14 November

NEW - Cesare Maria De Vecchi – Fascist politician

Mussolini supporter helped to lead historic march

Cesare Maria De Vecchi, one of the four leaders of the March on Rome in 1922 that resulted in Benito Mussolini’s Fascist party winning power in Italy, was born on this day in 1884 in Casale Monferrato in Piedmont.  De Vecchi was both a soldier and colonial administrator and he was accused of committing the first war crime of Fascist Italy when, under his leadership as governor of Italian Somaliland, 100 civilians were killed while he pursued a ‘scorched earth policy’ between 1925 and 1927. After graduating in jurisprudence, De Vecchi had become a successful lawyer in Turin. He took part in the final events of World War I, finishing with the rank of captain and decorations for valour. On his return to Italy, he became a supporter of the National Fascist Party and went on to become head of his local Fascist squadre, or militia.  In 1921, De Vecchi was elected to the Chamber of Deputies. Read more… 

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Carlo Emilio Gadda - writer and novelist

Author who drew comparisons with Levi and Joyce

The essayist and novelist Carlo Emilio Gadda, whose work has been compared with the writings of Primo Levi, James Joyce and Marcel Proust, was born on this day in 1893 in Milan.  His novels and short stories were considered outstanding for his original and innovative style, moving away from the rather staid language of Italian literature in the early 20th century, adding elements of dialect, technical jargon and wordplay.  It has been said that Gadda opted for his experimental style because he thought that only through the use of a fragmentary, incoherent language could he adequately portray what he considered a disintegrated world.  Born into an upper middle-class family living on Via Manzoni in the centre of Milan, Gadda lost his father when he was only a child, after which his mother had to bring up the family on limited means, although she refused to compromise with her lifestyle. Read more…

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Giuseppina Strepponi – soprano

Death of the woman who inspired Donizetti and Verdi

Opera singer Giuseppina Strepponi died on this day in 1897 at the village of Sant’Agata in the province of Piacenza in Emilia-Romagna.  She was the second wife of the composer Giuseppe Verdi and is often credited with helping him achieve his first successes, having starred in several of his early operas.  Strepponi was born Clelia Maria Josepha Strepponi in Lodi, a little over 40km (26 miles) southeast of Milan, in 1815.  Her father was the organist at Monza Cathedral and also a composer and he gave her piano lessons when she was very young. At the age of 15 she was enrolled at the Milan Conservatory and she won first prize for singing in her final year.  Strepponi made her professional debut in 1834 at the Teatro Orfeo in Taranto and enjoyed her first success the following spring in Trieste, singing the title role in Rossini’s Matilde di Shabran. Read more…

Maria Cristina of Savoy

Pious princess was beatified by Pope Francis

Princess Maria Cristina of Savoy was born on this day in 1812 in Cagliari on the island of Sardinia.  She was the youngest child of King Victor Emmanuel I of Piedmont-Sardinia and his wife Queen Maria Teresa of Austria-Este.  Maria Cristina was described as beautiful, but she was also modest and pious and in 2014 she was beatified by Pope Francis.  As a Savoy princess she had been expected to make an advantageous marriage alliance and when she was just 20 years of age she was married to Ferdinand II of the Two Sicilies, in an attempt to keep southern Italy on friendly terms, at a ceremony in Genoa.  Modest and reserved, she was never comfortable at the royal court in Naples and she was unhappy with Ferdinand. But she was said to be loved by the ordinary people of the Two Sicilies, who were charmed by her beauty and kindness.  Read more…

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Aleardo Aleardi - poet and patriot

History-loving writer dreamed of a united Italy

Patriotic poet Aleardo Aleardi was born on this day in 1812 in Verona.  At the height of his success he was hailed as an important figure in the Risorgimento movement.  Aleardi’s poems are mostly about events in Italian history and his love for his home country, which was under Austrian occupation while he was growing up.  He was originally named Gaetano Maria but changed his name to Aleardi, the surname of his father, Count Giorgio Aleardi, when he started writing.  Aleardi studied law at Padova University but gradually became more interested in poetry, influenced by some of his fellow students who were involved in the romantic Risorgimento movement.  Risorgimento, which means resurgence, was the name for the political and social movement that led to the consolidation of the different states of the Italian peninsula into the Kingdom of Italy.  Read more…

