Alessandro Manzoni Biography
Alessandro Francesco Tommaso Antonio Mandzoni was born in Milan on March 7 in the family of Count Pietro Mandzoni and Julia Beccarius, daughter of Cesare Bekkaria, the famous enlightener and author of the treatise "On Crimes and Punishments", in which he opens against torture and death penalty. The Mandzoni family was quite rich. The great-grandfather Pietro Antonio owned the land Bartio in Valssassino, from where he moved with his family in the year in Cheleotto-to the villa, built in the 18th century and then sold due to great financial problems.
Grandfather Alessandro and Father Pietro, born in the year, lived in Cheleotto. It was a marriage by agreement: the contract was signed on September 12 of the same year, and it has an indication of “the mediation of his Excellency Signor Count Pietro Verri, the actual state adviser and president of the Duchess of official management of Milan”, the mediation that began in February and carried out with “laudable modesty”.
To Pietro Verri Julia was very attached; He was an old friend of her family, and there were more feelings that he had for a young girl, than just sympathy. Julia reluctantly agreed to marriage, but she understood that this was the only possible solution. The marriage did not last long. From the first months of marriage, being under her husband, who was twice as long as she, seven unmarried sister-in-laws and a priest girl, Julia protested against the dark, retrograde atmosphere of the house, she passionately dreamed of receptions in prestigious salons and freedom.
She begins to visit Verry's house, where she meets the young and attractive Giovanni Verry and falls in love with him. Therefore, when Alessandro is born, confident rumors begin to walk that he is the son of Giovanni. Pietro Mandzoni, not paying attention to gossip, accepts his son and gives him to the nurse Katerina Pantrari, a woman with a mild and fun character, the wife of a certain Carlo Sprayer, living in the vicinity of Lekko.
With the birth of a child, the atmosphere in the Mandzoni house becomes even colder, to such an extent that in the year Julia asks and receives an official divorce. Alessandro, according to the law, remains with the father. At the age of six, the boy enters the college of the fathers of Somaska, first in the measure, and then, a year, in Lugano. Here he meets Padra Carlo Feliche Soave, the author of the collection "Moral Novels", a strict person, but very respected for his honesty, the only teacher whom Alessandro will recall with great reverence.
Two years later, Alessandro enters the Milan College of Barnobites, where in ten years he receives a good classical education. However, the college leaves him a feeling of irritation and dissatisfaction, strengthened by the situation in the family. But it is during this period that he has friends, communication with which will last all his life, as, for example, with Ermes Visconti, parents are little interested in the life of their son.
In years, Julia Beckaria met the noble and rich Carlo IMBONATI, with whom she lives first in London, and then in Paris, where she is accepted kindly thanks to her father's glory. Carlo dies in the year. Alessandro was practically abandoned by his mother, and only insignificant, very rare meetings were associated with his father. The father saw in his son the embodiment of his unsuccessful marriage and a woman, which he could not love and win.
The adolescence of Alessandro passed without family affection, support and love, which are necessary for the balance between its "I" and the outside world. In the year, Alessandro returns to Milan, who will soon become the capital of the Tsizalpian Republic, and enters the college of Longon. In the year, he graduates from his studies and returns to the family palace on St.
Damiano Street, diversity of his city residence visits to Villa Kaleotto near Lekko. He lives, practically without communicating with his father, with servants, from time to time accepting rare guests - Monti, Foskolo, Kuoko, in the same year, writes his first significant work - poeteto in imitation of the classics "On the triumph of freedom" "Del Trionfo Della Liberta", the result of his discontent with the teaching methods of Barnabits and Somaski, his breakdown Catholicism and enthusiasm for educational ideals and values of the French revolution.
Mandzoni's house was immersed in melancholy. But even in the company of seven old maids and uncles with Belm on the eye, Alessandro managed to have fun. He loved the theater and played Ridotto della Scala. He meets the poet Vincenzo Monti, who seems to him a man worthy of imitation, is fond of ideas that Napoleon spreads in Europe, although Napoleon’s personality disappointed him.
