But there were long periods when his ailments
denied him his sole consolation of work. Then he rose late, and walked
listlessly about without opening his lips or looking at a book the
whole day. As soon as he might, he returned to his studies; when he
must, he abandoned them again. At such a time he once wrote to a
friend who understood and loved him: "I have not energy enough to
conceive a single desire, not even for death; not because I fear
death, but because I cannot see any difference between that and my
present life. For the first time _ennui_ not merely oppresses and
wearies me, but it also agonizes and lacerates me, like a cruel pain.
I am overwhelmed with a sense of the vanity of all things and the
condition of men. My passions are dead, my very despair seems
nonentity. As to my studies, which you urge me to continue, for the
last eight months I have not known what study means; the nerves of my
eyes and of my whole head are so weakened and disordered that I cannot
read or listen to reading, nor can I fix my mind upon any subject."
[Illustration: GIACOMO LEOPARDI]
At Recanati Leopardi suffered not merely solitude, but the contact
of people whom he despised, and whose vulgarity was all the greater
oppression when it showed itself in a sort of stupid compassionate
tenderness for him.
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