Papini, Giovanni

(1881–1956)

   A self-taught intellectual of formidable energy and power but little precision, Giovanni Papini was a tireless editor and literary entrepreneur. Nevertheless, he is chiefly remembered today for his paean of praise for Fascism, Italia mia (My Italy, 1941).

   Born in Florence, Papini came to public attention as a literary figure between 1903 and 1907 as the editor of the little magazine Leonardoand as a contributor to Il Regno, a review edited by Enrico Corradini. A violent nationalist, Papini was also attracted by pragmatism, which, unlike American philosophers, such as John Dewey and William James, he interpreted as an ideology of power that would lead to the “twilight of the philosophers” rather than as a practical tool for the achievement of social reform. After experimenting with nationalism and futurism, Papini turned to the Church, becoming a devout Catholic in the 1920s. He also started his final literary venture, Frontespizio, and warmed somewhat to Benito Mussolini. After he was invited to join the Accademia d’Italia (1937), he became an ardent admirer. Italia mia was one of the low points of intellectual fellow-traveling with Mussolini’s regime. Atirade of invective against plutocratic Britain and the sinister forces of freemasonry and Jewry, and a plea for Italy to achieve its historical role and reemerge as the guiding hand in European civilization, the book was a study in the power of nationalist ideology to detach its followers from the moorings of common sense. By the end of the war, however, the Florentine intellectual had come to realize that the irrationalist philosophy he had propagated throughout his life had been one of the causes of the immense destruction that was all around him. He did not support the Republic of Salo. Papini died in Florence in 1956.