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Enzo Cucchi - artist

Enjoyed prominence as part of Transavanguardia movement

The artist Enzo Cucchi, who was a prominent member of the Italian Transavanguardia movement, was born on this day in 1949 in Morro d'Alba, a walled town set among hills about 10km (6 miles) inland from the Adriatic and 24km (15 miles) west of Ancona in the Marche region.  The Transavanguardia, which peaked during the 1980s, was part of an international revival of expressionist painting. Other Italians who could be considered part of the movement included Sandro Chia, Francesco Clemente, Nicolo de Maria and Mimmo Paladino.  Cucchi’s most important works include the frescoes of the Chapel of Monte Tamaro near Lugano, designed by the architect Mario Botta, which he painted between 1992 and 1994, and the design of the curtain for the theatre La Fenice of Senigallia (1996). Read more…

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Book of the Day: Blood and Power: The Rise and Fall of Italian Fascism, by John Foot

In the aftermath of the First World War, the seeds of fascism were sown in Italy. While the country reeled in shock, a new movement emerged from the chaos: one that preached hatred for politicians and love for the fatherland; one that promised to build a 'New Roman Empire', and make Italy a great power once again.  Wearing black shirts and wielding guns, knives and truncheons, the supporters of the Italian Fascist Party embraced a climate of violence and rampant masculinity. Led by Benito Mussolini, they would systematically destroy the organisations of the left, murdering and torturing anyone who got in their way.  In Blood and Power, historian John Foot draws on decades of research to chart the turbulent years between 1915 and 1945, and beyond. Drawing widely from accounts of people across the political spectrum, he tells the story of Italian Fascism and its legacy, which still, disturbingly, reverberates to this day.

John Foot is an English academic historian specialising in Italy. He is the author of several books on Italian history as well as histories of Italian football and Italian competitive cycling, and the story of the pioneering psychiatrist, Franco Basaglia, who led a revolution in mental health care in Italy.

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Cesare Maria De Vecchi – Fascist politician

Mussolini supporter helped to lead historic march

De Vecchi served as Governor
 of Italian Somaliland

Cesare Maria De Vecchi, one of the four leaders of the March on Rome in 1922 that resulted in Benito Mussolini’s Fascist party winning power in Italy, was born on this day in 1884 in Casale Monferrato in Piedmont.

De Vecchi was both a soldier and colonial administrator and he was accused of committing the first war crime of Fascist Italy when, under his leadership as Governor of Italian Somaliland, 100 civilians were killed while he pursued a ‘scorched earth policy’ between 1925 and 1927.

After graduating in jurisprudence, De Vecchi had become a successful lawyer in Turin. He took part in the final events of World War I, finishing with the rank of captain and decorations for valour.

On his return to Italy, he became a supporter of the National Fascist Party and went on to become head of his local Fascist squadre, or militia.

In 1921, De Vecchi was elected to the Chamber of Deputies and he later became under-secretary at the Treasury and under-secretary at the Finance Ministry during Benito Mussolini’s Government.

In October 1922, Fascist Party leaders planned a march on Rome and, on October 28, Fascist demonstrators led by De Vecchi, Emilio De Bono, Italo Balbo and Michele Bianchi approached the capital.

The Italian Prime Minister, Luigi Facta, wished to declare a state of siege, but this was overruled by King Victor Emmanuel III, who wanted to avoid bloodshed.

He persuaded Facta to resign and on October 30, 1922, he appointed Mussolini as Prime Minister, transferring political power to the Fascists without armed conflict. On October 31 the Fascists paraded in Rome, while Mussolini formed his coalition government. 

After becoming Governor of Italian Somaliland in 1923, De Vecchi left the Italian political scene for a while to serve abroad and he was made Count of Val Cismon, a new title created for him by Victor Emmanuel III.

