Of Bad People and Bad Novels: "The Cardinal's Lover" -- by Benito Mussolini

 

At 26, Benito Mussolini wrote and published a novel titled "L'Amante del Cardinale" (The Cardinal's Lover). It was something that always intrigued me, but only recently I found the time to get a copy of that old book and read it. The story of Mussolini as a leader is fascinating, and I thought I could find some hints in the novel about why and how he behaved the way he did.  

I didn't know what to expect from this novel, nothing especially good, for sure. But I didn't expect it to be so bad. I mean, as a novel, it is written in a decently understandable style, and you can read it from the first to the last page without feeling too much of an urge to throw it out of the window. But it has all the hallmarks of a bad novel. The main problem is that, for a novel to be any good, the author must care for his characters -- if he doesn't, that's the cardinal sin (appropriately, in this case). The novel will not only be bad, but also hateful. And that's the basic problem with Mussolini's novel. It is not only bad, but also hateful.

Let me tell you a little more about this novel. Mussolini is clearly influenced by Manzoni's "The Betrothed" (I Promessi Sposi), and his novel takes place more or less in the same historical period, the 17th century in Italy. At the start, Mussolini apes Manzoni with a flourish of words that describe the area, mountains, lakes, and valleys, then he goes on, telling us a dark story of love, blood, and murders. Like Manzoni, Mussolini follows real historical events. The difference is that Manzoni dominates the plot: he doesn't need to bend the actions of historical characters to suit his purposes; he just maneuvers his fictional characters in an environment consistent with history. Mussolini, instead, is mainly following historical figures, including the protagonists, Carlo Emmanuele Madruzzo, a Cardinal, and Claudia Particella, a noblewoman who really was his lover. To make them fit the plot, he needs to take a lot of liberties toward history. For the rest, the historical setting of the novel offers Mussolini several occasions for anticlerical tirades and, occasionally, for showing off his erudition -- but the impression is that his knowledge of history is haphazard and shallow. Nothing comparable to Manzoni's in-depth understanding of the times he was describing.

The resulting novel is a disaster: a jumble of things, people, and events, some of which are quite depressing. Just to give you an example, midway through the novel, Mussolini inflicts on his readers a detailed description of the unearthing of the body of a girl who had died a few months before. The description includes the screams of horror of the gravediggers at the sight of the decaying body but not the screams of horror of the outraged readers. 

Even the main character, Cardinal Madruzzo, comes out shallow. The figure of Claudia Particella is a little better, and Mussolini shows at least a spark of interest in her. Unfortunately, even here, the results are not great. As described by Mussolini, Ms. Particella turns out to be not very smart, having pardoned the person who tried to kill her not once but twice (!!). In the end, Mussolini condemns her to the death scene of a bad actress in a B-movie, overlong and over-acted. After having been poisoned, the poor woman must repeat a total of seven times the words "I die" ("muoio"), together with other assorted and longish expressions of pain, before finally giving up the ghost. Except that the real Claudia Particella died at 70, in her bed, surviving her Cardinal of 9 years. And that's supposed to be a "historical novel." Imagine that, in "War and Peace," Tolstoy was to tell us that Napoleon died in a bayonet charge against the Russian artillery at Borodino. That kind of bending.  

You can pardon the author of a novel for bending reality a little, sometimes even a lot. But the main problem of the whole rigmarole is that Mussolini doesn't care about his characters. It is the opposite of Manzoni, who never misses a chance for a spark of humanity in his characters in the "Promessi Sposi." That's what makes the difference between a masterpiece and a worthless piece of slime. So it goes. 

As I said, the reason I read this story was that I was curious about the possibility of gathering some hints about Mussolini's personality. Maybe his dreams, his goals as a young man, his ideals, this kind of things. But there is nothing like that in the novel. The author comes out of it as shallow as his characters. Which I think is what Mussolini probably was. A shallow character, of modest culture, with no real ideals and with just a few ideas, but confused. His success as a leader was perhaps due to exactly this factor: he was a blank slate. Which, I think, is what most dictators are. They are no big thinkers or idealists, they are just empty shells on which people can project their dreams, their fears, and their worries. And that was what happened with Mussolini, whose destiny was perhaps written from the beginning in the great novel written in the sky, which has all of us as protagonists. 

Manzoni: The Rythm and the Meaning of the Adelchi

In a post on "Cassandra's Legacy" I interpreted the reaction of Italians to the coronavirus epidemics in terms of the description that Alessandro Manzoni wrote of the bubonic plague that hit Milano in 1629-1631. The same dismay, the same folly, the same hatred, the same desperate attempt to find a culprit for something that goes beyond human understanding.

In that post, I praised Manzoni as a genius who had understood the basics of the field we call "memetics" nearly two centuries before Richard Dawkins proposed it for the first time, in 1976. But Manzoni was more than that, he was a fine poet, a deep thinker, a man who could explore the human soul and give us stories that are at the same time epic and human.

Everyone knows Manzoni for the novel "The Betrothed," but let me report here an excerpt from his tragedy, "Adelchi," the story of an unfortunate Longobard prince who fought for his honor and who only was defeated by betrayal. A powerful story that includes true jewels in the form of the poems told by the chorus.

Here is the chorus of the 3rd act. It tells of how the derelict Italians watch their masters, the Lombards, beaten by the Frankish warriors and running away in terror. The Italians hope in their salvation, but they will only have new masters. The translation is by Hampsicore, reasonably good, but it can't maintain the rhythm of the Italian version. If you can, do read the poem in Italian (below), it is truly a masterpiece of poetry. And even if you can't understand Italian, you may enjoy the pure sound of the Italian words,

Adelchi - Chorus of the Third Act

Alessandro Manzoni


From the mossy halls, from the crumbling fora,
From woods, from strident scorching smithies,
From furrows wet with servile sweat,
A dispersed crowd suddenly awakes,
Stretches out his ear, rises his head,
Hit by a new, increasing noise.

