Tasso and the Quest for Modern Epic: Goethe’s Torquato Tasso and Leopardi’s Operette morali

Abstract

The life of sixteenth-century Italian poet Torquato Tasso attracted considerable attention throughout Europe during the period 1750–1850, when the circumstances of his imprisonment and consequent madness made him a prototype of the Romantic poet. Goethe’s Torquato Tasso was influential in establishing Tasso as a symbol of the artist in conflict with his environment. However, a comparative analysis of the play alongside Leopardi’s Dialogue of Torquato Tasso and His Familiar Spirit reveals a more complex philosophical dimension to Tasso’s legend. Both texts are concerned with the discontinuity between ancient and modern culture, and focus on Tasso as a poet striving to adapt the epic to new forms of consciousness and social life.