Born in Recanati, Italy, he was a son of Monaldo Leopardi, a minor count of a small village in Marches that was ruled by the papacy. Giacomo's mother was the marquise Adelaide Antici. He grew up in practical isolation, with his father and a few priests as teachers. The father was extremely influential to the poet: perhaps a man of limited practical sense, he lost most of his patrimony in failed businesses, but he assembled an expensive and extraordinary library that was opened to the public in 1812.
Giacomo's loneliness, made worse by the formality of family manners (from the age of six, he was made to dress in black like his father), drove him into his father's library, where he read widely. A sort of child prodigy, by the age of ten he no longer needed tutors and by the time he was 17 he had mastered most areas of knowledge. He later referred to this devotion to study as "crazy and desperate". Nevertheless, it resulted in great expertise in classical languages (he learned at least seven languages, including Hebrew), and also history, philosophy, philology, natural sciences, and astronomy. The long periods of study in an unhealthy environment may have contributed to his asthma and scoliosis, and his weak eyesight was attributed to reading by candle light.
Leopardi began work as a translator (mainly of ancient classical works -- notably a version of Horace's Ars Poetica in ottava rima). He also wrote some minor treatises such as a History of Astronomy (1813) and an essay on Popular errors of ancients (1815), both interesting works with plenty of curious facts and anecdotes. He also wrote a fake Greek poem (Scherzi epigrammatici). In 1816 he wrote to the Biblioteca Italiana (literary magazine), defending the position of Italian classicists in answer to the famous assertions of Madame de Stael about translations and academic poetry. This was when he is considered to have passed "from erudition to beauty", from study to poetry and other composition, abandoning aseptic philology and the false taste of Arcadia in favor of a fresh neoclassical modern style. At this time he started writing the Zibaldone, his immense collection of thoughts and verses, and began his correspondence with Pietro Giordani. These letters reveal the intellectual depth of the young poet, as well as the proportional depth of his psychological problems, with his difficulty in accepting and acting within the context in which he lived. He may have fallen in love with his married cousin, Gertrude Cassi, during a visit to the family at Recanati. However, Natalino Sapegno, one of the most important Italian literary critics, suggests that he composed his Diario d'Amore while experiencing the discovery of romantic love, like many adolescents.
In 1819 Leopardi tried to run away from home, but his father discovered his plan and stopped him. He wrote about his physical condition in his letters, after temporary blindness forced him to stop reading. Soon after, he wrote some of the Idilli, including L'Infinito and Alla luna. He also developed his philosophical theory about pleasure (piacer, figlio d'affanno - pleasure is son to worry, to anguish, and it requires great labor to achieve). In 1822 his father allowed him to leave Recanati for a brief stay in Rome, but the poet was unhappy and could not find a suitable job. He was soon back in the palazzo, having lost his faith. The ornate celebrations of the Papacy's temporal power that he had seen in Rome were another disgusting element that prompted his return. Before leaving Rome, however, Leopardi had become well known, and his work was appreciated.
With the composition of his Operette Morali, Leopardi put into his works his saddest philosophical thoughts, and his historical pessimism (rationality as a cause for unhappiness) and his cosmic pessimism (nature as the source of human troubles because it gives illusions -- Ahi Natura, Natura, perché non rendi poi, quel che prometti allor?) were rendered in their complex entirety.
In 1825 he finally left Recanati for Milan, where he started working for an editor, Fortunato Stella. Then he visited Bologna (vainly following the countess Teresa Malvezzi, who fascinated him) and Florence, where he met Alessandro Manzoni (the other great Italian poet of the century), Viesseux, and Gioberti. In Pisa he wrote A Silvia. In 1830 some friends provided him with a regular stipend, which allowed him to finally forget Recanati and establish himself in Florence. Here he fell in love (this time more seriously) with Fanny Targioni Tozzetti (another married woman), but his love was unrequited. In Florence he met Antonio Ranieri, a Neapolitan gentleman in exile, with whom he later visited Naples which his friend suggested would helped him with its warm climate. In Naples he discovered a genuine passion for ice cream, the affection that Ranieri's sister Paolina showed him (in the Ranieris' villa Ferrigni on the slopes of Vesuvius), and the valued confidence of Basilio Puoti (the purista). He died of edema in Naples a few months later.
Several works in English: " class="external">http://www.geocities.com/leopardileopardi/p.html
His major works include the Zibaldone, the Operette Morali (a collection of short stories), and the Canti collection of poems. He held a pessimistic view of nature as a bad mother always on the verge of destroying humanity, while happiness came from the absence of pain (as expressed in La quiete dopo la tempesta where he says "piacer figlio d'affanno" (pleasure son of pain).
One among his best known poems is L'infinito which nearly every Italian student has to learn by heart: