'Vividly told, engrossing history' CLARE MULLEY, author of The Women Who Flew for Hitler
'Precise, empathic . . . a profoundly satisfying, albeit wistful, read and . . . a worryingly relevant one' GUARDIAN
A thrilling biography of Benito Mussolini's favourite daughter, and a heart-stopping account of the unravelling of the Fascist dream in Italy
Edda Mussolini was Benito's favourite daughter: spoilt, venal, uneducated but clever, faithless but flamboyant, a brilliant diplomat, wild but brave, and ultimately strong and loyal.
She was her father's confidante during the 20 years of Fascist rule, acting as envoy to both Germany and Britain, and playing a part in steering Italy to join forces with Hitler. From her early twenties she was effectively first lady of Italy. She married Galeazzo Ciano, who would become the youngest Foreign Secretary in Italian history, and they were the most celebrated and glamorous couple in elegant, vulgar Roman fascist society.
Their fortunes turned in 1943, when Ciano voted against Mussolini in a plot to bring him down, and his father-in-law did not forgive him. In a dramatic story that takes in hidden diaries, her father's fall and her husband's execution, an escape into Switzerland and a period in exile, we come to know a complicated, bold and determined woman who emerges not just as a witness but as a key player in some of the twentieth century's defining moments. And we see Fascist Italy with all its glamour, decadence and political intrigue, and the turbulence before its violent end.
'Vividly told, engrossing history' CLARE MULLEY, author of The Women Who Flew for Hitler
'Precise, empathic . . . a profoundly satisfying, albeit wistful, read and . . . a worryingly relevant one' GUARDIAN
A thrilling biography of Benito Mussolini's favourite daughter, and a heart-stopping account of the unravelling of the Fascist dream in Italy
Edda Mussolini was Benito's favourite daughter: spoilt, venal, uneducated but clever, faithless but flamboyant, a brilliant diplomat, wild but brave, and ultimately strong and loyal.
She was her father's confidante during the 20 years of Fascist rule, acting as envoy to both Germany and Britain, and playing a part in steering Italy to join forces with Hitler. From her early twenties she was effectively first lady of Italy. She married Galeazzo Ciano, who would become the youngest Foreign Secretary in Italian history, and they were the most celebrated and glamorous couple in elegant, vulgar Roman fascist society.
Their fortunes turned in 1943, when Ciano voted against Mussolini in a plot to bring him down, and his father-in-law did not forgive him. In a dramatic story that takes in hidden diaries, her father's fall and her husband's execution, an escape into Switzerland and a period in exile, we come to know a complicated, bold and determined woman who emerges not just as a witness but as a key player in some of the twentieth century's defining moments. And we see Fascist Italy with all its glamour, decadence and political intrigue, and the turbulence before its violent end.
Caroline Moorehead is a bestselling and prize-winning author, and the biographer of Bertrand Russell, Freya Stark, Iris Origo, Madame de la Tour du Pin and Martha Gellhorn. Her recent books - a quartet focussed on resistance to dictatorship, particularly in Italy - were shortlisted for the Samuel Johnson Prize, the Orwell Prize and the Costa Biography Award. She lives in London.
It's testament to Moorehead's precise, empathic prose that Edda
emerges not as the Duce's devilish scion, but as a wounded, fragile
being... It makes for a profoundly satisfying, albeit wistful, read
and - give the recent victory of Giorgia Meloni in the Italian
elections - a worryingly relevant one
*Guardian*
Interesting and original... Moorehead is a fine writer and a
conscientious historian
*Spectator*
[Moorehead] brilliantly sketches the background of Mussolini and
his regime
*LIterary Review*
Painstakingly researched and vividly told, this engrossing history
turns the spotlight on the deeply conflicted Edda Mussolini,
brilliantly balancing the big picture with a wealth of telling
detail
*CLARE MULLEY, author of The Women Who Flew for Hitler*
Caroline Moorehead writes with her characteristic elegance, eye for
detail and authoritative knowledge about a monster and a survivor.
The story of Mussolini's glamorous daughter is certainly a
fascinating one
*MIRANDA SEYMOUR, author of I Used to Live Here Once*
Wide-ranging and compelling... this book will take a leading place
in all studies of the reality of Fascism and all
authoritarianism
*RICHARD BOSWORTH, author of Mussolini and the Eclipse of Italian
Fascism*
This is a triumph
*Oldie*
Superbly written and researched
*Tablet*
[A] gripping new book
*History Today*
 |
Ask a Question About this Product More... |
|
