Mussolini's ghost: Italy's duce in history and memory

History and Memory

Volumn 18, Issue 1, 2006, Pages 86-119

  Ventresca, Robert A ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF WESTERN ONTARIO   (Canada)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 84902941762     PISSN: 0935560X     EISSN: 15271994     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1353/ham.2006.0008     Document Type: Review

References (143)

1. R. G. Collingwood, An Autobiography (Harmondsworth, 1939), 112.
2. See "Mussolini Put to Death by Partisans, Body Brought to Milan Day before the Allies Enter," New York Times, 30 April 1945.
3. Reports of the events of Piazzale Loreto in late April 1945 abound in Italian historiography and in public memory. See also newspaper accounts of the time, including the series of New York Times reports from 30 April 1945. For a concise summary of the events in question, see Mirco Dondi, "Piazzale Loreto," in Mario Isnenghi, ed., I luoghi della memoria: Simboli e miti dell'Italia unita (Rome-Bari, 1996), 487-99.
4. For an extensive survey of press reaction, see the following: L. Laurenzi, "La RAI replica lo scoop dell'orrore: Il fascismo in tv tra choc e polemiche," La Repubblica, 7 April 1994; N. Rangeri, "Combat Film, rapsodia in nero," Il manifesto, 7 April 1994;
5. "Deaglio, Curzi, l'Osservatore Romano: Tutti contro, ma gli autori replicano," Corriere della Sera, 8 April 1994;
6. Barbara Spinelli, "La TV e l'Italia malata," La Stampa, 8 April 1994;
7. see also Nuto Revelli in interview to L. Campetti, "Il fascismo è vivo, lotta contro di noi," Il manifesto, 8 April 1994;
8. Norberto Boggio in interview to Nello Ajello, "La Resistenza tradita," La Repubblica, 8 April 1994;
9. G. Ceronetti, "Lo spettro funesto," La Stampa, 7 April 1994;
10. G. Bocca, "I due falsi storici del 25 aprile," La Repubblica, 14 April 1994.
11. See Alexander Stille, "Abetting the Cult of Neo-Fascism," World Policy Journal 16, no. 2 (summer 1999): 135-42.
12. See "Mussolini's Ghost Still Rattling His Chains," The Globe and Mail, 2 June 1994.
13. On "mythic icons," see Richard Slotkin, Gunfighter Nation (New York, 1996), 5-6.
14. On lieux de mémoire, of course, one begins with the pioneering work of Pierre Nora, published in English as Realms of Memory: Rethinking the French Past, trans. Arthur Goldhammer, edited and with a foreword by Lawrence D. Kritzman (New York, 1996).
15. See Andrew Gumbel, "Scholars in a Spin over Churchill Link to the Death of Mussolini," The Independent (UK), 19 Sept. 1995.
16. These article appeared respectively in: Calgary Herald, 7 Jan. 1992;
17. The New York Times Magazine, 24 July 1994, SM14-17;
18. David Ronfeldt, "Mussolini's Ghost: In Iraq and Elsewhere, the Appeal of Fascism Proves Tenacious," Los Angeles Times, 25 May 2003;
19. Alan Cowell, "The Ghost of Mussolini Keeps Rattling His Chains," New York Times, 1 June 1994, A31;
20. Dario Fo, "Mussolini's Ghost," In These Times, 27 Feb. 2002;
21. Richard Wolin, "Mussolini's Ghost: Europe and the Specter of Fascism," Tikkun 9, no. 4 (July-Aug. 1994): 13.
22. See, for example, the article "Malcontents in Italy: Neo-Fascism as a Rallying Point for All Classes," The Times, 17 July 1951;
23. "Rights Regained by Fascists," ibid., 2 Jan. 1953;
24. and "Double Threat to Italian Democracy: Challenge of the Right," ibid., 5 June 1953.
25. Cf. Massimo Baoini, "Predappio," in Isnenghi, ed., I luoghi della memoria, 503-11.
26. Consider, for example, Patricia Clough, "Italian Desire for 'Strong Man' Indicated by Poll," The Times, 29 April 1972;
27. and Peter Nichols, "Could Italy Go back to Fascism?" ibid., 6 Sept. 1973.
