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CARLO See also: Italian dramatist, the real founder of See also: modern Italian See also: comedy, was See also: born at Venice, on the 25th of See also: February 1707, in a See also: fine See also: house near St See also: Thomas's
See also: church
.
His
See also: father Giulio was a native of See also: Modena
.
The first playthings of the future writer were puppets which he made dance; the first books he read were plays,—among others, the comedies of the Florentine Cicognini
.
Later he received a still stronger impression from the Mandragora of See also: Machiavelli, At eight years old he had tried to sketch a See also: play
.
His father, meanwhile, had taken his degree in See also: medicine at See also: Rome and fixed himself at See also: Perugia, where he made his son join him; but, having soon quarrelled with his colleagues in medicine, he departed for See also: Chioggia, leaving his son to the care of a philosopher, Professor Caldini of See also: Rimini
.
The See also: young See also: Goldoni soon See also: grew tired of his See also: life at Rimini, and ran away with a Venetian See also: company of players
.
He began to study See also: law at Venice, then went to continue the same pursuit at See also: Pavia, but at that See also: time he was studying the See also: Greek and Latin comic poets much more and much better than books about law
.
" I have read over again," he writes in his own See also: Memoirs, "the Greek and Latin poets, and I have told to myself that I should like to imitate them in their See also: style, their plots, their precision; but I would not be satisfied unless I succeeded in giving more See also: interest to my See also: works, happier issues to my plots, better See also: drawn characters and more genuine comedy." For a satire entitled Il Colosso, which attacked the honour of several families of Pavia, he was driven from that See also: town, and went first to study with the jurisconsult See also: Morelli at See also: Udine, then to take his degree in law at Modena
.
After having worked some time as clerk in the chanceries of Chioggia and Feltre, his father being dead, he went to Venice, to exercise there his profession as a lawyer
.
But the wish to write for the stage was always strong in him, and he tried to do so; he made, however, a See also: mistake in his choice, and began with a tragedy, Amalasunta, which was represented at Milan and proved a failure
.
In 1734 he wrote another tragedy, Belisario, which, though not much better, chanced nevertheless to please the public
.
This first success encouraged him to write other tragedies, some of which were well received; but the author himself saw clearly that he had not yet found his proper sphere, and that a See also: radical dramatic reform was absolutely necessary for the stage
.
He wished to create a characteristic comedy in See also: Italy, to follow the example of See also: Moliere, and to delineate the realities of social life in as natural a manner as possible
.
His first essay of this kind was Momolo Cortesan (Momolo the Courtier), written in the Venetian dialect, and based on his own experience
.
Other plays followed—some interesting from their subject, others from the characters; the best of that See also: period are—Le Trentadue Disgrazie d' Arlecchino, La Notte critica, La Bancarotta, La Donna di Garbo
.
Having, while See also: consul of Genoa at Venice, been cheated by a captain of Ragusa, he founded on this his play L'Impostore
.
At Leghorn he made the acquaintance of the comedian Medebac, and followed him to Venice, with his company,for which he began to write his best plays
.
Once he premised to write sixteen comedies in a See also: year, and kept his word; among the sixteen are some of his very best, such as Il Cafe, Il Bugiardo, La Pamela
.
When he See also: left the company of Medebac, he passed over to that maintained by the patrician Vendramin, continuing to write with the greatest facility
.
In 1761 he was called to See also: Paris, and before leaving Venice he wrote Una delle ultime sere di Carnevale (One of the Last Nights of Carnival), an allegorical comedy in which he said See also: good-bye to his country
.
At the end of the See also: representation of this play, the theatre resounded with applause, and with shouts expressive of good wishes
.
Goldoni, at this proof of public sympathy, wept as a See also: child
.
At Paris, during two years, he wrote comedies for the Italian actors; then he taught Italian to the royal princesses; and for the See also: wedding of See also: Louis XVI. and of
See also: Marie Antoinette he wrote in French one of his best comedies, Le Bourru bienfaisant, which was a See also: great success
.
When he retired from Paris to See also: Versailles, the See also: king made him a gift of 6000 francs, and fixed on him an
See also: annual pension of 1200 francs
.
It was at Versailles he wrote his Memoirs, which occupied him till he reached his eightieth year . The Revolution deprived him all at once of his modest pension, and reduced him to extreme misery; he dragged on his unfortunat& existence till 1793, and died on the 6th of February . The See also: day after, on the proposal of See also: Andre See also: Chenier, the See also: Convention agreed to give the pension back to the poet; and as he had already died, a reduced allowance was granted to his widow
.
The best comedies of Goldoni are: La Donna di Garbo, La Bottega di Caffe, Pamela nubile, Le Baruffe chiozzotte, I Rusteghi, Todero Bronlolon, Gli Innamorati, Il Ventaglio, Il Bugiardo, La Casa nova, Il Burbero benefico, La Locandiera
.
A collected edition (Venice, 1788) was republished at Florence in 1827
.
See P
.
G
.
Molmenti, Carlo Goldoni (Venice, 1875) ; Rabany, Carlo Goldoni (Paris, 1896)
.
The Memoirs were translated into See also: English by See also: John Black (
See also: Boston, 1877), with preface by W
.
D
.
See also: Howells
.
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