Background

Giossue Carducci is as Italian as it is possible to be. The man came from a family of revolutionaries in Tuscany who abhorred separated rule (including the deeply revered Pope) and insisted on the chance for federal unity among Italian regions. Those strong opinions suffused his work, a massive collection of poems that revived some of the classical and pagan world but brought them to bear with more modern (for the time) language.

While Carducci was probably most honored to become a Senator with in Italy’s newly independent system, he was widely appreciated by the Nobel committees becoming a unanimous selection by the committee in 1906 (over the much more widely read Leo Tolstoy). He was cited most plainly for his “creative energy, freshness of style, and lyrical voice”. He was buried in Bologna where he was a professor, and his tomb sits facing the stadium of Bologna FC (literally, one block away).

Works

Satan alone lives.
He holds sway in
the tremulous flash
of some dark eye,

Or the eye which languidly
turns and resists,
or which, bright and moist,
provokes, insists.

He shines in the bright
blood of grapes,
by which transient
joy persists,

Which restores fleeting
life, keeps
grief at bay,
and inspires us with love

You breathe, O Satan
in my verses,
when from my heart explodes
a challenge to the god

Of wicked pontiffs,
bloody kings;
and like lightning you
shock men’s minds.

–Hymn to Satan–

Message

Carducci was as political as he was poetic, and the citation for his “lyrical force” was a very considerate way of describing what sometimes feels like a diss-track master for the turn of the last century. If I were to sum up his message from the poems I read it would probably be something like: “F*** the system, bros…LIVE FOR THE NOW!!”

Position: #9 Striker

With this much aggression and energy, Carducci makes the most sense to me as a Striker, making him the first pre-1980 laureate I’ve put at the point of the attack. I’m aware that his legs have decayed a lot more than other options for the goal scorer, but Carducci’s old school style of doing what has long worked is a good match here. (Like Lucas Holer)

Next Time 1926 Honoree–Grazia Deledda

(Doubling our Italian quotient!!)