Set in Stone: 19th-century American Authors in Florence

By Sirpa Salenius

Set in Stone: 19th-century American Authors in Florence is a study of American authors whose Florentine sojourns have been honored with commemorative plaques in the city as well as its immediate surroundings. The writers included in the volume are Mark Twain, James Fenimore Cooper, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Henry James, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, and James Russell Lowell.
These authors resided temporarily in Florence in the nineteenth century and most of them found the relaxed, dolce-far-niente, atmosphere of the city ideal for creative work. The city and its long history inspired the authors, stirring their imaginations.
The volume gathers written testimonies of the impressions Florence awoke in these acclaimed visitors. Quotations have been taken from their writings—be they diaries, letters, autobiographies, novels or poems—in testimony to the importance of the Florentine sojourn to their lives and careers. Photographs and old postcards accompany the selected excerpts in order to offer the reader a comparison between the literary texts produced by the authors and the physical reality that inspired them.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Il Prato
• Release date: Nov 30, 2011
• ISBN: 9788863361483

Book preview

PREFACE

Florence has for centuries been the cultural and artistic center that has attracted artists and scholars from all over the world. In the 19th century it was one of the indispensable destinations of the Grand Tour of the Old Continent. Explorers from the New World arrived in search of self-improvement since America was generally thought to lack traditions and culture.¹ As Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote in his Preface to The Marble Faun, in America there was no shadow, no antiquity, no mystery, no picturesque and gloomy wrong, nor anything but a commonplace prosperity… For many visiting Italy had been a dream since childhood, a time spent looking at copies of famous Italian paintings. Visitors came to explore the numerous famous art collections of Florence in order to educate themselves on art and taste. In addition, the low prices of this Paradise of Cheapness appealed to travelers who had to live on a small budget yet wished to live like princes. Furthermore, the mild climate was known to be beneficial for those who were looking to improve their health. Thus, throughout the 19th century an ever-increasing number of Americans were drawn with fascination to Florence, the capital of Renaissance art. Scholars as well as artists – be they painters, sculptors, poets or prose writers – embarked on the packets and steamers for a pilgrimage to the Old World to experience in person the atmosphere shaped by the presence of art and history.

Traveling in the 1800s took a great deal of time and patience. The voyage across the ocean was long and tiresome. Harriet Beecher Stowe gives a vivid description in Sunny Memories of Foreign Lands of how the longed-for romantic sea voyage turned into an agonizing experience for groaning, seasick passengers with pale cheeks and sunken eyes. Excitement returned to the voyagers only at the sight of terra ferma. From the seaports of Italy, such as Genoa and Leghorn (or Livorno), the explorers continued their lengthy journey into the mainland. Travel modes on the continent differed according to budgets and timetables. Some, like Bayard Taylor, toured Europe for two years on foot. Several editions of his travel book, Views A-Foot; or Europe Seen with Knapsack and Staff, published in 1846, sold out, and at the request of his readers the author added a chapter in 1848 offering some practical information particularly for pedestrians. The more common travel modes were a hired carriage, vettura, or faster public carriages, such as mail coaches. The journey from Genoa or Leghorn to Florence usually took between three and five days. The mail coaches were safer since they carried armed guards, who protected passengers against bandits. Towards the end of the century railroads were constructed, thus changing the leisurely tours to speedy excursions done by train.

Americans arrived in Florence equipped with their guidebooks, such as the Murray and Baedeker guides, which provided useful information on accommodations, local customs, general living costs, and tipping. They also presented extensive descriptions of the recommended places to visit and artworks to be admired. Other popular works used as guidebooks when visiting Florence were Lord Byron’s Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, John Ruskin’s Mornings in Florence, and George Eliot’s Romola. In their eagerness for self-education, the explorers diligently studied the city’s architecture and repeatedly flocked to the various churches, the Uffizi Gallery, and the Pitti Palace, where they admired the great art works. They also took relaxing walks in the Boboli gardens and in the Cascine Park, and spent their evenings enjoying theatre performances in various Florentine theatres, such as Pergola and Goldoni. Many of them visited the studio of Hiram Powers, the American sculptor, a long time resident in the city. They were often invited to pass their evenings in Casa Guidi on via Maggio, the home of the English poet Robert Browning and his wife, Elisabeth Barrett Browning. More often than not, travelers had little contact with local Florentines as they spent their time in the company of fellow Americans or Anglo-Florentines living in Florence.

