Iris Origo

Iris Origo D.B.E.(1902-1988), the Marchesa Origo, was an Anglo-Irish-American writer, who devoted much of her life to the improvement of the Tuscan estate at La Foce, near Montepulciano, that she purchased with her husband in the 1920s.

Life

Iris Margaret Cutting was born on 15 August 1902, the daughter of William Bayard Cutting, the son of a rich and philanthropic New York family and Sybil Cuffe, the daughter of Lord Desart, an Irish peer. Her parents travelled widely after their marriage, particularly in Italy.

Following the early death of Bayard Cutting in 1910, Sybil Cuffe settled with her daughter Iris 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 Montia and a series of French and German governesses.

In 1918, Iris’s mother married the architectural historian Geoffrey Scott, who later embarked on a relationship with Vita Sackville-West. The marriage was to last until 1927; following their divorce, she was to marry for a third time, to the essayist Percy Lubbock. She died in 1943.

Iris 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 and a man possessed of good looks and much charm. 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 which, by much hard work, care and attention, they succeeded in transforming.

They had a son, Gian Clemente Bayard ("Gianni") (24 June 1925 – 30 April 1933), who died of meningitis, and two daughters, Benedetta (1 August 1940 - ) and Donata (9 June 1943 - ). It was following the death of Gianni that Iris 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."

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 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 Val d’Orcia", was the first of her books to be a popular, as well as a critical, success.

After the war, Iris 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’s mother at Lerici, on the Gulf of Spezia.

Antonio Origo died on 27 June 1976, and Iris Origo herself died on 28 June 1988. In 1977, she had been created an Honorary Dame Commander of the British Empire.

Works

* "A Measure of Love" (1957), a collection of biographical essays
* "A Need to Testify" (1984), containing biographies of Ignazio Silone, Gaetano Salvemini, Ruth Draper and Lauro de Bosis, four opponents of Fascism
* "Allegra" (1935), a short life of Byron’s daughter
* "Gianni", a privately printed memorial to Iris’s son
* "Giovanni and Jane" (1950), a children’s book
* "Images and Shadows" (1970), an elegiac autobiography
* "Leopardi" (1935), a biography of Giacomo Leopardi
* "The Last Attachment" (1949), an account of the relationship between Byron and Countess Guiccioli
* "The Merchant of Prato" (1957), an account of the life and times of Francesco di Marco Datini
* "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
* "War in Val d’Orcia" (1947), an account of Iris’s experiences of the Second World War in diary form

ources

Caroline Moorehead, "Iris Origo, Marchesa of Val d’Orcia" (London, John Murray, 2000)