Cavalcanti, Guido

Cavalcanti, Guido (gwē`dō kävälkän`tē), c.1255–1300, Italian poet; friend of Dante, whose work was greatly influenced by Cavalcanti's style. He belonged to the White faction in the struggle of the Guelphs in Florence and was exiled to Sarzana. There he fell ill with malaria and died soon after his recall. Much of his verse, very little of which remains, is in the Canzone d'amore [song of love]. For translations, see his Sonnets and Ballate (tr. by Ezra Pound, 1912) and Lorna de' Lucchi, An Anthology of Italian Poems (1922).

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Cavalcanti, Guido

(born c. 1255, Florence—died Aug. 27/28, 1300, Florence) Italian poet. Born into an influential Florentine family, he studied with the philosopher and scholar Brunetto Latini, who had earlier taught Dante, Cavalcanti's close friend. After Dante, he is considered the greatest Italian poet and personality in 13th-century Italian literature. He left about 50 poems, many addressed to two women and on the theme of love. His language demonstrates the grace and directness of the dolce stil nuovo (“sweet new style”). Dante Gabriel Rossetti and Ezra Pound translated his poems.

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Cavalcanti, Guido 

Born 1255 or 1259 in Florence; died there in 1300. Italian poet.

After G. Guinizelli, Cavalcanti became the major poet of the dolce stil nuovo. His canzones and sonnets celebrated sublime love for an idealized woman and attempted to reveal the philosophical meaning of this love. He also composed verses on earthly love, characterized by freshness and spontaneity (for example, his ballad “I Met a Shepherdess in the Woods”).

WORKS

Le rime … edite e inedite. Florence, 1813.
In Russian translation:
“Sonety.” In Khrestomatiia po zarubezhnoi literature: Literatura sred-nikh vekov. Compiled by B. I. Purishev and R. O. Shor. Moscow, 1953.

REFERENCES

De Sanctis, F. Istoriia itaVianskoi literatury, vol. 1. Moscow, 1963. Storia della letteratura italiana, vol. 1. Milan, 1965.