The Perfect Fascist: A Story of Love, Power, and Morality in Mussolini's Italy

by Victoria de Grazia

Through the story of one exemplary fascist--a war hero turned commander of Mussolini's Black Shirts--the award-winning author of How Fascism Ruled Women reveals how the personal became political in the fascist quest for manhood and power.

When Attilio Teruzzi, Mussolini's handsome political enforcer, married a rising young American opera star, his good fortune seemed settled. The wedding was a carefully stage-managed affair, capped with a blessing by Mussolini himself. Yet only three years later, after being promoted to commander of the Black Shirts, Teruzzi renounced his wife. In fascist Italy, a Catholic country with no divorce law, he could only dissolve the marriage by filing for an annulment through the medieval procedures of the Church Court. The proceedings took an ominous turn when Mussolini joined Hitler: Lilliana Teruzzi was Jewish, and fascist Italy would soon introduce its first race laws.

The Perfect Fascist pivots from the intimate story of a tempestuous seduction and inconvenient marriage--brilliantly reconstructed through family letters and court records--to a riveting account of Mussolini's rise and fall. It invites us to see in the vain, loyal, lecherous, and impetuous Attilio Teruzzi, a decorated military officer, an exemplar of fascism's New Man. Why did he abruptly discard the woman he had so eagerly courted? And why, when the time came to find another partner, did he choose another Jewish woman as his would-be wife? In Victoria de Grazia's engrossing account, we see him vacillating between the will of his Duce and the dictates of his heart.

De Grazia's landmark history captures the seductive appeal of fascism and shows us how, in his moral pieties and intimate betrayals, his violence and opportunism, Teruzzi is a forefather of the illiberal politicians of today.

Genres: History, Italy, Nonfiction, Biography, World War II, European History

496 pages, Hardcover

First published July 14, 2020

Reviews

[DS25 · Rating 5 out of 5]

Quando si legge la storia di un personaggio delle "retrovie", ossia non un assoluto padrone della politica italiana come M., ma uno dei suoi sgherri, si capisce fino a che punto tendiamo a sottovalutare la storia passata come un semplice momento ironico, scoppiettante di subitanea brutalità, una specie di candelotto di olio di ricino montato su un'asta e acceso a capodanno... dura pochissimo, fa tanto rumore ma poi finisce nell'ironia.
Calamandrei ha aiutato, tra gli altri, a ricordare che in mezzo ci fu sangue. Nella storia di Teruzzi il sangue viene fatto sgorgare a fiumi, e non un sangue solamente fisico, ma anche spirituale. Si vedono tutte le mestizie di piccoli uomini messi in alto, troppo in alto, in piccole cliques di potere autonome legate tra loro non da un patto feudale, ma da un'indissolubile burocrazia retroattiva.
Una sola cosa mi è dispiaciuta di questo testo: le critiche un po' troppo severe al diritto canonico e alla Chiesa, che sebbene collaboratrice, in alcuni momenti e parzialmente, fu capace di bloccare quelle che erano le tendenze folli della biopolitica nazifascista in Italia.

[Joseph Petrillo · Rating 5 out of 5]

There is so much to like in this book. It recounts the rise and fall of a high-level Fascist, Attilio Teruzzi, probably unknown now to all but a few historians, and his improbable marriage to an American opera singer of Jewish descent. A pliant mid-level soldier with more ambition than ability, Teruzzi rose to the upper levels of Mussolini's Government. In the hands of Ms. de Grazia, however, his story also illuminates how the Fascist movement came to power, remade Italy, extended the colonial empire in Africa, and ended in fiasco. Ms. de Grazia reaches deep into personal, government and religious sources to bring compelling detail and insight to the story. Absorbing such a thorough account might ask much effort of the reader, but the author's deft style and lapidary vocabulary make this a pleasant read. Learning so much has rarely been this enjoyable.

[Riet · Rating 5 out of 5]

Een bijzonder boek. Deels het verhaal van Attilio Teruzzi, een generaal onder Mussolini, die carriere maakt in de oorlogen in Afrika. Hij trouwt met jonge, rijke, Joodse Amerikaanse operazangeres voor de katholieke kerk. Later als hij van haar af wil, is dat een groot probleem en gaat er een eindeloze rechtszaak in het Vaticaan lopen. Maar samen met dit (echtgebeurde) verhaal vertelt de schrijfster ook de geschiedenis van het Italiaanse fascisme. Het is een fascinerend boek geworden.
Teruzzi blijft Mussolini tot het bittere einde trouw en moet daar voor boeten met gevangenisstraf op een klein eilandje in de baai van Napels. Kort na zijn vrijlating overlijdt hij.
Italie in het begin van de vorige eeuw komt er niet best van af, maar dat was al wel bekend. De geschiedenis, zoals de Grazia het beschrijft, maakt het alleen nog onbegrijpelijker. Ook de katholieke kerk onder Pius XII komt er slecht van af. Het boek is mooi geschreven, leest als een spannende crimi.

[Adrian]

Attilio Teruzzi an accomplished military man and early convert to fascism in Italy courts and marries Lilliana Weinman budding American opera star. It appears to be a successful match. In 1929 Lilliana returns to the US to renew her passport and she receives a cable from Attilio saying the marriage is over. Attilio sues for divorce. De Grazia has written a probing analysis of mores and manners in Mussolini's Italy. Around this domestic quarrel she shows how people related to each other and what was expected of a top tier member of the fascist government. There is also much in here about Matteoti's murder, the Italian incursion into North Africa and how the regime collapsed between 1943 and 1945. All of it was appreciated since I knew little about this history. De Grazia is as good on the social-cultural angle as she is on political-military. Really well done.

[astried]

Interesting way to tell the story of Italian facism.

[Olivia Walker · Rating 4 out of 5]

4⭐️
An interesting insight into the rise of Facism in Italy and the lengths people went to in order to fit in with this new political system.

[lex · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read for class

[Connor O’Reilly]

Absolute slog to get through. Just not a fan

[Jerry · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not finished yet, but to read the fascist takeover of Italy will make you cringe as to how the MAGA GOP is following the same playbook. They have their Mussolini like leader, acolytes, and supporters. Except with them, there is no love story.