Cervelli elettronici, corsa allo spazio e rischio nucleare: Italo Calvino, l’America e Benedetto Croce

Starting from Italo Calvino’s stay in the United States between 1959 and 1960, this essay reconstructs a crucial phase in the writer’s reflection on the relationship between scientific and technological development, political action, and moral responsibility. His direct encounter with large-scale American industry, electronic computers, nuclear technology, and the emerging Space Age reinforced a growing skepticism toward overarching ideological systems and sharpened his attention to the concrete dynamics of modernization. Within this framework, the essay examines a small but significant group of references to Benedetto Croce that appear in texts connected with the American experience, showing that Calvino’s interest was directed less toward Croce the theorist of aesthetics than toward the author of writings on morality and practical life.