Thirty-two thousand kilometers across America, with his wife at the wheel and an entire nation to decode. Guido Piovene never learned to drive, but he knew how to look beneath the surface. In De America, his journey through the United States becomes a portrait of a country of vast landscapes, technological ambition and deep contradictions. This was Eisenhower’s America, between Truman and Kennedy — a world far removed from today’s, yet strikingly relevant to it.

One of Italy’s leading writers and journalists of the 20th century, Piovene won the Strega Prize for Le stelle fredde and helped found Il Giornale, the newspaper established by Indro Montanelli. He was also a keen observer of America and its often uneasy relationship with Europe. In this interview, journalist and essayist Bruno Quaranta revisits Piovene’s vision of the United States, launching a new La Stampa USA series on Italian intellectuals who wrote about America and the cultural ties between the two countries.

Piovene witnessed Eisenhower’s democratic America, after Truman and before Kennedy entered the White House. How did he interpret that period?

“He recognized its ability to deliver what is essential to the development of a modern society. Following in the footsteps of the Roosevelt-Truman era, he singled out ‘the beneficial and relentless pressure for moral reform exerted by Washington and its bureaucracy on local interests.’”

An era so far removed from our own. Is there one example that captures the difference?

“Piovene pointed to Henry Kaiser, the leading industrialist of the time, who was disliked by conservatives because they saw him as a product of the New Deal. Kaiser was a lifelong Republican, yet he had no hesitation about voting for Eisenhower. As Piovene noted, he operated primarily ‘with government money, on behalf of the government.’”

There was a time when even Texas voted for Eisenhower …

“Texas and other States like it showed, through that choice, that they embodied ‘a certain old-fashioned conservatism, but — if the apparent contradiction is permissible — a progressive, forward-looking conservatism.’”

How did the rest of the world view America at the time, in Piovene’s eyes?

“His assessment was harsh. Piovene took Europeans to task for their intellectualism and arrogance. The Old Continent regarded America as ‘a mere offshoot of Europe.’”

What kind of perspective did he want Europeans to adopt?

“A more serious one. He wanted America to be seen as a world in its own right. For Europeans, he believed, could offer a complementary civilization — ‘that otherness, that foreign element necessary to the creation of a new civilization.’”

How did America strike Piovene as a traveler?

“Above all, through its vast spaces. He observed: ‘Visually, American civilization is a mixture of prehistoric, decaying nature and modern technology.’”

Piovene’s journey in De America begins in New York. How did the Big Apple greet him?

“On his first walk, he was stopped four times. Whenever he seemed lost, someone would approach him with the same question: May I help you? He later wrote: ‘That insistent, kind and sometimes embarrassing question probably holds the secret of what elsewhere is called American imperialism.’”

Does De America offer a glimpse of the United States we see today?

“To some extent, yes. Piovene wrote: ‘The rise, which has accelerated in recent years, of less liberal races, social classes and states, along with the dilution of the Anglo-Saxon element, is certainly preparing the way for a less tolerant America. Patriotism, Americanism, a sense of identity as Americans, and militarism are all making conspicuous advances.’”

— ALL RIGHTS RESERVED —