Editing Giosuè Carducci (section)

==Biography==

=== Early life and education ===
Giosuè Carducci was born in Valdicastello in [[Pietrasanta]], a small town currently part of the [[Province of Lucca]] in the northwest corner of [[Tuscany]], which at the time was [[Grand Duchy of Tuscany|an independent grand duchy]]. His father, Michele, was a country doctor and an advocate of the unification of Italy. A member of the [[Carbonari|Carboneria]], in his youth he had suffered imprisonment for his share in the [[Revolutions of 1830|revolution of 1831]].<ref>{{cite web |author=Adolfo Lippi |date=November 22, 2023 |title=Versilia, così l'impronta della Massoneria ha segnato l'ex Perla del Tirreno |url=https://www.iltirreno.it/versilia/cronaca/2023/11/22/news/cosi-l-impronta-della-massoneria-ha-segnato-l-ex-perla-del-tirreno-1.100426109 |language=it}}</ref> Because of his politics, the family was forced to move several times during Carducci's childhood, eventually settling for a few years in [[Florence]].{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}

Carducci's father attempted to impart to his son his own fervent enthusiasm for the writings of [[Alessandro Manzoni|Manzoni]], but Carducci never acquired a taste for [[Romanticism]]. The boy was also taught [[Latin]] by his father and delighted in the works of [[Virgil]] and other ancient authors. He avidly read books on the [[history of Rome]] and anything dealing with the [[French Revolution]]. He wrote his first poems when he was still a boy, in 1846.

After the failure of the [[Revolutions of 1848|revolution of 1848]], the Carducci family was obliged to move. The threat of violence became too great for Carducci's father, and the family relocated first to [[Lajatico]], then to Florence.

Carducci went to religious schools until 1852, and was influenced by his rhetoric teacher, the [[Piarists|Piarist]] Father Geremia Barsottini, who had translated into Italian prose all the ''[[Odes (Horace)|odes]]'' or [[Horace]]. The boy became fascinated with the restrained style of [[Greek Antiquity|Greek]] and [[Roman Antiquity]], and translated Book&nbsp;9 of [[Homer]]'s ''[[Iliad]]'' into Italian. In these years Carducci became further impassioned in the cause of [[Unification of Italy|Italian unification]] and discovered the works of [[Ugo Foscolo]] and [[Giuseppe Mazzini]]. After completing his education, Carducci followed his wandering father to [[Celle sul Rigo]] on [[Monte Amiata]], but soon after won a [[scholarship]] to the prestigious [[Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa]].

=== Early works ===
[[File:Amicipedanti.jpg|right|thumb|Giosuè Carducci with his friends Torquato Gargani and Giuseppe Chiarini, c. 1855]]
In 1855, Carducci published his first work, ''L'arpa del popolo'', an [[anthology]] of Italian poetry for use in schools, and a year later he received his [[doctorate]] and a certification for teaching. He took a position as a rhetoric teacher in a [[secondary school]] at the [[ginnasio|gymnasium]] in [[San Miniato]], Pisa.

In this period Carducci began working on his first major collection of poems. The collection was published in six books in 1871 under the title of ''Juvenilia''. Carducci's early verses exhibit the strong influence of classical models, of the ''[[stilnovisti]]'', of [[Dante Alighieri|Dante]] and [[Petrarch]] and, among the moderns, [[Vittorio Alfieri|Alfieri]], [[Vincenzo Monti|Monti]], [[Ugo Foscolo|Foscolo]] and [[Giacomo Leopardi|Leopardi]]. But the Carduccian spirit is already visible; his love for the beauty of style, the purity of sentiments and the celebration of liberty, as well as the ability to appreciate all that is genuine, therefore also the language of the common people.<ref name="Bickersteth" /><ref>G. Bertoni, ''La lingua poetica di Giosue Carducci'', in Regia Università di Bologna, cit., pp. 91–95</ref>

With several friends, among them Giuseppe Chiarini and Torquato Gargani, Carducci founded a literary society, ''Amici Pedanti'', a group that was essentially anti-Romantic and [[Anti-Catholicism|anti-Catholic]]. They believed that ltaly's only hope for the future was in the revival of the classical, [[Paganism|pagan]] spirit of the ancient world, which was emphasized as still existing in the Italian land and blood. Such opinions naturally provoked violent objections, both from Romantcs and from those who favored the ''status quo'', Carducci freely and ferociously responded in prose to the attacks many times. His first collection of poetry, ''Rime'', appeared in July, 1857.

