Giuseppe Belli (full name: Giuseppe Francesco Antonio Maria Gioachino Raimondo Belli) is considered the most traditional and influential among roman dialect authors, the one whose language style is credited as the most genuine.
Between 1824 and 1846 he wrote over 2,200 sonnets, each of which is a faithful picture of what Rome was like in the early 19th century, seen through the eyes of a commoner.
The very first words of his introduction leave no doubt about his literary intentions: « I have decided to leave a monument of what the common people of Rome are today... ».

His opinion about the social structure of his time was strongly critical. In those days the pope still ruled the city as a king; a few idle aristocrats and a rather arrogant clergy represented the high class, whose social power had already lost any historical or moral justification. At the opposite end of Rome's social ranking were the common people, the mob, fanatical and superstitious, whose only entertainments were the frequent sumptuous public celebrations held to hail and glorify the leading class, and the even more frequent public executions (one of the executioners even became a famous roman character, see When Mastro Titta Crossed The Bridge in the Curious and Unusual section). Belli wrote: « Our common people have no art: no art of speaking, nor poetical, just as any common people never had. Everything springs spontaneously from their own nature, always alive and strong, because let free to develop non-artificial qualities... »

This was still his opinion when, at the age of 70, he wrote: « [dialect] is not Rome's own tongue, but that of its rough and blunderous people », referring to it in terms of « bare, mean and also rude language ».
Such snobbish haughtiness towards society and his pessimistic view of human life, into which his bitter satire sinks its roots, can be explained by his long and at times troubled life, during which he survived his younger brothers and a sister, his wife, a daughter, a daughter-in-law and even a number of grand-children.
Having lost both parents while rather young, in his teens he stopped attending a regular school but kept studying on his own, as an autodidact. After having lived for three years with an uncle and an aunt, who treated him hardly, he got a job as accountant - the first of his many occupations, among which private tutor, clerk, etc. - and changed residence several times, until at the age of 26, having married the daughter of a rich lawyer, he finally settled. He came in touch very soon with the academic literary world, and was the co-founder of the Accademia Tiberina. During these years, he started signing his works with the double name, Giuseppe Gioachino.
His health was not very good, nor was his financial situation, having lost his job in 1826 and not having worked again up to 1841. He suffered from a number of physical problems, including a nervous breakdown that struck him after his wife's death when, covered with debts, he had to sell his own furniture and radically change his lifestyle.
During his mature years, Belli was also deeply touched by the changes in Rome's society: he had already abandoned his critical attitude towards papacy when, in 1849, the people upthrew the pope founding the short-living Roman Republic, the first important step towards the fall of the Papal State in 1870 (which Belli, though, did not witness, having died eight years before): « ...the people around me have changed so much that it seems as if I had turned into a stranger in Rome, or as if I were no longer living in Rome. » (1850).

Mostly written before turning a conservative, his sonnets point out the inconsistency of the decadent society of his time. But when such centuries-old condition really started changing, Belli's ideas too were no longer the same!

the monument (1913) built thanks to a public subscription, bearing the dedication: TO THEIR POET G.G.BELLI THE PEOPLE OF ROME

Each of his compositions gives life to a humorous, witty sketch which, through the lens of his sharp satire, reveals Belli's bitter and pessimistic attitude towards life and human condition. At the same time, his sonnets and especially the author's footnotes provide us with a wealth of interesting information about everyday's life in Rome in the early 1800s. Some of the sonnets have biblical themes, where all characters act, think, speak as roman people. It should not surprise that despite the many works he wrote in prose and in verse using the standard Italian language, Belli is only remembered for his Sonnets. The poet had likely born in mind the idea of publishing his collection of poems, as for a certain time he kept carefully count of his sonnets, yet without numbering them. The manuscript bears the generic title Poesie Romanesche ("roman dialect poems") but it is believed that he might have later on changed it into 996 (a number which he sometimes used as a signature, resembling in shape his own initials 'ggb'). In his maturity, though, having embraced a conservative position, Belli desowned his poems, declaring that they were « full of blameworthy words and thoughts », which he refused to recognize as his own feelings; « ...there is a box full of writings in verse. They shall have to be burned! » he wrote in his will. Luckily, this did not happen.

the two faces of the poet: the young anticlerical was desowned as an old man	A first collection of his Sonnets was published over twenty years after his death. Several others were discovered during the following years (some were unfinished), and the first complete edition was published almost one century later, in 1952. Much of their vigour depends on the use of the roman dialect: a play on words or a typical expression would not be the same in another language, not even in Italian. For this reason they have never been kept in great consideration by 'official' literature. So far, English translations have been made by Eleonore Clark, Harold Norse and Anthony Burgess. The ones published in these pages are the webmaster's own attempt. Each sonnet is conceived as a short story, an anecdote of everyday's life; the main elements of the sketch quickly unwind in the opening verses, while the last ones lead to a brilliant conclusion, often ironical or comical, sometimes lyrical or even philosophical.	Belli's birthplace, in via dei Redentoristi 13

SOCIETY AND EVERYDAY'S LIFE

PRIESTS, FRIARS, POPES AND THE CHURCH OF ROME

BIBLICAL THEMES

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BERNERI	PASCARELLA	ZANAZZO	TRILUSSA	FABRIZI

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