He was made a Senator by the king in 1925 and, during the 1930s, he chaired the Piedmont committee for the history of the Risorgimento and organised events and lectures to celebrate the period.

De Vecchi (2nd right), with (from left) De Bono, Bianchi,
Mussolini and Balbo, leaders of the March on Rome

As Minister for Education, De Vecchi promoted a version of history that identified the House of Savoy as the link between Imperial Rome and the Rome of Fascism.

He reformed the education system by  giving control of all high school education to the government, which could decide scholastic curriculums and apply censorship on textbooks before and after their publication. 

While De Vecchi was serving as Governor of Rhodes, he enacted the Italian racial laws, which stripped Jews of their assets and restricted their rights. He forced Jews to move their cemetery and give up the tombstones of their ancestors to provide materials for the rebuilding of the Palace of the Grand Master of the Knights of Rhodes. 

On March 6, 1940, Count Galeazzo Ciano, wrote in his War Diaries: ‘For the first time I found a person who wants to declare War with the Germans against France and England. This person is no less than the intrepid Cesare Maria de Vecchi di Val Cismon! The Americans say that a sucker is born every minute; one only has to look for him. This time I have found one. Cesare Maria is, above all, a man of pomposity and vain illusions, who dreams of obtaining a marshal's baton and decorations and hopes to gain them through the blood of others.’

After the announcement of the Armistice of Cassabile in September 1943, De Vecchi authorised German forces to enter the port of Piombino in southern Tuscany and forbade any act of resistance. However, units of the Royal Italian Navy and Royal Italian Army supported by local people prevented the Germans from landing at Piombino. They killed about 100 of them and captured more than 200 Wehrmacht soldiers. 

The following day, De Vecchi ordered the freeing of the Germans and the returning of their weapons to them, after which he signed the surrender of his division to the Germans. On September 13, De Vecchi, with a pass given to him by German Field Marshal Albert Kesselring, took refuge in Piedmont. 

In early October 1943, De Vecchi went into hiding from Mussolini's Italian Social Republic, which had condemned him to death in his absence. After the war he escaped to Argentina on a Paraguayan passport.

After returning to Italy in 1949, De Vecchi supported the neo-fascist Italian Social Movement but refused to accept any political or institutional office within the movement. De Vecchi died in Rome in 1959.

Piazza Mazzini, the main square in Casale
Monferrato, where Cesare De Vecchi was born

Travel tip:

Casale Monferrato in Piedmont, where Cesare Maria De Vecchi was born, is situated on the south bank of the Po river, about 60km (37 miles) east of the regional capital, Turin, at the foot of the Monferrato hills.. A town with around 36,000 inhabitants today, it was founded in Roman times and later turned into a major citadel by the Gonzaga family. At the heart of the historic centre is Piazza Mazzini, which grew on the site of the Roman forum. The square is dominated by an 1843 equestrian statue by Abbondio Sangiorgio of King Charles Albert of Piedmont-Sardinia.  To the east of the square is the Lombard Romanesque cathedral of Sant'Evasio, founded in 742 and rebuilt in the early 12th century, occupying the site of a Roman temple dedicated to Jupiter.  The Castello dei Paleologi, on Piazza Castello, is a hexagonal fortress that probably dates from 1000 and was rebuilt in the 15th century with corner towers and a moat. The town is famous for Krumiri Rossi, traditional curved dry biscuits created in the 19th century. Sitting in the heart of the Monferrato wine region, its local wines include Barbera and Grignolino.