28. See Baoini, "Predappio." 14.
29. Luisa Passerini, "Mussolini," in Isnenghi, ed., I luoghi della memoria, 167.
30. In 1944, the Central Committee of the CLN in Rome granted sweeping powers to its Milan Committee which, according to Paul Ginsborg, "became the supreme organ of the Resistance," and took the name National Committee for the Liberation of Upper Italy. See Ginsborg, A History of Contemporary Italy: Society and Politics, 1943-1988 (London, 1990), 16.
31. H. Stuart Hughes, The United States and Italy (Cambridge, MA, 1979), 135.
32. See Robert A. Ventresca, From Fascism to Democracy: Culture and Politics in the Italian Election of 1948 (Toronto, 2004).
33. On the question of popular consensus under fascism and the debate over when and why support for the Duce evaporated among ordinary Italians, see Pietro Scoppola, La Repubblica dei partiti: Evoluzione e crisi di un sistema politico, 1945-1996 (Bologna, 1991), 84-85.
34. "Libertà cosciente," La Punta, 2 Feb. 1944
35. quoted by Claudio Pavone, Una guerra civile: Saggio storico sulla moralità nella Resistenza (Milan, 1991), 564-65.
36. See James Miller, "Carlo Sforza e l'evoluzione della politica americana verso l'Italia, 1940-1943," Storia contemporanea (Dec. 1976): 825-53;
37. J. P. Diggins, Mussolini and Fascism: The View from America (Princeton, NJ, 1972).
38. see Elena Aga-Rossi, Una nazione allo sbando: L'armistizio italiano del settembre 1943 (Bologna, 1993), 79.
39. In a series of articles Mussolini wrote and published under the title Giramondo during the last year or so of his life, he asked to be spared "la farsa di un assordante processo a Madison Square di Nuova York," and he said he was proud to be living through "il quinto terribile atto" of the national drama in person. See his writings, collected and published in English translation as The Fall of Mussolini: His Own Story, trans. Frances Frenaye, ed. Max Ascoli (Westport, CT, 1975).
40. Luzzatto, Il corpo del duce, 41.
41. See also L. Canfora, La sentenza: Concetto Marchesi e Giovanni Gentile (Palermo, 1985).
42. Luzzatto, Il corpo del duce, 42.
43. On the amnesty and the abortive "purge" of fascist officials, see Giorgio Bocca's biography, Palmiro Togliatti (Milan, 1991), 416-20.
44. See also Roy Palmer Domenico, Italian Fascists on Trial, 1943-1948 (Chapel Hill, NC, 1991).
45. See "Guilt of Italians Complex Problem," New York Times, 5 Nov. 1943.
46. Luzzatto, Il corpo del duce, 42.
47. L'Italia libera (Milan edition), 26 April 1945.
48. Longo was quoted in G. Pesce, Quando cessarono gli spari, (Milan, 1977), 129.
49. Pertini's views have been described in G. Artieri, Le guerre dimenticate di Mussolini: Etiopia e Spagna (Milan, 1995), 283.
50. On Pertini's general hard-line approach to dealing with the Italian Social Republic, see Paolo Spriano, Storia del partito comunista italiano, vol. 5, La Resistenza, Togliatti e il partito nuovo (Turin, 1975), 446.
51. For a fascinating reflection on the role of Mussolini's physique in the cult of personality, and in Italian fascism as a whole, see Mario Isnenghi, "Il corpo del Duce," in S. Bertelli and C. Grottanelli, eds., Gli occhi Alessandro: Potere sovrano e sacralità del corpo da Alessandro Magno a Ceausescu (Florence, 1990);
52. A. Lepre, Mussolini l'Italiano: Il Duce nel mito e nella realtà (Milan, 1995);
53. A.M. Imbriani, Gli italiani e il Duce: Il mito e l'immagine di Mussolini negli ultimi anni del fascismo (1938-1943) (Naples, 1992).
54. For this notion of the "sacralization" of politics in Fascist Italy (and in Nazi Germany for that matter), see Emilio Gentile, The Sacralization of Politics in Fascist Italy (Cambridge, 1996);
55. George L. Mosse, Nationalization of the Masses: Political Symbolism and Mass Movements in Germany from the Napoleonic Wars through the Third Reich (New York, 1975).
