GIUSTI, Giuseppe - Il Congresso di Pisa 1839 - 1850

Italy: mid-19th century.

Manuscript (apocryphal?) containing some burlesque-satirical pieces by the poet Giuseppe Giusti (1809–1850) and published in print between 1844 and 1847. Of noble family, Giusti studied first in Florence and then in Pisa, where he earned a law degree in 1834. Five years later is The Congress of Pisa which opens this manuscript collection, poetry with biting tones in which the author lampoons both the so-called learned men (in 1839 the first congress of Italian scientists had indeed met in Pisa) and the Tuscan politicians. It is indeed dedicated to Grand Duke Leopold II one of Giusti’s most famous pieces, “Il re Travicello”, where the excessive regal tranquility in Tuscany is mocked at a time when in the rest of Europe political ferment was spreading. Subsequently, however, Giusti joined the Civic Guard and partially changed his views, coming to appreciate the grand ducal reforms, without this preventing him later in 1848 from actively entering politics by joining the Tuscan uprisings. All of his poetry is characterized by a fluid, smooth verse, and above all by a constant humorous undertone, more or less pronounced, which sometimes turns into moralizing satire. Other poems contained here are: “Avviso per un settimo Congresso dei Dotti, che [è] di là da venire”; “Apologia del giuoco del lotto”; “Dies Irae”; “Il Creatore e il suo mondo”; “L’incoronazione”; “Il Papato di prete Pero”; “Lamento”.

Manuscript on paper, octavo size (153×110 mm). 34 unnumbered leaves (the last three white) in two fascicles without binding. The first leaf is very ornate, with a ground watermark of a glass on the last white leaf. Genuine copy and in manuscript.