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The Alps provide a mountainous backdrop to Turin, the
regional capital of Piedmont that was once Italy's capital

Travel tip:

Piedmont in northern Italy is the second largest region after Sicily. It borders France, Switzerland and the Italian regions of Lombardy, Liguria, Aosta Valley and a small part of Emilia-Romagna. Piedmont was acquired by Otto of Savoy in 1046 and its capital was established at Chambery, which is now in France. The Savoy territory became the Duchy of Savoy in 1416 and the seat of the Duchy was moved to Turin in 1563 by Duke Emanuele Filiberto. After Victor Amadeus II became King of Sardinia in 1720, Piedmont became part of the Kingdom of Sardinia and Turin grew in importance as a European capital city. It was at the centre of the fight for the unification of Italy and was the region of birth of the first prime minister of Italy, Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour. Turin was the first capital of the unified Kingdom of Italy from 1861 to 1865, before the capital moved to Florence in 1865 and later to Rome in 1871. The mountainous areas of Piedmont, which make up more than 40 per cent of the region, including several major sections of the Western Alps, play a vital part in the power production of the region and of northern Italy as a whole. The region’s hydroelectric plants supply energy for industry, transportation, and domestic use. The Alpine and sub-Alpine meadows afford excellent pasture for cattle as the base of a prosperous dairy industry, while the lowlands produce wheat and rice, vegetables and fruit. The hills south of the Po are noted for the production of some of Italy’s highest-quality wines, both of the sparkling and still varieties. 

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Further reading:

Galeazzo Ciano, the son-in-law Mussolini had executed as a traitor

Italo Balbo, the former Blackshirt thug who was Mussolini’s ‘heir apparent’

The March on Rome - the insurrection that put Fascists in power

Also on this day:

1812: The birth of Maria Cristina of Savoy

1812: The birth of poet and patriot Aleardo Aleardi

1893: The birth of writer and novelist Carlo Emilio Gadda

1897: The death of soprano Giuseppina Strepponi, second wife of Giuseppe Verdi

1949: The birth of painter Enzo Cucchi

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13 November

Dacia Maraini – writer

Long career of a feminist novelist and playwright

Novelist and short story writer Dacia Maraini was born on this day in 1936 in Fiesole in Tuscany.  An Italian female writer who is widely recognised abroad, Dacia Maraini is also a respected critic, poet, journalist and playwright. She established la Maddalena, the first Italian theatrical group composed exclusively of women.  The themes of limitation and oppression in Maraini’s writing have their roots in her childhood years, which she spent in a concentration camp in Japan. She then went to live in Sicily, which she has also described as an oppressive setting.  Her writing expresses the concerns of the Italian feminist movement, focusing on issues such as abortion, sexual violence, prostitution and the mother/daughter relationship. Many of her works are autobiographical and are written in the form of diaries and letters.  Maraini lived with the writer Alberto Moravia from 1962 until 1983 and was a close friend of Pier Paolo Pasolini and Maria Callas.  She was the daughter of Sicilian princess Topazia Aliata di Salaparuta, who was an artist, and Fosco Maraini, a Florentine ethnologist.  When she was still a young child, Maraini’s family moved to Japan to escape Fascism in 1938. They were interned in a Japanese concentration camp. Read more…

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Alberto Lattuada – film director

Versatility and eye for talent made him leading figure

A leading figure in Italian cinema, Alberto Lattuada was born on this day in 1914 in Vaprio d’Adda in Lombardy.  Lattuada was the son of the composer Felice Lattuada, who made him complete his studies as an architect before allowing him to enter the film business.  As a student, Lattuada was a member of the editorial staff of the antifascist publication Camminare and also of Corrente di Vita, an independent newspaper. Corrente di Vita was closed by the Fascist regime just before Italy entered the Second World War. Lattuada, who is said to have detested fascism, helped to organise a screening of a banned anti-war film at about this time, which got him into trouble with the police.  In 1940 Lattuada started his cinema career as a screenwriter and assistant director on Mario Soldati’s Piccolo mondo antico (Old-Fashioned World).  He directed his own first movie, Giacomo l’idealista (Giacomo the Idealist) in 1942.  In 1950 he co-directed Luci del varietà with Federico Fellini. This was the first film directed by Fellini.  Read more…

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Gioachino Rossini - composer

