Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa

Giuseppe Tomasi, the 11th Prince of Lampedusa and 12th Duke of Palma, was born in Palermo on 23 December 1896 and died on 23 July 1957. He is remembered as a Sicilian writer and the last of the Tomasi line to hold the princely title before it became extinct (though his uncle, Pietro Tomasi della Torretta, a former Italian ambassador to the UK and Senate president, was the title’s final official bearer). His sole novel, *Il Gattopardo* (published after his death in 1958), is set in his native Sicily during the Risorgimento and remains his most famous work.

Tomasi was a reserved, solitary, and somewhat misanthropic aristocrat who opened up only to a few close friends, spending much of his time reading and meditating. As a child, he said he preferred the company of things to people, and in 1954 he noted that at least ten of his sixteen waking hours were spent alone.

He was born to Giulio Maria Tomasi, Prince of Lampedusa and holder of several other titles, and Beatrice Mastrogiovanni Tasca Filangieri di Cutò. His sister Stefania died of diphtheria in 1897, leaving him an only child. He was close to his strong-willed mother, while his father was cold and detached. Though much of the family fortune had been lost or tied up in litigation, they still lived in the grand Palazzo Lampedusa in Palermo with his grandparents, three bachelor uncles, and servants. Summers were often spent at his mother’s family home in rural Santa Margherita di Belice.

His early education was irregular. At age eight, he spoke conversational French but could not yet read or write Italian. He later studied with a tutor, learned French from his mother, and was read adventure novels by a grandmother. The Santa Margherita palace had an excellent library, which he devoured, and a small theatre where traveling players performed each summer. He recalled seeing *Hamlet* there with an audience of mostly illiterate laborers.

In March 1911, his aunt Princess Julia Trigona was murdered by her lover, a scandal that sent the family to Tuscany and Rome. That autumn, Tomasi began classical studies at a liceo in Rome, then continued in Palermo for three years. In 1914–1915, he enrolled in law at the University of Genoa, though it’s unclear if he attended; he definitely took law classes in Rome in early 1915. That year he was drafted, serving first in the artillery and then the infantry. After officer tr