| Abstrakt: |
When Italy surrendered to the Allies in 1943, Giacomo Matteotti's memory burst back into public space after almost twenty years of clandestine commemoration. This article focuses on the uses of Matteotti's memory during the Resistance and the transition to a new democratic Republic. It argues that Matteotti was both Italian and reformist, not revolutionary, and thus his memory appealed to partisans as a symbol of national anti-Fascism and to the Allies because he represented parliamentary democracy. The article begins by establishing the qualities of Matteotti's commemoration after his death in 1924, before examining the daily uses of that memory by those involved in Italy's fight for liberation from 1943. Finally, it identifies how representatives of Italy's new democratic institutions transposed the language of sacrifice used to remember Matteotti onto the Italian people during the construction of the Republic, representing Italians as victims, rather than perpetrators, of Fascism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] |