Italian composer who found the fast route to wealth and popularity

One of Italy’s most prolific composers, Gioachino Rossini, died on this day in France in 1868.  He wrote 39 operas as well as sacred music, songs and instrumental music. He is perhaps best remembered for The Barber of Seville (Il barbiere di Siviglia), and Cinderella (La Cenerentola).  Rossini was born into a musical family living in Pesaro on the Adriatic coast in 1792. During his early years his mother earned her living singing at theatres in the area and he quickly developed musical talent of his own.  He made his first and only appearance on stage as a singer in 1805 but then settled down to learn the cello.  His first opera, The Marriage Contract (La cambiale di matrimonio), was staged in Venice when he was just 18.  In 1813 his operas, Tancredi and L’italiana in Algeri, were big successes in Venice and he found himself famous at the age of 20.  The Barber of Seville was first produced in Rome in 1816 and was so successful that even Beethoven wrote to congratulate Rossini on it.  The composer became wealthy and in big demand and travelled to Austria, France and England.  Read more…

Roberto Boninsegna - footballer

Prolific striker who helped Italy reach 1970 World Cup final

The footballer Roberto Boninsegna, a prolific striker who scored 171 goals  in 14 years in Italy’s Serie A, was born on this day in 1943 in Mantua in Lombardy.  Boninsegna, whose relentlessly tenacious attacking style made him a fan favourite despite his relatively small physical stature, was at his peak during a seven-season spell with Inter Milan from 1969 to 1976, during which he scored 113 goals in 197 Serie A appearances.  He was also a prominent member of the Italy national team at the 1970 World Cup finals in Mexico, scoring the opening goal for the Azzurri in their epic 4-3 extra-time victory over West Germany in the semi-final.  Boninsegna was also responsible for Italy’s first-half equaliser against Brazil in the final, before the South Americans, universally acclaimed as one of the finest teams in football history, overwhelmed them in the second half, winning 4-1.  Read more…

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Agostina Livia Pietrantoni - saint

Tragic sister’s simple virtue stopped the traffic in the capital

Nun Agostina Livia Pietrantoni died on this day in 1894 in Rome after being attacked by a patient at the hospital where she was working.  Her story touched Romans so deeply that her funeral brought the city to a standstill as thousands of residents lined the streets and knelt before her casket when it passed them.  The November 16 edition of the daily newspaper Il Messaggero reported that a more impressive spectacle had never before been seen in Rome.  ‘From one o’clock in the afternoon, the streets close to Santo Spirito, and all the roads it was believed that the funeral procession would pass, were crowded with people to the point of making the flow of traffic difficult.’  Sister Agostina was beatified by Pope Paul VI in 1972 and canonised by Pope John Paul II in 1999. Her feast day is celebrated each year on November 12.  Sant’Agostina was born Livia Pietrantoni in 1864 in Pozzaglia Sabina to the north east of Rome. She was the second of 11 children born to a poor farmer and his wife.  She started work at the age of seven doing manual labour, carrying heavy sacks of stones and sand for road construction.  Read more…

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Giovanna of Italy - Tsaritsa of Bulgaria

Daughter of King of Italy who married Tsar Boris III

The girl who would grow up to be Ioanna, Tsarista of Bulgaria, was born Princess Giovanna Elisabetta Antonia Romana Maria of Savoy on this day in 1907 in Rome.  Giovanna’s father was King Victor Emmanuel III, who was Italy’s monarch through two world wars from 1900 until he abdicated in 1946 just as Italy was about to become a republic.  Her mother was Queen Elena of Montenegro.  At the age of 22, Princess Giovanna became Tsarista Ioanna - the last Tsarista - after marrying the Tsar of Bulgaria, Boris III, in the Basilica of St Francis in Assisi.  It was the hope of the Italian royal family that the marriage would strengthen their relationship with the Balkan states.  The marriage lasted until Boris’s death in 1943 at the age of just 49. The Tsar had fallen ill during a trip to Germany to discuss Bulgaria’s role in the Second World War as a member of the Axis bloc and there were suspicions that he was poisoned on the orders of Hitler.  Bulgaria had agreed to join the Axis under the threat of invasion by the Germans, who wanted to use their territory to launch an attack on Greece, but the Tsar was said to be appalled at Hitler's massacres of Jews. On two occasions he refused orders to deport Bulgarian Jews.  Read more…

