Cecco Angiolieri, the enfant terrible of Italian literature, loved women, gambling, food and wine. It is said that he found comfort for his bad luck at the dice and with Becchina, his unreciprocating lover, only by pouring venomous scorn upon his miserly parents.

Cecco's outbursts of rage against his fate and his earthly view of the world - poles apart from the Stil Novo of Cavalcanti and Dante, the target of some of his fiercest sonnets - are perfectly encapsulated in his poetry, which is presented here with the facing Italian text in the witty verse translation of C.H. Scott and Anthony Mortimer.