Giuseppe Parini

Foscolo met Parini (Bosisio-Lecco 1729–Milan 1799) in Milan in 1798 and with his writing he contributed to the spread of a heroic portrayal of the author, which had already been promoted at the start of the century by an edition of Opere di Giuseppe Parini (Works of Giuseppe Parini, Milan, Genio Tipografico, 1801) edited by Francesco Reina. Foscolo takes the same line of apology as the Milan edition and in Ortis, in the letter written on December 4, he tells of a meeting in Milan between Jacopo and the old poet, outlining a highly idealized portrait of Parini, who becomes a symbol of the man of culture motivated by a strong civil conscience and love for his country. Foscolo gives the poet the role of interpreting the crisis of values of the generation of young people who were active during the Republican Triennium and who, after active service, were disillusioned by the contemporary situation and hostile to the Italian states' military and political dependence on France. Parini is presented as the model of a free intellectual, unconnected to the lure of power, who has the fundamentally important job of verifying and judging the historical situation; in what is almost a monologue with a tone of reasoning, built on the basis of a dialectic of clearly Machiavellian roots, the poet shows that it is impossible to reconcile ethics and politics without accepting compromise.

Foscolo's Parini forwards the model of a writer who lives in a condition of marginality from society (and the tones of the polemic with the Napoleonic literary figures can be heard in advance here) and in dignified solitude, a necessary condition for pure, uncontaminated criticism. The same line is expressed years later in the celebration contained in Dei Sepolcri, where the lack of a fitting burial for the poet is the pretext to launch polemics against the Saint-Cloud edict; the verses dedicated to Parini (vv. 53-90) allude to the satiric output of the Milanese poet who poked fun at the corruption and immorality of the nobility in the poem Il Giorno (The Day).