Iris Origo

Dame Iris Margaret Origo, Marchesa of Val d'Orcia, DBE (15 August 1902 — 28 June 1988), née Cutting, was an Anglo-Irish writer, who devoted much of her life to the improvement of the Tuscan estate at La Foce, near Montepulciano, which she purchased with her husband in the 1920s.

Origins and upbringing

Origo was the daughter of William Bayard Cutting, the diplomat eldest son of a rich and philanthropic New York family and Lady Sybil Cuffe, the daughter of Lord Desart, an Irish peer. Her parents travelled widely after their marriage, particularly in Italy, when her father was diagnosed with tuberculosis. Following her father's death in 1910, Iris and her mother settled in Italy, buying the Villa Medici in Fiesole, one of Florence's most spectacular villas. There they formed a close friendship with Bernhard Berenson, who lived not far away at I Tatti. Iris was briefly enrolled at school in London, but was largely educated at home, by Professor Solone Monti as well as a series of French and German governesses.

In 1918, Lady Sybil Cutting married the architectural historian Geoffrey Scott, who later embarked on a relationship with Vita Sackville-West. The marriage was to last until 1926; following their divorce, she married for a third time, to the essayist Percy Lubbock; she died in 1943. Her second marriage reportedly failed because she was emotionally needy and had married a man who suffered from neurasthenia.

[Lady Sybil] had a brief affair with Bernard Berenson and then astonished everyone by marrying Mary Berenson's protege, Geoffrey Scott, the fragile and neurasthenic author of The Architecture of Humanism. The marriage was not happy. No one could outdo Sybil where neuroses were concerned, and she spent more and more time in bed on one pretext or another.

Personal life

Iris Cutting travelled to England and the United States in order to be launched in the society of both countries. In 1922, she first met Colin Mackenzie, a young Scottish businessman working in Milan; a romantic, epistolary affair was followed by a lifelong friendship. On 4 March 1924, Iris married Antonio Origo, the illegitimate son of Marchese Clemente Origo. They moved together to their new estate at La Foce, near Chianciano Terme in the Province of Siena. It was in a state of bad disrepair but, by much hard work, care and attention, they succeeded in transforming it. They had a son, Gian Clemente Bayard (aka "Gianni") (24 June 1925 — 30 April 1933), who died of meningitis, aged seven years old, and two daughters, Benedetta (born 1 August 1940) and Donata (born 9 June 1943). It was following the death of Gianni that Iris Origo embarked on her writing career, with a well-received biography of Giacomo Leopardi, published in 1935. The Observer said: "Her book is a monument to scholarship — the literary and historical background is painted with consummate skill, and a pattern of good taste."^{[citation needed]} She followed this in 1938 with a biography of Cola di Rienzo, the 14th century populist revolutionary and would-be dictator in Rome.

War years

During the Second World War, the Origos remained at La Foce and looked after refugee children, who were housed there. Following the surrender of Italy, Iris Origo also sheltered or assisted many escaped Allied prisoners of war, who were seeking to make their way through the German lines, or simply to survive. Her account of this time, War in the Val D'Orcia, was the first of her books to be a popular, as well as a critical, success.^{[citation needed]}

Post WWII

After the war, she divided her time between La Foce and Rome, where the Origos had bought a flat in the Palazzo Orsini, and devoted herself to writing. The Origos also spent holidays at Gli Scafari, the house built by Iris' mother at Lerici on the Gulf of Spezia.^{[citation needed]}

Death

Antonio Origo died on 27 June 1976. Iris Origo died on 28 June 1988, aged 85.

Honours

On 31 December 1976 she was appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) in the Overseas and Diplomatic List.

Works

• Allegra (1935), a short life of Byron’s daughter
• Leopardi (1935), a biography of Giacomo Leopardi
• Gianni, a privately printed memorial to Iris's son
• Tribune of Rome: A Biography of Cola di Rienzo (1938) pub. The Hogarth Press, London. Biography of the 14th century Roman revolutionary Rienzo
• War in Val d'Orcia(1947) pub. David R. Godine, Boston. A diary of personal and family experiences during the last years of Fascism and liberation of Italy
• The Last Attachment (1949), an account of the relationship between Byron and Countess Guiccioli
• Giovanni and Jane (1950), a children’s book
• A Measure of Love (1957), a collection of biographical essays
• The Merchant of Prato (1957), pub. Jonathan Cape (London), Alfred A. Knopf (US). An account of the life, times and commercial operations of Francesco di Marco Datini
• Images and Shadows (1970), an elegiac autobiography
• The Vagabond Path (1972), an anthology
• The World of San Bernardino (1963), a life of Bernardino of Siena
• Un'amica. Ritratto di Elsa Dallolio (1982), a memoir of an old friend
• A Need to Testify (1984), containing biographies of Ignazio Silone, Gaetano Salvemini, Ruth Draper and Lauro de Bosis, four opponents of Fascism

External links

• Villa Medici
• Villa La Foce” and Iris Origo
• "An American writer in Tuscany" Iris Origo and Villa La Foce

Sources

• "Coming Home to Heroism", The Spectator 7 October 2000. Available online. Book review of Caroline Moorehead's Iris Origo: Marchesa of Val d'Orcia (London, John Murray, 2000)
• Gianna Pomata, "Dalla biografia alla storia e ritorno: Iris Origo fra Bloomsbury e Toscana" in Genesis. Rivista della Sociata' italiana delle storiche, pgs. 117-156 (2007)