Foscolo

Foscolo, Ugo (circ. 1776-1827), an Italian prose author and poet, was born at sea, and educated at the university of Padua. His Thyestes was produced at Venice just before the fall of the republic, and on the Austrian ascendency he went to Rome, where, in 1802, he published Ultime Lettere di Jacopo Ortis. His style is good, but tinged with sadness and melancholy. In 1803 he published a satire. He went to Paris, and, returning to Milan in 1807, he produced a poem Dei Sepolcri, and two tragedies, Ricciardi and Ajace. Ordered to quit Milan, he went to Mantua, where he lived till the abdication of Napoleon, and translated Sterne's Sentimental Journey. Owing to his ideas upon Italian independence, he had again to leave the country, and went to Switzerland, Russia, and, in 1815, to England, where he finally died in poor circumstances at Turnham Green. He wrote Notes on Dante, and An Essay on Petrarch.