56. see Mario Isnenghi, "L'esposizione della morte," in Gabriele Ranzato, ed., Guerre fratricide: Le guerre civili in età contemporanea (Turin, 1994), 330-52, esp. 333.
57. Luzzatto, Il corpo del duce, 42;
58. cf. Pavone, Una guerra civile, 511.
59. Luzzatto, Il corpo del duce, 42;
60. cf. A. Repaci, Fascismo vecchio e nuovo e altri saggi (Turin, 1954), 137.
61. Luzzatto, Il corpo del duce, 43.
62. See Pietro Nenni, Vento del Nord: Giugno 1944-giugno 1945 (Turin, 1978), 355-56.
63. John Foot, "The Dead Duce," History Today 49, no. 8 (Aug. 1999): 14-15.
64. Walter Audisio, In nome del popolo italiano (Milan, 1975).
65. Luzzatto unhesitatingly gives in to just such a temptation in Il corpo del duce, 45.
66. See Lampredi's testimonial in "La fine del Duce," l'Unità, 23 Jan. 1996;
67. cf. G. Bocca's response to the publication of the testimonial, "Che noia è rimorto il Duce," La Repubblica, 25 Jan. 1996.
68. Quoted by Luzzatto, Il corpo del duce, 45;
69. originally in "L'uomo e gli uomini," Rinascita (April 1945), 105.
70. Cf. John W. Dower's excellent Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II (New York, 1999).
71. Luzzatto, Il corpo del duce, 69.
72. The Vatican reaction is described in Milton Bracker's piece "Slain by Partisans," New York Times, 30 April 1945, 1.
73. See also l'Osservatore Romano, late April-early May 1945.
74. See also the Christian Democrat organ Il popolo, 30 April 1945.
75. Cf. A. Giovagnoli, La cultura democristiana (Rome-Bari, 1996) for Catholic reaction to the events in question.
76. Sforza is quoted by Audisio in In nome del popolo italiano, 383-84.
77. "The End of Mussolini," New York Times, 30 April 1945, 18.
78. See "L'esecuzione di Mussolini," l'Unità, 30 April 1945.
79. Quoted by Luzzatto, Il corpo del duce, 69;
80. Cf. Pavone, Una guerra civile, 514.
81. On the difficult task facing Resistance leaders as they came to terms with the limited nature of the Resistance and its responsibilities to rebuild and redefine Italy, see G. E. Rusconi, Se cessiamo di essere una nazione: Tra etnodemocrazie regionali e cittadinanza europea (Bologna, 1993).
82. See also Luzzatto, Il corpo del duce, 69.
83. The debate begun by De Felice in his controversial book-interview, Rosso e nero, has been summarized in a useful survey by Jader Jacobelli, ed., Il fascismo e gli storici oggi (Rome-Bari, 1988).
84. For a brief overview of the role antifascism played in Italy's democratic transition after 1945, see Giovanni De Luna and Marco Revelli, Fascismo, antifascismo: Le idée, le identità (Florence, 1995).
85. See R. J. B. Bosworth, "The Italian 'Second Republic' and the History of Fascism: Finding (and Losing) a Usable Past?" in idem, The Italian Dictatorship: Problems and Perspectives in the Interpretations of Mussolini and Fascism (London and New York: 1998), 14-15.
86. In addition to ibid., see an insightful commentary by Simone Neri Serneri, "A Past to Be Thrown Away? Politics and History in the Italian Resistance," Contemporary European History 4, no. 3 (1995): 367-81.
87. Neri Serneri, "A Past to Be Thrown Away?" 367-68.
88. Cf. Bosworth, "The Italian 'Second Republic'," 15-18.
89. Neri Serneri, "A Past to Be Thrown Away?" 368.
90. See Maria Grazia Bruzzone, "Benito e Claretta: Sul set della morte," La Stampa, 21 Feb. 1994.
91. See "Gli autori si difendono," La Stampa, 8 April 1994, 5;
92. Simonetta Fiori, "Ma l'autore non si pente," La Repubblica, 8 April 1994, 10-11;
93. Guido Tiberga, "Soldati reclutati a Hollywood: Chi c'era dietro la macchina da presa," La Stampa, 7 April 1994.
94. See Sandro Veronesi's biting indictment of the Combat Film series in which he accuses the RAI of "rewriting history," "La Rai rescrive la storia: Salò e la Resistenza sono uguali," l'Unità, 7 April 1994, 3.
