Summary
Highlights
This video analyzes Giacomo Leopardi's 'La quiete dopo la tempesta', written between September 17 and 20, 1829, and published in 1831. The poem explores the concept of pleasure derived from the absence of suffering and is complementary to 'Il sabato del villaggio'. It is structured into three stanzas in hendecasyllables and septenarii, centered on happiness as a moment of calm after a storm. The poem divides into a descriptive first part and a reflective second and third part.
The first stanza describes the immediate aftermath of a storm: birds chirping, a hen returning to the road, and the serene sky breaking through from the west. The landscape clears, the river flows clearly, and everyone rejoices as the sounds of work resume. This section uses archaic terms like 'augelli' and 'romore' and alliterations, particularly of the 'r' sound, along with inverted word orders (hyperbaton).
The artisan appears, singing while admiring the still damp sky. A young woman collects rainwater, and a vendor resumes his daily cry. The sun, personified, returns, illuminating the hills and villas as servants open balconies and terraces. Sounds of distant bells and a creaking cart indicate travelers resuming their journeys. The scene emphasizes sounds and the vastness of space, filtered through the poet's evocative imagination, linking to Leopardi's poetics of the vague and indefinite. Life restarts, and everyone, from animals to people, feels relief.
The poem raises rhetorical questions about when life is most enjoyable: when one studies, works, or undertakes new endeavors, and especially when one forgets their sufferings. Leopardi introduces his famous concept: 'pleasure, child of affliction'. True pleasure is non-existent, merely an illusion born from the fear of past danger. After fearing the worst, even those weary of life fear death, and feeling relief from pain is mistakenly called pleasure. Thus, happiness is not the presence of good but the absence of evil.
Leopardi bitterly and ironically addresses nature, calling it 'courteous' for offering only the cessation of pain as pleasure. He argues that nature generously dispenses suffering, and the brief moments of relief are seen as a miracle. Humanity, 'dear to the gods,' is fortunate if it can sigh with relief after pain and is blessed if death frees it from all sorrow. This aligns with his belief, as seen in the dialogue of Plotinus and Porphyry, that death is the only remedy for all ills. Leopardi highlights nature's cruel and affliction-dispensing role.
Leopardi employs apostrophes and antifrasis ('natura cortese', 'umana prole cara agli eterni') along with numerous enjambments throughout the lyric. The poet sees nature as an enemy, cruel and a dispenser of woes, and pleasure as vain and non-existent. Like 'A Silvia' and 'Le ricordanze', this poem is built on the rhythm of illusion and truth. Despite criticisms regarding the 'unpoetic' nature of the reflective parts, Croce maintains the unity and rhythmic progression across the descriptive first stanza and the more reflective, often anaphoric, and exclamatory second and third stanzas.