Page 42 - Studio International - April 1973

perhaps, an absurd and beautiful recall to the of the petty bourgeois radicalism of Futurism in Congress held in Milan in November of 1924,
ideal of an impossible injustice ? . . . For my which evasive extremism announces its at the conclusion of the sessions, a rather
part, I prefer the bomb of the anarchist to the revolutionary impotence, its irremediable peremptory message was sent to the 'old
election banner of the bourgeois who hides at contradiction. comrade, Benito Mussolini' : 'With a gesture of
the moment of peril . . . Morality of danger : The fact remains, however, that such force now indispensable, free yourself of
elastic liberty with neither prison nor thoughts, the true roots of which were parliamentarianism. Restore to fascism and to
carabinieri. Prisons are infamous traps undoubtedly obscure to Marinetti himself, Italy the marvellous spirit of '19, disinterested,
presupposing a bestial Cat-force treating the could promote among the futurists these burning (ardita), antisocialist, anticlerical,
most charming and ingenuous temperaments confused and surprising political aspirations. antimonarchist . . . Do not imitate the inimitable
like mice . . . Well, it really is time the prisons The very way in which, at times, Marinetti Giolitti, imitate the great Mussolini of '19 . . .
and penal settlements, these relics of the middle spoke of Lenin, seemed designed to beget You can and you must do this, we must wish it
ages, were destroyed and razed to the ground ambiguity, 'I am happy to learn that the Russian and we do.' But times had changed. Once in
. . .' Drawn from a collection of 1919 with the futurists are all bolsheviks and that futurist art power, fascism, in all its attitudes, made every
title Democrazia futurista (Futurist was for some time State art in Russia . . . This effort to appear different. Futurist restiveness,
Democracy), these quotations might perhaps be honours Lenin and pleases us as if it were our anarchic rashness, `rebellism', were of no
enriched by a few from another text of the own victory. We are not bolsheviks because we more use. The opposition beaten on the
following year, dedicated 'To the French, have our own revolution to make'.? In this light political field, its own position consolidated
English, Spanish, Russian, Rumanian, it is not to be wondered at that Mario Carli, in with the consensus of monarchy and
Hungarian, Japanese futurists', and entitled Al February 192o, in Testa di Ferro (Ironhead), the bourgeoisie, fascism was now interested in
di la del Comunismo (Beyond Communism), newspaper he edited, wrote an article Ii vostro declaring the post-war phase of agitation over.
incongruent like most of Marinetti's doctrinal bolscevismo (Our bolshevism), not at all hostile Now, that is, it had to show itself the party to
texts, but explicit and open as far as his `political to Lenin, and some time before, in Roma re-establish the harmony that had been
conceptions' and the civic tasks to be entrusted futurista, succeeded in imagining a pact between lacerated by the struggles of the crisis. 'With
to Futurism were concerned. `futurists, arditi, fascists, combatants, etc., and Mussolini,' wrote Tilgher in La Stampa in
Starting with the declaration: 'History, life, the so-called parties of the avant garde, official April of 1928, 'Romanticism rose to the
the earth, belong to the improvisers. We hate the socialists, reformists, syndicalists, republicans'. government. And after that, he set about
militarist barracks as much as the communist One must straight away add that Carli must have constructing for this romantic soul the
barracks. Anarchist genius despises and breaks developed these inclinations when he followed definitive, precise, classical form, in which it
open the communist prison', the text, in a D'Annunzio to Fiume, when the poet of La will finally be able to rest quietly.'
hyperbolic mixture of nationalism and gloria, flanked in the 'regency' by De Ambris, It is difficult to think of a more apt definition
libertarian spontaneity, reaches the summit of one of the recognized heads of Italian anarcho- of the fascist restoration of order, even as regards
eloquence, 'The fatherland is the maximum syndicalism, dreamed of 'transmuting the art. The 'new state' had need of 'historical
extension of the individual, or better, the bolshevik thistle into the Italian rose'. It foundation'. Futurist invective against Rome
greatest individual able to live long, to direct, appears that at one time D'Annunzio, to could not be entertained. In this respect,
dominate, defend every part of its body.' escape the impasse into which the government D'Annunzio served better than Marinetti:
However, after the creation of such an had forced him, was not at all insensitive to the `stock', 'legionaries', 'forums', 'fatal hills',
anarchist fatherland within which 'the appeal of an agreement between the `eagles', all the merchandise that gushed in his
insurrectional dynamism of the libertarian, interventionist forces and the Italian left. work. Now, even in art something was
Famone' and 'the innovatory dynamism of Not much later, Marinetti and his faithful required worthy of the romanità of 'our
Poeta-Idiota', the two characters of his old re-entered the fascist ranks, not without, millenary tradition', latin' and 'Mediterranean'.
`hilarious tragedy', Re Baldoria, may be fused, however, having tried for some time to force In this way the `Novecento' style came into
one notes that the class struggle as interpreted upon them the road to the left. This continued being with the Exhibition of the Fascist
by Marxism has to be abolished. 'In even after the March on Rome. At the Futurist Revolution, a neoclassicizing, academic
all countries, and in Italy particularly, the
distinction between proletariat and
bourgeoisie is false. There does not exist a
bourgeoisie totally rotten and moribund, nor a
proletariat wholly sane and vigorous . . . It is
absurd to call rotten and moribund
bourgeoisie that formidable mass of youth,
intelligent, industrious and petty bourgeois:
students, clerks, farmers, businessmen,
industrialists, engineers, notaries, lawyers, etc.,
all sons of the people, all concerned to conquer
with tenacious work the mediocre paternal
wellbeing. They all went to the war as
lieutenants and captains and today, although
weary, they are ready to expend further effort
with heroism . . . The peasants and workers who
went to war, not yet having a national
consciousness, could not have won without the
example and the intelligence of those heroic
petty bourgeois officers .. .'6 Here, then,
identified by Marinetti himself, is the matrix

Alessandro Marinelli, plan for the Aeroplane
Room 5936
168