The poetic vocation of the sixteen -year -old Mandzoni is expressed in the autobiographical sleep “Self -portrait”, in which he represents himself as follows: “Capel Bruno; Alta Fronte; Occhio Loquace, in nature,“ Duro Dei Modi, Ma Di Cor Gentile is a young man who is looking for himself.In style, the sonnet is close to the manner of Vittorio Alfieri, who was a kind of idol for the youth of that time, the embodiment of an unrecognized genius and a rebellious character, a fighter against any mediocrity and hypocrisy.
Inspired by friendship with the laws of Foscolo and Ermes Visconti, as well as the first experienced sense of love for the sister of Visconti, the "angelic Louisin", the poet writes the ode "Qual Su Le Cinzie Cime", which feels the influence of the poetry of Parini and Foscolo; The idyll of "Adda", a kind of invitation of Monty to the villa in Kaleotto; The four "sermons" "Sermoni", in which in the manner of Horace satirically ridicules the modern decline in morals.
The young man understands that the poet must make extraordinary efforts in order to make a work of art as an instrument of education for humanity. This thought - the heritage of another great poet, whose personality was worried about the minds of Milan’s intellectuals and became significant for Lombard enlightenment - Giuseppe Parini at eighteen years old Alessandro Mandzoni is already widely known in intellectual circles, in which he asks the judgments and assessments of his works.
It becomes a friend of Vincenzo Kuoko, the author of the essay "On the Neapolitan Revolution of the Year" "Saggio Sulla Revoluzione Napoletana Del", which shocked the young poet with terrible descriptions of Bourbon repressions. From him, Alessandro receives an incentive to study the works of Jambattist Vico and historical research. The idea of history as an analysis of the living conditions of the people and as a set of events, the main character of which is the mass of the people, occupies the author of the "engaged", "novel about the poor" at this time.
Milan is an attractive city and inspiring for a young man who, until sixteen, lived among the pacifying landscapes of Lake Como and harsh walls of colleges. Despite this, Alessandro leaves the pawnshop with enthusiasm when his mother invites him to Paris in the year. In the year, Monti was visiting Count Imbonati and Julia and told them about his son, whom they hardly knew.
Finally, a mother’s figure appears in Alessandro's life. Perhaps the fear of loneliness or guilt encourage Julia to invite his son to himself. Alessandro accepts the invitation, but while he is preparing for the journey, Imbonati suddenly dies, bequeathing Julia all his condition, among other things, this is Villa Brasulio, not far from Milan. In September, twenty -year -old Alessandro comes to Paris, however, instead of his mother he is met by a mourning woman.
However, over time, attachment arises between the mother and the son, even stronger due to long years of separation. From this moment in the life of a young man, the most important and constructive period of intellectual formation begins. Julia Beccaria was 43 years old at that time. A blonde with gray eyes and an eagle nose, a woman of an imperious, proud and courageous nature, she retained the grace that once made her queen of Milan salons.
Her son is immediately succumbing to this charm, penetrates her confidence, helps her survive the pain of loss. For her, he writes the lyrical poem “To the death of Karl IMBONATI” “In Morte Di Carlo Imbonati”, in which he seems to him that the deceased appeared in a dream to advise how a person of honor should behave. The poem is similar to a moral commandment, which Mandzoni will follow his whole life, in which the poet expresses his human and literary ideals related to the ethics and concrete analysis of the history of mankind and its evolution.
The poet also condemns art for the sake of art and art, which has become the subject of economic relations.
It is impossible not to recall here the spiritual testament of Giuseppe Parini - ODU "Fall". Moral severity exposes Mandzoni’s hostility towards the flatterers who, singing their gentlemen, turn literature into a “shameful bazaar of flattery”. The time spent in Paris gives Mandzoni the opportunity to expand their cultural horizon thanks to acquaintances that will play a significant role in its artistic and literary formation.