Although Carducci won a competition for the Chair of Greek in a secondary school in [[Arezzo]], his political opinions and his father's political record as a revolutionary caused the granducal government to deny him the appointment.<ref>[[#Magill & Kohler 1958|Magill & Kohler 1958]], p. 182.</ref> Carducci was forced to return to Florence, where he eked out a living by giving private lessons. In November, his [[Depression (mood)|depression]] became worse when his brother Dante killed himself for unknown reasons. After the death of his father (1858), Carducci was compelled to take care of his family, whose affairs were in disarray. He moved with his mother and brother into a very poor house in Florence, continuing his private lessons. He also began to collaborate with the publisher Gaspero Barbera; together they founded a short-lived [[literary magazine]], ''Il Poliziano''. Despite his financial situation, Carducci married Elvira Menicucci in March, 1859.

=== Italian unification ===
{{Quote box |width=285px |align=right |quoted=true |bgcolor=#FFFFF0 |salign=right
 |quote =<poem>
'''''Hymn to Satan'''''

To thee of All Being 
The First Cause immense
Of matter and spirit
Of reason and sense

Whilst in the full goblet
Shall sparkle the wine,
So bright the pupil
The souls of men shine,

Whilst earth still is smiling,
And the sun smiles above,
And men are exchanging
Their sweet words of love,

Thrills mystic of Hymen
Through high mountains course,
And broad plains are heaving
With life's fertile force,

On thee in verse daring,
From tight rein released,
On thee I call, Satan,
The King of the feast.
</poem>|source = ''From "Hymn to Satan" poem by Giosuè Carducci''}}
On April 27 of that year, the [[Grand Duchy of Tuscany|Grand Duchy]] was dissolved and Tuscany joined the newly formed [[Kingdom of Italy]]. Carducci's fortunes began to turn for the better. First, he was offered the Chair of Greek in the secondary school of [[Pistoia]], where he remained for nearly a year; then, the Minister of Public Education, [[Terenzio, Count Mamiani della Rovere|Terenzio Mamiani della Rovere]], appointed him to the Chair of Italian Eloquence at the [[University of Bologna]]. Carducci soon became a popular lecturer. He was somewhat ambivalent toward his professorial role and its traditional [[Philology|philological]] orientation and fretted about its effect on his poetry, but the position allowed him to deepen his acquaintance with the [[classics]] and with the literature of other nations. His political views also changed. Under [[Victor Emmanuel II]], Carducci had been an idealistic [[Monarchism|monarchist]] in support of the union of Italy, but after [[Giuseppe Garibaldi|Garibaldi]] was wounded and captured by Italian troops in the [[battle of Aspromonte]] in 1862, Carducci allied himself with the democratic republicans and became more pronouncedly [[Jacobins|Jacobin]] and anticlerical, venting his intense feelings in aggressive poetry.

His anti-clerical revolutionary vehemence was prominently showcased in one famous poem, the deliberately blasphemous and provocative {{ill|Inno a Satana|it|A Satana|quote=y}} ("Hymn to Satan"). "Satan" / "Lucifer" was considered by Italian [[Left-wing politics|leftists]] of the time as a metaphor for the rebellious and freethinking spirit. The poem was composed in 1863 as a dinner party toast, published in 1865, and then republished in 1869 by Bologna's radical newspaper, ''Il Popolo'', as a provocation timed to coincide with the [[First Vatican Council]], a time when revolutionary fervour directed against the papacy was running high as republicans pressed both politically and militarily for an end to the Vatican's domination over the [[Papal States]].<ref>''Carducci, Giosuè, Selected Verse/ Giosuè Carducci: edited with a translation, introduction and commentary by David H. Higgins'', (Aris & Phillips; Warminster, England), 1994. See also: Bailey, John Cann, ''Carducci'' The [[Taylorian Lecture]] (Clarendon Press, Oxford) 1926.</ref> In 1866 Carducci was initiated at the [[Freemasonry|Masonic]] lodge "Galvani" of Bologna.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Gilbert |first1=Sari |date=2 June 1981 |title=Freemasonry in Italy Has Had 2 1/2 Centuries of {{sic|Contro|vesy|hide=y}} |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1981/06/02/freemasonry-in-italy-has-had-2-12-centuries-of-controvesy/800d7499-43d2-4366-9508-24cc83128811/ |access-date=28 July 2021 |newspaper=Washington Post}}</ref>

=== Literary fame ===
While "Inno a Satana" had quite a revolutionary impact, Carducci's finest poetry came in later years. He published his ''Giambi'' ([[Iambic pentameter|iambics]]; later ''Giambi ed epodi''), a collection of polemical poems, under the pseudonym "Enotrio Romano"; the poems reveal Carducci's affinities with [[Victor Hugo]] and [[Heinrich Heine]].{{sfn|Wellek|1960|p=43}} By 1872, Carducci had begun to control his polemical instincts, and some of his finest poems, later collected in ''The New Lyrics'', were written in the 1870s. ''[[Barbarian Odes]]'', begun in 1873, are considered his most influential work, and contain some of his most celebrated poems.<ref>One prominent English translation is ''The Barbarian Odes of Giosuè Carducci'', translated from Italian by William Fletcher Smith, (Manasha, Wisconsin: George Banta Publishing Co., 1939). The translation is reviewed in {{cite journal |last=Dismukes |first=William Paul |date=March 1940 |title=''The Barbarian Odes of Giosuè Carducci'' by William Fletcher Smith |journal=Italica |volume=17 |issue=1 |pages=29–30 |doi=10.2307/475605 |jstor=475605}}
</ref>

