To Italy by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
The speaker addresses Italy, lamenting its beauty and misery and wishing it stronger or less fair so foreign powers would fear it more or desire it less. The closing lines depict invading armies, the bloodied Po, and dependence on foreign arms that leaves Italy enslaved whether victorious or defeated.
By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow · Genre: Sonnet, Political Poetry · 178 words
First lines
By Vincenzo Da Filicaja
Italy! Italy! thou who'rt doomed to wear / The fatal gift of beauty, and possess / The dower funest of infinite wretchedness / Written upon thy forehead by despair; / Ah! would that thou wert stronger, or less fair. / That they might fear thee more, or love thee less, / Who in the splendor of thy loveliness / Seem wasting, yet to mortal combat dare! / Then from the Alps I should not see descending / Such torrents of armed men, nor Gallic horde / Drinking the wave of Po, distained with gore, / Nor should I see thee girded with a sword / Not thine, and with the stranger's arm contending, / Victor or vanquished, slave forever more.
Genres
- Sonnet — Fourteen rhymed lines turn from an address to Italy's beauty and misery toward images of invasion and subjugation.
- Political Poetry — The speaker laments foreign armies crossing the Alps and Italy's continued enslavement despite military victory or defeat.
Tags
foreign invasion · national subjugation · beauty · sonnet
What this Textopian page supports
To Italy is listed on Textopian as a poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, dated Date unknown.
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- Work type: Poem
- Author: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
- Date: Date unknown
- Language: English
- Genres: Sonnet, Political Poetry
- Length: 178 words
- Structure: 1 section, 2 paragraphs
- Reading fit: Fairly Easy (7th Grade)
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