Through doubtful gazes, through fearful faces,
Like a sunbeam through thick clouds,
The proud virtue of the fathers faintly shines;
In the gazes, in the faces, confused and unsure,
The scorn suffered mingles and contrasts
With the poor pride of a time that’s gone.

It1 gathers wishful, it scatters trembling
Through twisted paths, with errant pace,
Between fear and desire it advances and stops;
And peeps and gazes, disheartened and confused,
The scattered drove of the cruel lords,
That flees from the swords, that has no rest.

It sees them, panting like restless beasts,
With their tawny manes ruffled for fear,
Seeking the familiar refuge of their den;
And yonder, laid down the usual threat,
The haughty women, with pale faces,
Staring pensive at their pensive sons.

And on the fugitives, with greedy swords,
Like unleashed dogs, running, rummaging,
Warriors coming from left, from right:
It sees them and, enraptured by an unknown joy,
With the agile hope it prefigures the event
And dreams of the end of the hard servitude.

Listen! Those strong men who hold the field,
Who to your tyrants preclude any escape,
Have come from afar through rough paths:
They interrupted the delight of festive lunches,
They got up quickly from their bland rests,
Abruptly called by a martial bugle.

They left, in the rooms of their native roof,
The afflicted women, repeating their farewell,
Prayers and advices, truncated by tears.
Their heads are loaded with dented crests,
They put saddles on their brown destriers,
They flew on the bridge that gloomily resounded.

In hosts they passed from land to land,
Singing merry war songs,
But thinking of the sweet castles in their hearts;
Through stony valleys, through steep cliffs,
They watched with weapons on icy nights,
Recalling the faithful love talks.

They endured obscure dangers in unpleasant places,
Laboured runs on slopes without human tracks,
Severe commands, hunger;
They saw the spears lowered on their chests,
Next to their shields, close to their helmets,
They heard the arrows fly hissing.

And the hoped prize, promised to those strong men,
Would be – oh, deluded! – to overturn the destiny,
To put an end to the pain of a stranger crowd?
Go back to your superb ruins,
To the peaceable works of your scorching workshops,
To the furrows wet with servile sweat.

The strong enemy mingles with the defeated one,
The new lord remains with the old one;
Both peoples weigh on your neck.
They divide serves, divide herds,
They rest together on the bloody fields
Of a dispersed crowd which has no name.

Coro dell’atto terzo dell’Adelchi

Alessandro Manzoni


Dagli atrii muscosi, dai fori cadenti,
dai boschi, dall’arse fucine stridenti,
dai solchi bagnati di servo sudor,
un volgo disperso repente si desta;
intende l’orecchio, solleva la testa
percosso da novo crescente romor.

Dai guardi dubbiosi, dai pavidi volti,
qual raggio di sole da nuvoli folti,
traluce de’ padri la fiera virtù;
ne’ guardi, ne’ volti, confuso ed incerto
si mesce e discorda lo spregio sofferto
col misero orgoglio d’un tempo che fu.

S’aduna voglioso, si sperde tremante;
per torti sentieri, con passo vagante,
fra tema e desire, s’avanza e ristà;
e adocchia e rimira scorata e confusa
dei crudi signori la turba diffusa,
che fugge dai brandi, che sosta non ha.

Ansanti li vede, quai trepide fere,
irsuti per tema le fulve criniere,
le note latebre del covo cercar;
e quivi, deposta l’usata minaccia,
le donne superbe, con pallida faccia,
i figli pensosi pensose guatar.

E sopra i fuggenti, con avido brando,
quai cani disciolti, correndo, frugando,
da ritta da manca, guerrieri venir:
li vede, e rapito d’ignoto contento,
con l’agile speme precorre l’evento,
e sogna la fine del duro servir.

Udite! Quei forti che tengono il campo,
che ai vostri tiranni precludon lo scampo,
son giunti da lunge, per aspri sentier:
sospeser le gioje dei prandî festosi,
assursero in fretta dai blandi riposi,
chiamati repente da squillo guerrier.

Lasciâr nelle sale del tetto natío
le donne accorate, tornanti all’addio,
a preghi e consigli che il pianto troncò.
Han carca la fronte dei pesti cimieri,
han poste le selle sui bruni corsieri,
volaron sul ponte che cupo sonò.

A torme, di terra passarono in terra,
cantando giulive canzoni di guerra,
ma i dolci castelli pensando nel cor;
per valli petrose, per balzi dirotti,
vegliaron nell’arme le gelide notti,
membrando i fidati colloquî d’amor.

Gli oscuri perigli di stanze incresciose,
per greppi senz’orma le corse affannose,
il rigido impero, le fami durar;
si vider le lance calate sui petti,
a canto agli scudi, rasente gli elmetti,
udiron le frecce fischiando volar.

E il premio sperato, promesso a quei forti
sarebbe, o delusi, rivolger le sorti,
d’un volgo straniero por fine al dolor?
Tornate alle vostre superbe ruine,
all’opere imbelli dell’arse officine,
ai solchi bagnati di servo sudor.

Il forte si mesce col vinto nemico;
col novo signore rimane l’antico;
l’un popolo e l’altro sul collo vi sta.
Dividono i servi, dividon gli armenti;
si posano insieme sui campi cruenti
d’un volgo disperso che nome non ha.