In the ''Barbarian Odes'' Carducci endeavored to imitate ancient classical [[stanza]] forms, such as the [[Alcaic stanza|Alcaic]] and the [[Sapphic stanza|Sapphic]]. Since they were based on stress and not on syllabic quantity, he believed they would have sounded ‘barbaric’ to classical poets: hence the title of the collection.{{sfn|Carsaniga|2002}}
[[File:1903-Majani-Come quercia druidica sta il tuo fatal lavoro.jpg|thumb|300px|Caricature of Giusuè Carducci by Augusto Majani: the poet's head is at the top of the tree trunk with beard blended into the trunk and hair blended into the tree limbs. Several titles of his works are inscribed on limbs. Two people stand together, beneath the crown of the tree, stretching to touch or grasp the lowest branches]]
Following the publication of the ''Barbarian Odes'', Carducci became an object of adulation for the younger generation of Italian poets. Periodicals such as ''Fanfulla della Domenica'', ''Cronaca'' ''bizantina'', and ''Domenica letteraria'' helped spread his fame. ''New Barbarian Odes'' solidified his reputation, and he assumed the role of national poet.

The 1880s were for Carducci a period of intense literary activity. In 1881 he began to write for ''Cronaca bizantina'', a flamboyant and very successful literary journal that numbered among its contributors the likes of [[Giovanni Marradi]], [[Matilde Serao]], [[Edoardo Scarfoglio]], Guido Magnoni, and [[Gabriele D'Annunzio]].{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}} Within the next few years he published the three admirable volumes of his ''Confessioni e'' ''Batlaglie'' (1882), the ''Ça Ira'' [[Sonnet|sonnets]] (1883), and a considerable number of articles, pamphlets and essays.{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}} 

His lyrical production, too, seemed to reach its perfection in these years of tense, unrelenting work; for the ''Canzone'' ''di Legnano'', the Odes to Rome and to Monte Mario, the [[Elegy]] on the urn of [[Percy Bysshe Shelley]], the ringing rhymes of the ''Intermezzo'', in which he happily blended the satire of Heine with the lyrical form of his native poetry – all belong to this period.{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}

In the Late 19th century Carducci's political and philosophical views shifted; he resigned himself to [[constitutional monarchy]] and acquired a more religious attitude, with some appreciation of the Church's mission, though he remained fundamentally anticlerical.<ref name="Bickersteth">{{cite book |last1=Bickersteth |first1=Geoffrey Langdale |url=https://archive.org/details/cu31924027533805 |title=Carducci |date=1913 |publisher=Longmans, Green |location=London |page=[https://archive.org/details/cu31924027533805/page/n39 14]}}</ref>

=== Later life and international success ===
The last two decades of Carducci's life were filled with misery. In 1885, he became ill. Five years later he was made a [[Senate of the Kingdom of Italy|senator]] by the King of Italy,<ref>{{cite book |last=Scalia |first=Samuel Eugene |title=Carducci |publisher=S.F. Vanni |year=1937 |location=New York}}</ref> but in 1899, a stroke paralyzed his hand and nearly deprived him of speech. He continued working, despite the setbacks, publishing his last volume of poetry, ''Rime e ritmi'' (Rhymes and Rhythms), in 1899 and collecting his works from 1850 to 1900. In 1904, he resigned from teaching. His disciple [[Giovanni Pascoli]] replaced him as professor of [[Italian literature]] at the University of Bologna.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Giovanni-Pascoli|title=Giovanni Pascoli {{!}} Italian poet|work=Encyclopedia Britannica|access-date=2017-08-23|language=en}}</ref> 

In 1906, Carducci became the first Italian to receive the [[Nobel Prize in Literature]]. He died the following year in Bologna, at the age of 71. His funeral, celebrated in [[San Petronio, Bologna|San Petronio]], was followed by a procession through the streets of the city attended by a large crowd. He is buried in the [[Certosa di Bologna]]. A monument in his honor was erected in Bologna between 1908 and 1926 to a design by [[Leonardo Bistolfi]].<ref>{{cite encyclopedia |title=Bistolfi, Leonardo |encyclopedia=[[Grove Art Online]] |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |last=Terraroli |first=Valerio |date=2003 |doi=10.1093/gao/9781884446054.article.T009056}}</ref>