1978), and La domencia col poeta (1979). Diego Valeri’s achievement as a writer is his reversal of the gloomy, negative tone of his fellow modernist contemporaries and his development of the ideals and of tensions found in classical poetry so that his poetry is a continuation of the classical lyric tradition.