95. see "Galante Garrone: 'Schiaffo alla storia'," l'Unità, 8 April 1994, p. 6;
96. Giorgio Bocca, "I due falsi storici del 25 aprile," La Repubblica, 14 April 1994, 1, 6;
97. Alessandra Baduel, "Pavone: 'Mai sentite tante falsità,'" l'Unità, 7 April 1994, 4;
98. "Emozioni tante, poca storia," an interview with partisan and writer Nuto Revelli, La Stampa, 7 April 1994, 5.
99. For a survey of audience share, see "Combat Film, bufera sulla RAI," La Stampa, 7 April 1994, 5;
100. "Milioni di spettatori, ma è polemica: La RAI nella tempesta per i film USA sul '45," ibid., 7 April 1994, 1.
101. See also "In 2,5 milioni incollati allo schermo," La Repubblica, 8 April 1994, 11;
102. "La Rai replica lo scoop dell'orrore: Il fascismo in tv tra choc e polemiche," ibid., 7 April 1994, 9.
103. See Alessandra Mussolini's interview to Maurizio Tropeano, "Mussolini: 'Ho spento la tv'," La Stampa, 8 April 1994, 5.
104. See Claudio Pavone's interview to Alessandra Baudel, "Pavone: 'Mai sentite tante falsità,'" l'Unità, 7 April 1994, 4.
105. See Giovanni De Luna's interview to Simonetta Fiori, "Bocciati dagli storici: 'Ignoranza comica'," La Repubblica, 7 April 1994, 9.
106. Many critics charged that Zucconi favored Accame over Anselmi, to the point of ignoring the latter at crucial moments in the broadcast to give voice to Accame or to others in the studio. See Sandro Veronesi, "La Rai riscrive la storia: Salò e la Resistenza sono uguali," l'Unità, 7 April 1994, 3.
107. Accame referred to the controversy over Tangentopoli - translated loosely as "bribesville," it refers to the widespread corruption and bribery scandal that helped bring down Italy's First Republic and defined the early years of the Second Republic. See Barbara Spinelli, "La TV e l'Italia malata," La Stampa, 8 April 1994, 1, 6.
108. Bosworth, "The Italian 'Second Republic'," 16.
109. See, for example, De Felice's role as consultant to the exhibition The Italian Economy between the Wars, 1919-1939 held in Rome's Colosseum, 22 Sept.-18 Nov. 1984.
110. For a fascinating account of the exhibition, which was considered a major popular success, see Tim Mason, "The Great Economic History Show," History Workshop Journal, no. 21 (spring 1986): 3-35.
111. For a concise, if somewhat thin, summary of De Felice's place in the historiography of Italian fascism, see Borden W. Painter, Jr., "Renzo De Felice and the Historiography of Italian Fascism," American Historical Review 95, no. 2 (April 1990): 391-405.
112. Gallerano is quoted by Guido Crainz, "The Representation of Fascism and the Resistance in the Documentaries of Italian State Television," in R. J. B. Bosworth and P. Dogliani, eds., Italian Fascism: History, Memory and Representation (London and New York, 1999), 134.
113. Fini quoted in Antonio Carioti, "From the Ghetto to Palazzo Chigi: The Ascent of the National Alliance," in Richard S. Katz and Piero Ignazi, eds., Italian Politics: A Review, vol. 10, The Year of the Tycoon (Colorado, 1996), 62.
114. See reports in La Repubblica, 25 Nov. 2003. This attempt to shed the neofascist past went back into the 1990s. See Celestine Bohlen, "Italy's Hard Right Sheds Neo-Fascist Past for Respectability," New York Times, 2 March 1998, A6.
115. See the story as reported in La Repubblica, 27 Nov. 2003. This was not the first time Alessandra had broken ranks and left the National Alliance, although for different reasons. See "A Mussolini Quits Rightist Party in Italy," New York Times, 15 Nov. 1996, A8.
