Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa

Sixty years after his death on July 23, 1957, I propose a deepening of Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, author of the novel "Il Gattopardo".

In 1957, as already mentioned, he was dying in Rome Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, aristocrat from Palermo who matured late literary ambitions. Ambitions that could not quite indulge in life, because his masterpiece, the novel entitled "Il Gattopardo" It was published posthumously. About Giorgio Bassani, editorial consultant at the time of the publishing house Feltrinelli, if the novel by Sicilian writer, was successfully released in 1958, and immediately felt a "literary event", so as to win the Strega Prize in 1959.

Divergent opinion was to Elio Vittorini, player for the publishing house Mondadori, who had refused to print it.

Prince Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, in whose coat of arms appeared a leopard, was born in Palermo December 23, 1896.

Of retiring disposition and lonely, he led his youth in study, travel and periods of deliberate isolation in the family palace.

The advent of fascism, he retired to his native Sicily, taking frequent trips abroad. He mastered the French language thanks to his mother Beatrice, however companion of many journeys. The close relationship between mother and son influenced the outcome of the marital union between Joseph and his wife Licy, Latvian and aristocratic daughter of a German baron. The wedding was held in Riga in 1932, but soon the disagreements with the mother-in-law led Licy to leave the family. Only later, when Latvia was invaded by Nazi troops, the two met again in Italy.

Suffering from an incurable disease, the writer died in Rome July 23, 1957 at the age of 63 years, unaware of all the celebrities that his novel, as yet unpublished, would reach. In 1963 Luchino Visconti film realized the transposition into an extraordinary film which won the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival.