Mussolini - Hardcover

Bosworth, R. J. B.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0340731443 ISBN 13: 9780340731444

Publisher: Bloomsbury USA, 2002

Synopsis

In 1945, disguised in German greatcoat and helmet, Mussolini attempted to escape from the advancing Allied armies. Unfortunately for him, the convoy of which he was part was stopped by partisans and his features, made so familiar by Fascist propaganda, gave him away. Within 24 hours he was executed by his captors, joining those he sent early to their graves as an outcome of his tyranny, at least one million people.

He was one of the tyrant-killers who so scarred interwar Europe, but we cannot properly understand him or his regime by any simple equation with Hitler or Stalin. Like them, his life began modestly in the provinces; unlike them, he maintained a traditonal male family life, including both wife and mistresses, and sought in his way to be an intellectual. He was cruel (though not the cruellist); his racism existed, but never without the consistency and vigor that would have made him a good recruit for the SS. He sought an empire; but, in the most part, his was of the old-fashioned, costly, nineteenth century variety, not a racial or ideological imperium. And, self-evidently Italian society was not German or Russian: the particular patterns of that society shaped his dictatorship.

Bosworth's Mussolini allows us to come closer than ever before to an appreciation of the life and actions of the man and of the political world and society within which he operated. With extraordinary skill and vividness, drawing on a huge range of sources, this biography paints a picture of brutality and failure, yet one tempered with an understanding of Mussolini as a human being, not so different from many of his contemporaries.

About this title

Book Description:

The new edition of this award-winning biography contains fresh insights into one of history's most intriguing figures. By emphasizing the impact of political and social upheaval in shaping Mussolini's image, Bosworth skillfully juxtaposes his subject's renowned brutality against his inner compassion. Mussolini never fails to grip.

About the Author:

Richard Bosworth is one of the world's leading authorities on modern Italian history. He has been a Visiting Fellow at a number of institutions, including the Italian Academy at Columbia University, Clare Hall (Cambridge), Balliol (Oxford), and the Humanities Research Centre (Canberra). He is currently Professor of History at the University of Western Australia and the author of The Italian Dictatorship:Problems and Perspectives in the Interpretation of Mussolini and Fascism (Arnold/Oxford, 1998).

About this edition

• Publisher: Bloomsbury USA
• Publication date: 2002
• ISBN 10: 0340731443
• ISBN 13: 9780340731444
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 608