He made his debut as a poet with Romanesque sonnets, published in *Il Capitale Fracassa*, in which there began to emerge a thoughtful and melancholic personality. However, his tendency toward narrative, toward objective representation yet transfigured by an intense lyrical ferment, became more pronounced and organized, under the influence of Carducci, into attempts of greater commitment (*Il morto di campagna*, 1884), until it culminated in the broad historical visions of *Villa Glori* (1886) and *La scoperta dell'America* (1894): epic poetry restored to its most genuine sources and put into the mouth of a naive, wandering rhapsodist, who, stripping it of every legendary aura, lends it a realistic relief and renders it almost contemporary. Signs of fatigue, as well as some gaps in historical development, are evident in the 350 sonnets of *Storia nostra*, a history of Italy from the founding of Rome onward.
P.’s anticlericalism, which appears declared and resolute in some sonnets, is based less on dogmatic or ethical motives than on the controversy, common to other contemporary writers, surrounding temporal power.