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Book of the Day: The Silent Duchess, by Dacia Maraini

The Silent Duchess, published in Italian as La lunga vita di Marianna Ucrìa, won the Premio Campiello, one of Italy’s most prestigious literary prizes. It is set in 18th-century Sicily, marked by a rigid feudal aristocracy, patriarchal control, and the backdrop of the Spanish Inquisition. Its main protagonist is Marianna Ucrìa, the intelligent daughter of Duke Signoretto Ucrìa. At age seven, she witnesses a public hanging and suffers a childhood trauma - raped by her maternal uncle - that leaves her deaf and mute. At age 13, Marianna is forced into an arranged marriage with that same eccentric uncle, Duke Pietro, and endures a traditional life of confinement and childbearing. Because she cannot speak or hear, Marianna navigates the world through observation, reading, and writing notes. She educates herself deeply, reading French and English texts alongside the philosophical works of David Hume. After her uncle-husband dies, Marianna uncovers the suppressed truth about her childhood abuse. Rather than conforming to traditional mourning or re-confinement, she claims her autonomy, rejects old social hierarchies, and chooses an independent path of travel and self-discovery. Widely hailed by literary critics, The Silent Duchess has sold more than a quarter of a million copies.

One of Italy's foremost women writers, Dacia Maraini is the author of more than 50 books, including novels, plays, collections of poetry and critical essays.

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12 November

Piero Terracina - death camp survivor

Roman lived to be 91 after being freed from Auschwitz

Piero Terracina, the man thought to be the longest survivor among the Jews rounded up for deportation in Rome after Nazi occupation during World War Two, was born on this day in 1928 in the Italian capital. Terracina was taken to the notorious Auschwitz death camp in Poland, where almost one million Jewish prisoners were killed, but was spared death and eventually liberated in 1945.  After a long and difficult recovery he returned to Rome and lived to be 91. For the last almost 30 years of his life, so long as his health allowed, he devoted himself to maintaining awareness of the Holocaust in the hope that such horrors would never be repeated.  Terracina enjoyed a relatively uneventful early childhood. Many of Rome’s Jews still lived in the area of Rione Sant’Angelo, to which they had been originally confined by papal decree in the 16th century.  Read more…

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Umberto Giordano - opera composer

Death of the musician remembered for Andrea Chenier

Composer Umberto Giordano died on this day in 1948 in Milan at the age of 81.  He is perhaps best remembered for his opera, Andrea Chenier, a dramatic work about liberty and love during the French Revolution, which was based on the real life story of the romantic French poet, André Chenier.  The premiere of the opera was held at Teatro alla Scala in Milan in 1896. At the time, its success propelled Giordano into the front rank of up-and-coming Italian composers alongside Pietro Mascagni, to whom he is often compared, and Giacomo Puccini.  Another of Giordano’s works widely acclaimed by both the public and the critics is the opera Fedora.  This had its premiere in 1898 at the Teatro Lirico in Milan. A rising young tenor, Enrico Caruso, played the role of Fedora’s lover, Loris. The opera was a big success and is still performed today.  Read more…

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Giulio Lega – First World War hero

Flying ace survived war to look after health of Italy’s politicians

Credited with five aerial victories during the First World War, the pilot Giulio Lega was born on this day in 1892 in Florence.  After the war he completed his medical studies and embarked on a long career as physician to Italy’s Chamber of Deputies.  Lega had been a medical student when he was accepted by the Italian army for officer training in 1915.  Because he was unusually tall, he became an ‘extended infantryman’ in the Grenadiers. He made his mark with them at the Fourth Battle of the Isonzo, for which he was awarded the War Merit Cross for valour. The following year he won a Bronze Medal for Military Valour in close-quarters combat, which was awarded to him on the battlefield.  Lega volunteered to train as a pilot in 1916. After gaining his licence he was sent on reconnaissance duty during which he earned a Silver Medal for Military Valour.  Read more…

