Edmondo De Amicis

Born in Oneglia, Italy, on October 21, 1846, Edmondo De Amicis was educated in Cuneo and Turin before entering the military academy at Modena. He served as an officer and took part in the 1866 Battle of Custoza, then gradually moved from army life into journalism and literature.

His early success came with writing drawn from military experience, followed by popular travel books based on journeys through Spain, Morocco, Constantinople, Paris, and other places. He became internationally famous for Cuore (Heart), published in 1886, a children's novel presented as a schoolboy's diary that won generations of readers with its emotion, moral seriousness, and sympathy for ordinary people.

De Amicis also wrote poetry, short fiction, and essays, and he remained an important public literary figure in Italy until his death in Bordighera on March 11, 1908. What still stands out in his work is its openness of feeling: he wrote in a way that tried to teach kindness, civic spirit, and fellow-feeling without losing the energy of lived experience.