As the poet recounts in his "Self-portrait", he already took pleasure in the music of words: "I felt something infinitely sweet listening to chants, nursery rhymes and little verses, even those of the children's magazine Il Corriere dei Piccoli -- not so much in singing, but insofar as they were pronounced or simply spoken, according to harmony linked to the very function of language, to its inner song."

At the same time, Giovanni was forced to go into debt due to the embezzlement and flight of a clerk at the company (a labour cooperative for injured veterans) which was providing him with the means to support the family.

During this period, he became close to his maternal grandmother and to his aunt Maria, who as he wrote in Uno squardo dalla periferia ("A view from the edge"), made him listen to "fragments of Latino maccheronico (mock Latin)" and involved him in the activity of the little theatre where she worked as a dramaturge, capocomico, director and actress.

He returned to Pieve in 1933 and although he remained under a ban that prevented him from teaching, he was able to contribute to the upkeep of his family thanks to a part-time position at Collegio Balbi-Valier and to various odd jobs.

With the transition to teaching school, which Zanzotto commuted to Treviso to attend, commenced his first strong literary interests, which he nourished at the moment by consulting the encyclopedia compiled by Giacomo Prampolini.

In addition to the symptoms, these brought on a feeling of exclusion and peril: "I think it may have had a negative influence on my childhood and adolescence, this particular aberrant idea which gradually took root in me: the impossibility of actively participating in the game of life, insofar as I would soon be excluded.

Having received his teaching credentials, he was entrusted with several pupils for private lessons by the director of Collegio Balbi-Valler and obtained 2,000 lire as a debt of honour from the parish priest, Monsignor Martin, for continuing his studies.

With Valeri's encouragement, he immersed himself in the writings of Baudelaire and discovered Rimbaud as well as (thanks to Luigi Stefanini) the poetry of Hölderlin, which he read for the first time in Vincenzo Errante's translation.

He discovered at that time that within the regime and above all in the student clubs, there were many who nevertheless acted with practical autonomy, or in contrast to himself, as he came to be informed by his friend, Ettore Luccini, history and philosophy teacher at the liceo classico.

The news of the outbreak of World War II was met in the town with great consternation, the economic crisis came to the fore, and Zanzotto's family had to sell half of the house at Col Santa.

At the Young Fascists University of Treviso (Gioventù Universitaria Fascista), within which there were also people practising anti-fascism, he made, in 1942, a "presentation" on Eugenio Montale, where he interpreted the pessimism of the author in a political and ethical light.

An opportunity to publish presented itself in the collection of poetry assembled by the Florentine magazine Rivoluzione, founded by Mario Tobino, but due to the war, the periodical was forced to shut down.