Giro di Lombardia - historic cycle race

2021 edition was 115th since inception

The Giro di Lombardia cycle race - now known simply as Il Lombardia - was contested for the first time on this day in 1905.  The last of the cycling calendar’s five ‘Monuments’ - the races considered to be the oldest, hardest and most prestigious of the one-day events in the men's road cycling programme - the Giro di Lombardia is has also been called the Autumn Classic or la classica delle foglie morte - the classic of the dead (falling) leaves.  It is a particular favourite with cyclists who excel on hill climbs, its changing route normally featuring five or six notable ascents, of which the Madonna del Ghisallo, the site of a church that has become a sacred place in the cycling world, is a permanent fixture.  The race was the idea of journalist Tullio Morgagni, well known as the founder of the Giro d’Italia, although the Giro di Lombardia predated the former by three years.  Read more…

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Treaty of Rapallo 1920

Agreement solves dispute over former Austrian territory

The Treaty of Rapallo between Italy and the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes was signed on this day in 1920 in Rapallo near Genoa in Liguria.  It was drawn up to solve the dispute over territories formerly controlled by Austria in the upper Adriatic and Dalmatia, which were known as the Austrian Littoral.  There had been tension between Italy and the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes since the end of the First World War when the Austro-Hungarian empire was dissolved.  Italy had claimed the territories assigned to it by the secret London Pact of 1915 between Italy and the Triple Entente.  The Pact, signed on 26 April 2015, stipulated that in the event of victory in the First World War, Italy was to gain territory formerly controlled by Austria in northern Dalmatia.  These territories had a mixed population but Slovenes and Croats accounted for more than half.  Read more…

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Silvio Berlusconi resigns as PM

Financial crisis brings down 'untouchable' premier 

Silvio Berlusconi resigned as prime minister of Italy on this day in 2011. A controversial, polarising figure, he had dominated Italian politics for 17 years.  With Italy in the grip of the economic crisis that had brought severe consequences to other parts of the Eurozone, Berlusconi lost his parliamentary majority a few days earlier and promised to resign when austerity measures demanded by Brussels were passed by both houses of the Italian parliament.  The Senate had approved the measures the day before. When the lower house voted 380-26 in favour, Berlusconi was true to his word, meeting president Giorgio Napoletano within two hours to tender his resignation.  His last journey from the Palazzo Chigi to the Palazzo Quirinale, the respective official residences of the prime minister and the president, was not a dignified one.  Read more…

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Book of the Day: If This Is a Man / The Truce, by Primo Levi. Translated by Stuart Woolf

Written by fellow Italian Jewish death camp survivor Primo Levi, who was liberated from Auschwitz alongside Piero Terracina in January 1945, If This Is a Man offers essential context on the specific conditions Italian deportees faced in the camp and the difficult journey home. With the moral stamina and intellectual poise of a 20th-century Titan, this slightly built, dutiful, unassuming chemist set out systematically to remember the German hell on earth, steadfastly to think it through, and then to render it comprehensible in lucid, unpretentious prose. He was profoundly in touch with the minutest workings of the most endearing human events and with the most contemptible. What has survived in Levi's writing isn't just his memory of the unbearable, but also, in The Periodic Table and The Wrench, his delight in what made the world exquisite to him. This volume combines If This Is a Man, which was also published as Survival in Auschwitz, with its sequel, The Truce. The former, published in 1947, covers Levi’s capture in northern Italy, his deportation, and his eleven months inside Auschwitz until the camp was liberated by the Red Army in January 1945.  The Truce, published 16 years later in 1963, picks up immediately where the first ends. It chronicles his chaotic, nine-month odyssey across Eastern Europe - travelling through Poland, Russia, Romania, and Hungary - as he tried to get home to Turin after liberation.

Primo Levi was born in Turin in 1919 and trained as a chemist. Arrested as a member of the anti-fascist resistance during the war, he was deported to Auschwitz. Stuart Woolf (1936–2021) was an English-Italian historian and prominent translator renowned for translating Primo Levi's classic works If This Is a Man and The Truce into English, earning the John Florio Prize in 1966.

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