The story of Giuseppe Giusti deserves to be known because his name has been echoing for more than a century. Loved for his sharp and brilliant poems he was a great mind of the nineteenth century.
Who was Giuseppe Giusti
Giuseppe Giusti (Monsummano Terme, 13 May 1809 – Florence, 31 March 1850) was an Italian poet and writer.
It grows in one wealthy family and at the age of seven he was entrusted to the education of Don Antonio Sacchi, of whom the author however reports few positive memories. At the age of twelve he then began attending the Zuccagni Orlandini boarding school of the city of Florence, an excellent place to train intellectually. With the closure of the school he then moved to Episcopal College of Pistoia and here he receives another part of his training.
Giuseppe’s father, not satisfied with his path, also inserts him in Carlo Lodovico College of Lucca where he resumes his studies especially in grammar.
Over the years in the well-known Tuscan city he also discovers the art of literary production starting to write sonnets that highlight his vocation. After completing the high school he enrolled at the University of Pisa to attend the Faculty of Law.
The bohemian youth by Giuseppe Giusti
In the Pisan environment he discovers the bourgeois and intellectual circles attending lounges and cafes going so far as to get into debt and leave the studio behind. This life leads his father to call him back home where he continues his days alternating the pleasure of idleness with the boredom of dead moments. After three years spent in disarray decides to return to Pisa to continue his studies which, as promised to his father, he would take seriously.
Needless to say, it was a broken promise. Giusti returns to frequent the now known environments and despite complex dynamics that have also led him to the police station manages to get his degree, albeit with a delay. Some events of his youthful period are shown with the years necessary for the formation of his character and his poetic style. In fact, it is recognized in recent years through its distinctive note, the irony.
He later moved to Florence, a city with which he did not immediately create an imprint. Despite this he still manages to develop one good worldly life dividing between receptions and elegant dances in an extremely cosmopolitan city for the time. After his stay in Florence, he knows the beauty of other Italian cities for shorter stays, including Rome and Naples.
Giuseppe Giusti under the wing of Manzoni
Freedom of thought in Italy has struggled in recent years to find space, but Giusti’s literary production finds no obstacles in city of Lugano where his poems are published as “anonymous works”. In the following years he managed to obtain credit also in Italy by having himself printed, albeit anonymously, with a different awareness. It was in fact known to many the authorship of the well-known verses produced by the author.
Invited by some friends and colleagues, he decides to leave for Milan where great authors can’t wait to meet him. Among these is the great Alessandro Manzoni whom Giusti remembers as follows:
“What peace – wrote the poet – what love, what good intelligence between them! In Alessandro I don’t know if the skill or the goodness is greater; the only one I remember having known about his cut is Sismondi “
In the Milanese city he has a way of get in touch with some brilliant minds of the Manzoni network including Tommaso Grossi and Giovanni Torti. He receives the right recognition from these intellectuals who consecrate him artistically. In fact, it was not very widespread the use of humor, especially one as sharp and brilliant as that of Giuseppe Giusti. The author also takes political positions, as it is known in “Sant’Ambrogio” where he expressly declares himself anti-Austrian. Among other famous works we remember “Il re Travicello”, “The papacy of Prete Pero”, which presents itself as a harsh satire against the clergy, and “Epistolario”.
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