116. Carioti, "From the Ghetto to Palazzo Chigi," 62.
117. Crainz, "The Representation of Fascism and the Resistance," 134.
118. See, for example, Nicola Caracciolo's Tutti gli uomini del Duce (transmitted in 5 parts in 1982), Pasquale Squitieri's Claretta (1984)
119. Alberto Negrin's Io e il Duce (1985).
120. Neri Serneri, "A Past to Be Thrown Away?" 369-70.
121. See Pavone, Una guerra civile. For a measure of public reaction to Pavone's work, see Massimo Legnani, "A proposito di storia, stampa e pubblico: Le accoglienze alla 'guerra civile' di Claudio Pavone," Italia contemporanea 32, no. 186 (March 1992): 119-24.
122. Neri Serneri, "A Past to Be Thrown Away?" 373.
123. Cf. Sarah Morgan, Rappresaglie dopo la Resistenza: L'eccidio di schio tra guerra civile e guerra fredda (Milan, 2002).
124. See Claudio Pavone's excellent and concise "Introduction" to the special issue of the Journal of Modern Italian Studies 9, no. 3 (2004)
125. Ibid., 271-74. For a fuller treatment of the myth of Italian "goodness," see D. Bidussa, Il mito del bravo italiano (Milan, 1994).
126. The "bad German-good Italian" myth has been explored by Filippo Focardi, "La memoria della guerra e il mito del 'bravo italiano': Origine e affermazione di un autoritratto collettivo," Italia contemporanea, no. 220-221 (Sept.-Dec. 2000): 393-99
127. "'Bravo italiano' e 'cattivo tedesco': Riflessioni sulla genesi di due immagini incrociate," Storia e memoria 1 (1996): 55-83.
128. Ruth Ben-Ghiat, "A Lesser Evil? Italian Fascism in/and the Totalitarian Equation," in Helmut Dubiel and Gabriel Motzkin, eds., The Lesser Evil: Moral Approaches to Genocide Practices (London, 2004), 140.
129. See Bidussa, Il mito del bravo italiano. In the past decade or so, Italian historians have devoted ever-greater attention to the racism and racialist thought in fascist Italy. See Alberto Burgio, "Una ipotesi di lavoro per la storia del razzismo italiano," in idem and Luciano Casali, eds., Studi sul razzismo italiano (Bologna, 1996), 19-28.
130. For the most recent scholarship on the Jews of Italy under fascism and Italian anti-Semitism, see Stefano Luconi's review article "Recent Trends in the Study of Italian anti-Semitism under the Fascist Regime," Patterns of Prejudice 38, no. 1 (March 2004): 1-17.
131. See also B. D. Cooperman and B. Garvin, eds., The Jews of Italy: Memory and Identity (Bethesda, MD, 2000);
132. Joshua D. Zimmerman, ed., The Jews of Italy under Fascist and Nazi Rule, 1922-1945 (Cambridge, 2005).
133. Ben-Ghiat, "A Lesser Evil?" 137.
134. On the notion of Italian fascism as an "imperfect totalitarianism," see Emilio Gentile, "Fascism in Italian Historiography: In Search of an Individual Historical Identity," Journal of Contemporary History 21, no. 2 (April 1986): 200-203.
135. See also Renzo De Felice, Il fascismo: Un totalitarianismo all'italiano? (Turin, 1981);
136. Emilio Gentile, La via italiana al totalitarianismo: Il partito e lo stato nel regime fascista (Rome, 1995).
137. See Richard Pankhurst, "Italian Fascist War Crimes in Ethiopia: A History of Their Discussion, from the League of Nations to the United Nations (1936- 1949)," Northeast African Studies 6, nos. 1-2, n.s. (1999): 83-140.
138. See Pavone, "Introduction," 271-74.
139. Collotti is quoted in Ben-Ghiat, "A Lesser Evil?" 146.
140. See also James Walston, "History and Memory of the Italian Concentration Camps," The Historical Journal 40, no. 1 (1997): 169-83.
141. Ben-Ghiat, "A Lesser Evil?" 147.
142. See Ernesto Galli della Loggia, "Criminali di guerra nostrani," Corriere della Sera, "Sette" Magazine, 28 June 2001
143. quoted in Ben-Ghiat, "A Lesser Evil?" 153 n. 46.