Tommaso Grossi

Tommaso Grossi (1791-1853) was one of the main representatives of Italian Romanticism, and one of Manzoni’s closest friends. An admirer and follower of Porta, he wrote satirical and parodistic poems in Milanese dialect (including a burlesque version of a novella by Boccaccio). The text which made him famous was the Prineide (1815), a dialect poem that circulated in manuscript form and contained a strong polemic against the restored Austrian government. The police at first charged Porta with responsibility for this poem, upon which Grossi admitted authorship and spent a couple of days in prison. From 1816, he participated in Porta’s literary salon (known as the Cameretta), which marked the start of a close friendship and literary collaboration with the great dialect poet. Like Porta, Grossi took part in the romantic polemic by writing satirical texts against the cultural conservativeness of the classicists and the use of mythology in literature. He used dialect for La fuggitiva, a sentimental novella in verse (a very widespread romantic genre), later translating it into Italian. His later poetic output was all in Italian and included the epic poem I Lombardi alla Prima Crociata (1826), mentioned by Manzoni in his novel (Promessi Sposi, Chapter XI), two novellas in verse (Ildegonda in 1820, and Ulrico e Lida in 1837), the historical novel Marco Visconti, continuing the genre inaugurated in Italy by Manzoni. In 1822 Grossi went to live at the Manzoni family home on the via del Morone, in a room opposite Manzoni’s study. In a passage in his novel Manzoni jokes that he could go and rummage through his friend’s manuscripts whenever he wanted. Manzoni also mentions Grossi in his correspondence with Fauriel, indicating the epic poem I Lombardi alla Prima Crociata as an example of a new genre of historical narrative, a blend of history and invention that he intended to use for his novel.