Journal: Bibliotheca Sacra
Volume: BSAC 60:238 (Apr 1903)
Article: Italian Poetry Of Our Time
Author: James Lindsay

BSac 60:238 (April 1903) p. 308

Italian Poetry Of Our Time

Rev. James Lindsay

Something is done to make contemporary poets in Germany and France known to the English-speaking world: why should the poetical literature of Italy to-day be treated as a negligible quantity? One has but to mention such names as Carducci, Chiarini, D’Annunzio, Fogazzaro, Graf, Mazzoni, Negri, and Pascoli,—to name no others,—to see the injustice of such a procedure. Genius has hardly ever been without a home in Italy, and has certainly a residence in the poetic spirit there to-day. The day of Monti, with verse of boundless flow, is long past; long silent is the muse of Alfieri and Foscolo; spent long ago the mighty genius of Leopardi, wasted on lyrics of lamentation and despair; hushed, also, the noble, modest, and gifted Manzoni; gone are the bright and hopeful Aleardi, Tommaseo, and many another beside.

For the Italy of the nineteenth century had not only a brilliant array of philosophers, historians, and novelists, but, passing from “the great massy strength of abstraction,” had a rich supply of poets, also, memorable for their power and originality in dealing with the objectively real. Certain it is that Italian poetry does not in our time lack in originality and even grandeur; its capital defect is, not to be sufficiently focused and centered in mighty poems and great personalities. That poetry has followed the instinct of genius, doing “what it must,” but at times caring overmuch for perfection of form and finish.

BSac 60:238 (April 1903) p. 309

At the head of Italian poets of this time stands Carducci, than whom Europe has perhaps no more powerful poetic genius in this time. The so-called “pagan “or “barbaric “movement, headed by Carducci, was something inevitable— the result of life overleaping the bounds of old and outworn paths. A vital thing was the new literary Revival or Risorgimento, and three decades have passed since Carducci voiced its spirit of revolt in his classic “Hymn to Satan,” with its famous apostrophe—

“Salute, O Satana,
O ribellione,
O forza vindice
Delia ragione”!

That is to say, “Hail to thee, O Satan! O rebellion! O avenging force of reason”! The satan so invoked is no spirit of evil, but simply the unquenchable spirit of progress. Thus he says: —

“To thee, of all being,
Principle immense,
Matter and spirit,
Reason and sense.”

It was the revolt of the Neo-Classical school against the churchly Christianity then current and the obscurantism of the priesthood. Strength, vigor, dignity, resonance, and classic beauty are the marks of Carducci’s verse. Not only are strength and beauty within this p...