GOZZI, CARLO, COUNT (1722-1806)

This article appears in Volume V12, Page 305 of the Encyclopedia Britannica.

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GOZZI, CARLO, COUNT (1722-1806) , Italian dramatist, was descended from an old Venetian family, and was born at Venice in

March

1722. Compelled by the embarrassed

condition

CONDITION (Lat. condicio, from condicere, to agree upon, arrange; not connected with conditio, from condere, conditum, to put together)

of his father's affairs to procure the means of self-support, he, at the age of sixteen, joined the army in Dalmatia; but three years afterwards he returned to Venice, where he soon made a reputation for himself as the wittiest member of the Granelleschi society, to which the publication of several satirical pieces had gained him admission. This society, nominally devoted to conviviality and wit, had also serious literary aims, and was especially .zealous to preserve the Tuscan literature pure and untainted by foreign influences. The displacement of the old Italian comedy by the dramas of Pietro Chiari (1700-1788) and Goldoni, founded on French models, threatened defeat to all their efforts; and in 1757 Gozzi came to the rescue by publishing a satirical poem, Tartana degli influssi per l' wino bisestile, and in 1761 by his comedy, Fiaba dell' amore Belle tre melarancie, a parody of the manner of the two obnoxious poets, founded on a fairy tale. For its representation he obtained the services of the Sacchi company of players, who, on account of the popularity of the comedies of Chiari and Goldoniwhich afforded no

scope

SCOPE (through Ital. scopo, aim, purpose, intent, from Gr. o'KOaos, mark to shoot at, aim, o ic07reiv, to see, whence the termination in telescope, microscope, &c.)

for the display of their peculiar talentshad been left without employment; and as their satirical powers were thus sharpened by personal enmity, the play met with extraordinary success. Struck by the effect produced on the

audience

AUDIENCE (from Lat. audire, to hear)

by the introduction of the supernatural or mythical

element

ELEMENT (Lat. elementum)

, which he had merely used as a convenient medium for his satirical purposes, Gozzi now produced a

series

SERIES (a Latin word from serere, to join)

of dramatic pieces based on fairy tales, which for a period obtained

great

GREAT

popularity, but after the breaking up of the Sacchi company were completely disregarded. They have, however, obtained high praise from Goethe, Schlegel, Madame de Stael and Sismondi; and one of them, Re Turandote, was translated by Schiller. In his later years Gozzi set himself to the production of tragedies in which the comic

element

ELEMENT (Lat. elementum)

was largely introduced; but as this innovation proved unacceptable to the critics he had recourse to the Spanish drama, from which he obtained models for various pieces, which, however, met with only equivocal success. He died on the 4th of April 18o6.
His collected works were published under his own superintendence, at Venice, in 1792, in Jo volumes; and his dramatic works, translated into German by Werthes, were published at Bern in 1795. See Gozzi's

work

WORK

, Memorie inutili

delta

DELTA (from the shape of the Gr. letter A, delta, originally used of the mouth of the Nile)

vita di Carlo Gozzi (3 vols., Venice, 1797), translated into French by Paul de Musset (1848), and into English by J. A. Symonds (1889); F. Horn, Ober Gozzis dramatische Poesie (Venice, 18o3); Gherardini, Vita di Gasp. Gozzi (1821); " Charles Gozzi," by Paul de Musset, in the Revue des deux monde: for 15th November 1844; Magrini, Carlo Gozzi e la fiabe: saggi storici, biografici, e critici (Cremona, 1876), and the same author's book on Gozzi's life and times (

Benevento

BENEVENTO

, 1883).

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