Several American authors who temporarily resided in Florence in the 19th century found the relaxed, dolce-far-niente, atmosphere of the city ideal for creative work. In the secluded villas in the suburbs of Florence they were able to fully concentrate on writing. Furthermore, the city and its history inspired the authors, stirring their imaginations. The focus of this volume is on documenting and exploring the lives of these American authors, limiting the study to writers whose sojourns in Florence have been honored with commemorative plaques in the heart of the city as well as its immediate surroundings. The first step was locating the plaques identifying these authors who include Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens), James Fenimore Cooper, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Henry James, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, and James Russell Lowell. A number of other acclaimed authors, some of whom also used Florence as a setting in their articles, poems, and novels, have not been included in the present volume since their residences in the city are not immortalized with commemorative plaques. Well-known authors without plaques include Francesca Alexander (author of Roadside Songs of Tuscany), William DeForest (author of European Acquaintance), poet and philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson, journalists Kate Field and Margaret Fuller, William Dean Howells (author of Indian Summer), Harriet Beecher Stowe, Edith Wharton (author of The Italian Novel and Italian Villas and Their Gardens), Constance Fenimore Woolson (author of Dorothy and Other Italian Stories and The Front Yard and Other Italian Stories), and many others.

Once the plaques celebrating the Florentine sojourns were located, the research focused on gathering written testimonies of the impressions Florence awoke in these visitors. The selected quotations are taken from diaries, autobiographies, letters, travel books, novels, and poems. These acclaimed artists’ extensive writings on Florence testify to the importance of the Florentine sojourn in their lives and their careers. Often these artists inserted their impressions and descriptions of the idyllic places, historical sites, and the ancient Florentine villas in their works, whether travel articles or fictitious short stories, novels or poems. The excerpts are accompanied by photographs of 19th century Florence from the Alinari archives, old postcards, as well as photographs of the villas and other residences inhabited by the authors during their stay in Florence. These pictures have been used in order to offer the possibility of comparison between the literary texts on Florence produced by the authors and the physical reality that served them as a source of inspiration.

MARK TWAIN (Samuel Clemens)

(1835-1910)

Via di Vincigliata (photo: S. Salenius)

NELLE CIRCOSTANTI COLLINE / CELEBRATE DALL’ARTE DI / GIOVANNI BOCCACCIO / TROVARONO ACCOGLIENTE OSPITALITÀ E ISPIRAZIONE / LEIGH HUNT / CHARLES ARMITAGE BROWN / JANET ROSS / JOHN ADDINGTON SYMONDS / EDWARD HUTTON / MARK TWAIN / FREDERICH H. TRENCH / BERNARDO BERENSON²

The first of Mark Twain’s four visits to Florence took place in 1867. The author had convinced the San Francisco Daily Alta California, California’s most popular magazine, to pay his fare ($1,250) on the first transatlantic luxury cruise so he could report on the journey. Thus, on June 8th, Mark Twain sailed from New York on the steamer Quaker City. The cruise around the world had scheduled stopovers in Africa, Asia, and in Europe. The main attraction of the tour was the Paris Exposition of 1867. During the five-month cruise, Twain made friends with other passengers, especially with banker Dan Slote and Doctor Abraham Reeves Jackson, with whom he toured in Italy. He spent time in the company of the correspondent of the Cleveland Herald, Mary Mason Fairbanks, who became a mother and a mentor to the young writer. He formed a very close friendship with Charles Langdon, whose sister, Olivia, Twain married