GIRAUD, COUNT GIOVANNI, one of the beet and moat popular writers of Italian comedy, was born at Rome on the 28th of October 1776, and was of a noble and wealthy family, originally of French extraction. Of his first studies and his early passion for the drama and everything connected with the theatre, be himself has given an amusing account iu the general preface to his comedies. When he was at the age of sixteen the death of his father, Count Ferdivando, left him to frequent the theatre without restraint. Even before that time he had begun to attempt dialogues and scenes in imitation of Goldoni, Chiari, and other dramatists ; but it was not till some years afterwards that he composed his first regular piece, I Gelosi per Equivoco,' nor was that performed till 1807. It met with decided success; and in the same year he produced his 'L'Ajo sell' Itnbarazzo' (` The Tutor in a Scrape), which is universally allowed to be his masterpiece, and one of the happiest specimens of modern Italian comedy. In 1812 he went to Paris with his elder brother Pietro, and he again visited France in 1815, after the restoration of the Bourbons, and also came over for a short time to England. On his return to Italy he published (1816) his Teatro Domestioo,' and produced some fresh pieces for the stage, but was soon after seized with a fancy for entering into mercantile speculations and other schemes, which, besides diverting him from the career in which he had distinguished himself, failed eo completely, that he was at length reduced to cord parative poverty. His disappointments greatly affected both his health
and his mind ; be fell into a declining state, and was at last carried off by a severe nervous attack in the spring of 1834.
Giraud possesses more of comic power than is displayed by any of his contemporaries; he exhibits more of vivacity, incident, situation, and stage effect; and if his dialogue seldom rises above the level of ordinary conversation, it is free from that drawling flatness which is a frequent defect of modern Italian comedy. Some of his pieces were founded upon real circumstances, and in one instance this brought him into a very serious dispute with the family of the Marchese Albergati (another celebrated dramatist); for his Sospetto Funesto ' was supposed by them to allude very undisguisedly to an unfortunate domestic affair, and the suspicious circumstances attending the sudden death of the marquis's second wife. The piece was in consequence prohibited ; nor does it appear to have ever been published. To all of those which he did publish he prefixed a separate preface, which self•commentaries possess a value and interest of their own.