Samuel Putnam translated Gramsci for American readers in 1946. That summer, Science & Society printed his version of Gramsci’s prison letters on Benedetto Croce, a thinker from Italy. Putnam had worked with books and writers from Europe for years. His own life story traces a move from revolt in the arts toward action on the left.[1][2]
Early life and intellectual formation
Putnam grew up in Illinois and studied at the University of Chicago. In his 1947 memoir, he recalled reading Bernard Shaw with teacher Percy Holmes Boynton. He also joined a small group studying Marx’s Capital in German, led by a Russian student. Such reading opened questions about society alongside his interest in books. It did not mark a settled Communist commitment.[2]
His skill in Italian grew through a different route. Putnam recalled living with an Italian American family while at college. He kept studying the language and its books for more than ten years before moving to Europe. Publisher Pascal Covici then hired him to translate Pietro Aretino. With that work, Putnam could leave his newspaper job and earn his living from books.[2]
While living in France, Putnam tried to build a life around art and writing. By 1930 he was challenging writers who placed experiments with words above their work’s content. His memoir describes a further change during 1929–1933: politics began to matter more as he watched Europe’s cultural disputes and the rise of Fascism. The Depression also made it harder to earn a living abroad. Back in New York, he found writers seeking relief and work. He recalled chairing a meeting of unemployed writers and joining a demand for a public writers’ project.[2]
Ideas and political aims
Putnam came to question the hope that artists could stand apart from society. In his account, a retreat to a French village failed to offer that escape. News of Hitler’s advance, worries about his son’s future, and the need for paid work all reached him there. He later argued that American writers could have more public effect if they joined forces.[2]
His work on the left grew during the 1930s. A guide to his papers at Southern Illinois University reports that he wrote for the Daily Worker and supported Communism during the Depression. It dates his break with Communism to May 1945. That reported change came before his Gramsci text appeared. The printed letters alone cannot tell us his party status or aims in 1946.[3]
Career and activities
Putnam worked as a newspaper reporter and literary critic before moving to France in 1926. There he edited the New Review, a small magazine for new writing. He recalled asking Ezra Pound to serve as associate editor. Translation helped pay the printing bills, while his wife Riva also worked to support the project.[2][3]
After his return to the United States in 1933, Putnam spoke in left literary circles. A February 17, 1934 notice in the Daily Worker announced a talk at New York’s John Reed Club called “From Dada to Revolution.” The notice shows how he presented his experience to that audience. It announced the talk; it does not preserve what he said.[4]
For the 1946 letters, Putnam used a text that La Rinascita had printed in Rome in June 1944. The American journal’s opening note names him as translator. It also credits most of the footnotes to him. That note gives us a specific route from a journal in Italy to one in the United States.[1]
Major works
Gramsci ’s letters on Croce
“Benedetto Croce and His Concept of Liberty” filled ten printed pages in Science & Society. In the letters, Gramsci asked how Croce’s ideas shaped people’s loyalties. Croce did not have to run a party. His books could help new leaders accept a place within Italy’s ruling class. Gramsci saw that work as one way the class kept power. He also opposed Marxists who thought changes in the economy alone could explain how politics worked.[1]
Putnam translated the argument and added brief notes to help readers follow its references. Gramsci remained the author of the letters. Putnam’s work gave English readers access to them; it did not make every claim in them his own.[1]
A memoir of the move toward politics
Putnam’s Paris Was Our Mistress [2] appeared in 1947. He used his years abroad to explain why the life of an artist apart from society had lost its appeal for him. The memoir also records how he learned languages, found publishers, and ran a magazine. It helps explain the experience behind his translation work. Its account of his earlier thoughts is a later recollection.[2]
Influence and criticism
The 1946 letters gave Americans a place to read Gramsci’s own words in English. They could study his case for the power of ideas: Croce’s standing as a thinker could help keep a ruling group in place.[1]
How readers used these letters remains an open question. A printed text lets people read an idea. To show that Putnam changed their plans, we would need evidence of what a reader did with it.