Dictionary.net

A celebrated Italian poet and patriot; born on the island of Zante, Jan. 26, 1778; died Oct. 10, 1827, in London. His tragedy "Thyeste" was received with great favor at Venice in 1797. "The True Story of Two Luckless Lovers, or Last Letters of Jacopo Ortis" (1799), afterward rewritten and renamed "Italy" (1802), voices his disappointment that the French armies did not liberate Italy; as did an outspoken apostrophe to Bonaparte. In 1807 was published his finest poem, "The Graves". His second tragedy, "Ajax", brought out at Milan in 1809, caused his expulsion from Lombardy; he went to Florence and there produced the tragedy "Ricciarda" (1813); compelled to flee from Italy, he composed in Switzerland the bitter satire against his enemies, "The One-Volume Book of the Super-Revelations of the Cleric Didymus, Least of the Prophets". He wrote many critical and literary essays.