Wisdom and Woe

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Giuseppe Mazzini (1805-1872) ranks among the most influential public intellectuals of the 19th century. Although today he is mostly remembered as a spiritual father of Italian unification, he saw his patriotic goals as part of a larger struggle for the emancipation of all oppressed people--notably, slaves and women--inspiring revolutionary movements around the world, for which he had been called "the Apostle of Modern Democracy."

Individualism and nationalism had emerged as the twin mandates of nineteenth century European history. But the French Revolution and Napoleonic expansionism, respectively, had become emblematic of their excesses. Mazzini, holding a dialectical view of progress and human history (strongly influenced by Hegel), rejected these extremes and instead envisioned a perfect synthesis of the individual and society, freedom and necessity, thought and action, secularism and Christianity.

He denied the Enlightenment notion of political rights as entitlements against external restraint. Instead, Mazzini conceives of freedom positively as a choice to do good, only secured through action, arguing that "the sole origin of every right" is duty. Only by a proper dedication to one's obligations--to family, country, humanity, and God--can a people achieve "the progress of all through all" and defeat (as he sees it) the "two lies" menacing the world: Machiavellianism and materialism.

For this meetup, we will read The Duties of Man (Doveri dell'uomo, 1858).

The Duties of Man:

[These virtual sessions are hosted by the New Bedford Whaling Museum. To register, see below.]

Join NBWM's Moby-Dick Book Club, a virtual series exploring Herman Melville’s iconic American novel. The final session will be on the third Tuesday of November 2025. These sessions will prepare readers for the 30th Moby-Dick Marathon at the New Bedford Whaling Museum, taking place on January 3, 2026.

Tuesday, November 18 at 5:30pm EST:
Chapter 96 to the Epilogue
Theme: Melville and the Ocean
Featured Guests: Professors Mary K. Bercaw Edwards & Jennifer Baker

NOTE: Click on "Read more" to see the entire meetup description and links.

In 1831, Giuseppe Mazzini founded Young Italy, an organization dedicated to furthering liberty, equality, and humanity within his nation. It soon spawned offshoots such as Young Poland, Young Ireland, Young Turks, and Young America. These movements promoted socio-political visions that might be termed "international nationalism": both radically inclusive and (as their names suggest) innately modern and patriotic. As Herman Melville later wrote, "There seems no reason why patriotism and narrowness should go together."

The cultural front of the Young America movement advocated a literary exceptionalism rooted in American subjects, scenes, and sensibilities, in contradistinction to the (allegedly) aristocratic traditionalism of Europe. The 1855 Preface to Leaves of Grass is illustrative. Whitman declared that great poems must incarnate America's "geography and natural life" and "cheer up slaves and horrify despots." Similar ideas were expressed by writers such as John Neal, William Cullen Bryant, and Ralph Waldo Emerson, animating what F. O. Matthiessen later identified as the "American Renaissance."

But perhaps "the most famous literary manifesto of the American nineteenth century" is Melville's "Hawthorne and His Mosses" (1850). The essay is putatively a review of Hawthorne's short stories (although it's hardly that and more besides) authored by "a Virginian Spending July in Vermont" (although Melville was a New Yorker spending August in Massachusetts). Echoing the language of the American Revolution, Melville calls for independence from Old World (especially British) dictates of taste, urging American authors to establish an original literary tradition, and for American readers to proudly embrace them.

Evert Duyckinck and Cornelius Mathews provided leading publishing platforms for Young America--including Yankee Doodle, The Literary World, The Democratic Review, and Arcturus--where Melville's works were often showcased. But Melville's attitude toward Young America is complicated by his apparent satirization of Duyckinck in Pierre (1852), and the possibility that the "Arcturion" (a ship described as "exceedingly dull" in Mardi), derived its namesake from Arcturus.

For this meetup, we will read "Hawthorne and His Mosses" and Books 17-18 from Pierre ("Young America In Literature" and "Pierre, As a Juvenile Author, Reconsidered").

Note: This meetup will be recorded for private use.

Hawthorne and His Mosses:

NOTE: Click on "Read more" to see the entire meetup description and links.

In 1847, Elizabeth and Robert Browning settled in Italy to consummate one of history's most famous literary romances. Elizabeth called their new home the Casa Guidi. There she witnessed the events of the early Risorgimento, Italy's intensifying struggle for nationhood against foreign hegemony, and was inspired to produce some of her finest work, including "Casa Guidi Windows" (1851).

The poem begins with the sound of euphoric celebrations wafting through the titular windows, reflecting, in its first half, the air of hopeful optimism that filled the streets of Florence on 12 September 1847, when Grand Duke Leopold II restored civil liberties to the citizens. But the second half of the poem, following Leopold's betrayal of his people and the Austrian army's reoccupation of the city on 25 May 1849, is characterized by bitter denunciation. In between is the failed Revolutions of 1848. Each half captures the very different moods of their respective circumstances, providing distinct "windows" into society, and representing both the romance and reality of effecting lasting change.

Browning's poem is a highly political piece of writing, but it is also intensely personal. Turning her gaze both outward and inward, she symbolically identifies herself with Florence, considering her own marital aspirations and struggle for independence in light of the city's political situation and attempted rebirth.

Melville remarked that "Mrs. Browning was a great woman." In his copy of "Casa Guidi Windows," he underscored a footnote: "The event breaks in upon the meditation, and is too fast for prophecy in these strange times." Lucy M. Freibert comments: "In Clarel, too, historical events and sights break in upon Clarel's meditation.... Clarel, like Browning's persona, muses over past and present, trying unsuccessfully to predict or prophesy, in the midst of nineteenth-century intellectual conflict, what will be the outcome of human endeavors."

Elizabeth Barrett Browning died at Casa Guidi on 29 June 1861, without living to see the outcome of the Risorgimento's endeavors.

Casa Guidi Windows: