EDMONDO DE AMICIS. — Writer and journalist, born in Oneglia on 31 Oct. 1846, died in Bordighera on 11 Mar. 1908.
He attended the Military School in Modena, from which he graduated in ’65 as a second lieutenant in the infantry, taking part the following year in the war against Austria. In 1867 he edited the newspaper L’Italia militare in Florence, publishing in it the sketches later collected in a volume (La vita militare, Milan 1868). Manzoni, whom De Amicis always aspired to consider his master, encouraged him in his literary career. With the Novelle (Florence 1872) and the Ricordi del 1870-71 (ibid. 1872), De Amicis confirmed his qualities as a narrator with a short breath but a clear vision.
Between 1870 and 1880 he made journeys to Spain, Holland, Morocco, London, Constantinople, and Paris, described later in books of vivid impressions. After the mediocre volume of Poesie (Milan 1880), he published a collection of profiles (Gli amici, 2 vols., ibid. 1883). But his best-known book is Cuore, published in Milan in 1886.
Using a diary-like structure, De Amicis constructs a varied and engaging narrative that portrays the life of a school class, a pretext for examining the moral climate of families, studying the characters of the young boys, their reciprocal reactions and their relations with adults, and moralizing through the ways of the heart. The work, not without defects (among which the almost total absence of the religious idea), more than any other bears witness to the important social and national role played by De Amicis in attempting to delineate the essence and limits of the Italian bourgeoisie during a delicate period in the life of the country. In 1891, outside the field of active politics, De Amicis adhered to socialism as a faith in progress for the elevation of humanity.