Social Aspects of the Italian Revolution, in a Series of Letters from Florence

Having married and settled in Florence in the 1840s, the poet and translator Theodosia Trollope (1816–65) found herself well placed to chronicle the events which contributed to the unification of Italy. While another Englishwoman in Italy, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, would become better known for her verse, Trollope nevertheless firmly established herself in the liberal and literary circles of Florentine society, allowing her to witness at first hand, and explore in prose, the effects that the Risorgimento was having on those living through it. Vividly capturing the unfolding situation in Tuscany, twenty-seven letters first appeared in The Athenaeum in 1859–60. They were published together in this work of 1861, along with an update on the months that had elapsed since the last letter was written in April 1860. Championing the cause of unification, Trollope's writing helped to generate enthusiasm in Britain for the progress and personalities of the Risorgimento.