Marino, Giambattista

Marino, Giambattista (jäm'bät-tē`stä märē`nō), 1569–1625, Italian poet. His florid, highly elaborated style, called Marinismo, which was akin to euphuism, was much admired and imitated in his time. He had a strong influence on writing in all European literature. Among his principal works is Adone (1623), a long narrative poem. His name sometimes appears as Marini.

Bibliography

See study by J. V. Mirollo (1963).

---

Marino, Giambattista

(born Oct. 18, 1569, Naples—died March 25, 1625, Naples) Italian poet, founder of the school of Marinism (later secentismo), which dominated 17th-century Italian poetry. Trained as a lawyer, Marino chose not to practice and instead found immense success with poetry that he managed to get published despite censorship. His most important work, a labour of 20 years, is Adonis (1623), an enormous poem (45,000 lines) that relates, with many digressions, the love story of Venus and Adonis. His work, praised throughout Europe, far surpassed that of his imitators, who carried his complicated wordplay and elaborate conceits and metaphors to such extremes that Marinism became a pejorative term.