Here, Alessandro finds his own close friend, Claude Fourier, a philologist who, together with Madame de Steel, developed a culture of romanticism in France. It was Claude Fourier who put Mandzoni into a circle of “ideologists” - a group of intellectuals, opposing the Napoleonic regime, because he destroyed what they fought in the year. Under their leadership, Mandzoni is revealed for new European literature and begins to realize that any study should be carried out "as carefully and without the conclusion of any conclusions if you are not completely sure of them." Hence the detailed attention that Mandzoni pays the recreation of historical situations in his dramatic works and in the "engaged".
He also separates Voltaire's ideas, and thanks to Fourier he joins romantic ideas and meets the works of August-Wilhelm Schlegel in the year, the Urania poettho “Urania” “Urania” is released in the year; Perhaps dedicated to the lover of Sofia Pear, which proves the educational role of poetry.The poet uses the classicist schemes of the Monti, which, however, are only an external form.
Poilentto is an educational work of art. Here, the Muse and the Grace, sent to the Earth by Jupiter, almost in Christianly symbolize virtues that form God's crown. However, some time later, Mandzoni refuses his creation, saying that "it is not necessary to write poetry. Perhaps I will write something worse, but such poems are never." Indeed, the poetto is not able to arouse the reader’s interest, and in style it is very mediocre.
During this period, he accompanies his mother three times to Italy: in Turin in the year, in Genoi, in February, to get married to Luiga Visconti, the engagement did not end in marriage and in September of the same year in Milan after an unsuccessful engagement with his daughter Destu de Trashi. On the shores of Lake Como, with the mediation of his mother, he meets Enrritta Blondel, the daughter of Geneva bankers who moved to Italy.
This time the engagement was successful. Thus, the sixteen -year -old Enrickette entered the life of Mandzoni to leave a deep mark in her. She and Alessandro were combined in marriage in the municipality of Milan on February 6. In the evening of the same day, the young people were blessed through the evangelical rite in the house of Enrickette, the house of convinced Calvinists.
Enrritt's father, Francois-Louis Blondel, was a rich Geneva entrepreneur, the owner of spinning factories on the banks of Adda. During these years, he unfolds active banker activities in Milan and buys the Palace of Imbonati. In June, the Mandzoni family goes to Paris. All three - newlyweds and Julia - are immensely happy. It is known about Enrritt that "she was a blonde, good -natured and graceful, very modest, ready to hide from society, while the mother of Alessandro always felt like an actress; very neat and tactful, while Julia preferred an artistic disorder in everything." Alessandro was sure that the mother was satisfied with the daughter -in -law; And she belonged to Julia with respectful tenderness and subsidiary attachment.
In December, the young spouses had a daughter of Julia-Clawed, who in August, according to the marriage contract, was baptized by the Catholic ritual. The modest life of Alessandro does not give biographers the opportunity to establish the events that led the spouses to the Catholic faith. Without a doubt, Enrritte was bored with endless visits to the salons, and motherhood forced her to think about her obligations in relation to the child - the obligation regarding how to grow him, but also how to educate him.
How to bring Julia to the Christian faith if Enrickette herself feels uncertain? Thus, there was a need to get to know Catholicism, according to the canons of which the daughter was supposed to be brought up. A friend of the family becomes the abbot-sentence of Eustakio D over the communication of Enricette with the abbot did not pass by Alessandro. Until that moment, he was absolutely indifferent to religion, possibly because of his youthful rebellion against pedantic religious education.
Gradually, he is infected by the desire of his wife to find a way to communicate with God. In the same period, Mandzoni’s “appeal” takes place, although the Catholic faith for him is not a way of life, as for Enrietta: in faith he saw his previously hidden values. Numerous friends throughout their lives will ask Mandzoni about "insight", about the moment that has become decisive in its acceptance of faith.
And Alessandro never answered these questions directly: "It was the mercy of the Lord, my dear, just the mercy of the Lord."