Pitiless. Ruthless as Memory
TERRA, STEFANO
"Pitiless. Ruthless as Memory" From the Anti-Fascist Underground-A Story of "Death in Italy" Authors Note: By STEFANO TERRA THE soldier who has suffered the whistling bullet, heard the wounded...
...I've got my grievances...
...This statement, of course, will not be greeted with loud hpsannas of approval...
...A disheveled young man came out, followed by a fat nurse in a white patched uniform...
...Should the reader run across some grammatical or syntactical irregularity, let him not think that it is the linotypist's fault or due to my short stay "in cultured circles...
...He dreamed be was a little boy in a great gilded church...
...But when we are in the midst of a war which we still may.lose and v/hich- we may lose because, we have not the slightest idea what we .are fighting for and even less what exactly we arc fighting against, this deliberate an<l cheerfully accepted ignorance n>ay prove'to be disastrous...
...The Syndicates and I are sick to death of people like you, coming in here, forty years old, to bother everybody about backache...
...In short, we must give them a sound "background education," Those who have listened thus far to the click of the hooves of ray old and trusted hobbyhorse, will knew in what general direction t am moving...
...and now waits with the small band of anti-fascist exiles scattered ihrooghoot North Africa for the day to strike . heck against Fascism...
...We must teach our people to "understand" and that we can only hope to do by showing them the facts, not as the dismembered odds and ends of the day's actualities but as part of * whole that is much greater than any of its...
...Hew moeh is known of the Italian straggle for liberstiee, ef the suffering* of the people of their hate seat dssmassatsw ef their hope aad lev...
...Suddenly no ess was indifferent T- - Actually things eappenad fast,though in the days fr^ come to all the factories aad to all the workers' Quarters you could near endless accounts of how it had been...
...It is time for us Italians to get down to essentials...
...a. «, and from 6 to 8 nsw*,*«wteetot*# by eppoiwsptja^SnV...
...Which were the countries where Labor had been most successful...
...He was thinking that Venetian women are almost always blonde...
...Go to the Case del Fsacio...
...What to there in for me...
...red-brick pile had been built in the fabulous tksae «f Queen Marghenta aad the King with the big mustaches.' It stood at the entrance to the exclusive suburbs where rich businessmen built neo-claask villas to rest and f*rgnt the smell ef their factories...
...Ti It was stil...
...Amendola and Giua is still alive...
...In front of him on another wooden bench sat four girls...
...The late afternoon came with its rich glow, aad then the dusk which hides the shape of things, la the eeontoys same lights came on, and from the hills a thin wted kiew...
...A few remarks about my style: I hope that it may . startle ears dulled by thirty years of literary and political d'Annunrio...
...Maybe when he was young he had eease M that bench wish his girl...
...NE man alone walked slowly, with extraordinary csha...
...Of HAT'S the matter...
...Solve**toi has written, flaw history, Bergeee has recorded thehr spirit Ignsxio Silone has rendered their tragedy...
...written by aa Italian "worker who has served as a revolutionary to the underground...
...All right, all right . . . Same old story...
...It would do Labor an awful lot of good if it got rid of a few chips oa -its ahoaMare,' soporialty the one about the so-called "highbrow,'' the man who plays with ideas, who is supposed to be a kind of sissy and who never in all his life has a notion of any practical value...
...Then be raised his bead and the bald patch disappeared...
...He woke up gently, bat he preferred not to nee, not to move, not even to breathe...
...fis^ ? ; L. He was at the trolley stop...
...VIN the park be sought oot a bench hidden by areas...
...What I have in mind is something |*** different It is a broad historical U* tto***J sens* of the word) foundation upon ekaS , individual reader can afterwards ****jgna might not prove to be a short-cut to ft...
...component parts...
...The' door opened...
...Now his heart no longer beat wits' hammer blows...
...but th* lathe-turner's voice...
...Giuseppe, strange to •say, perhaps because of his backache or the gods who change men's humors, wee not impressed to learn that "he" was annoyed...
...it cooled itself in the dark valley of the Po, and then it moved through the foliage of tan trans...
...It is...
...Name . . age . . .** and so on...
...as he shouted his way towaat the entrance, had roused th* crowd...
...He decided to go see the doctor at the Medical Center...
...Big and light, and erne day you wiu see him...
...The doctor slapped his thigh...
...I omit Russia not because I art a friend of little Martin Die* but because I know nothing about it as I have not been there sine* the year 1907 and I believe in pittiim mj infssspaljiHi from the original sources, rather than from the Best Sellers, and if yon care to know, that goes for Mission to Moscow too...
...Aad as f or the price of books, the publishers (and the anthers, too) will be de-Mgbtad to provide Leber with cheap books 1 the price or two packages or cigarette* or two gisssss ef beer or oa* movie) if Labor from its side wg| ahsrw the s«e>Ssat toterost bj each, a that are so^to^oaT United 8unm^(compare the tries or Russia) it ts today iiilkeka* to print cheep book* and pay the OP*t»Um snd lithographer...
...If you're working, yon can be taken care of...
...When, at the termination Of this war, the rule of the insurance companies, the bureaucratic rule of lawyers'and professors poisoned by their own fake romanity, is over, then their literature must go too...
...In the name of the youth of Italy which has lived without compromise, which has suffered and overcome Fascism, I want to thank Salvemini, Lussu, Silone, Trentin, Nenni, Cianca...
...life to a toad darkened by a tyranny which ht now crumbling have remained unknown...
...Bob there was nothing to be done against toe lies, sad the yellow plaster walls were really ytflssg Hm%-..---y~'^'-'AvijC...
...Even if it means thai a real Coliseum must be rased to the ground...
...During th* tost two thousand years we haac had quite a number of such "highbrows," men who lived by and for ideas...
...Judging from toe smell of sulphur they gave out, they must certainly have come from the artificial silk plant...
...who has translated them far ae, writes: "Americans care very meek about Italy now...
...Me started for the small park near the river...
...The Black-Shirts flashec their daggers, and a blade was thrust into Cantalpo"s tbigh...
...aad they stood motionless hi front of the various entrances to the Interviewing Offices...
...t,f ¦ • '¦•HE reason for this deplorable state of affairs * is a very simple one...
...To save the plaster, or for' hygienic reasons, wooden panels were fastened to the walls over the benches...
...Not to waste any more time on theoretical discussion (for which as a nation we have but small love) let me give you a few examples ef what I mean...
...Giuseppe Cam * v talupo let himself aad his aching bach1 dawn gently and leaned against the wooden panel...
...They may have smoked too many cigarettes and most likely they did not get as much fresh air as was good for them, but their knowledge was their strength and their power was derived from their familiarity with the pest aa It toy revealed to the printed book which was their guide, companion ead friend...
...He snouted to snake way: "I've got old scores to settle...
...You're,not working now...
...His mind was crowded with the reasons he had he** hs& for gp tei*f.i still' las hsvUruaM to ate heart rose to-JT" lips to indistinct words at protest . . . comrades bstrs s3 ' •naff if III deled to 'their Wains by "the "SquadriseT / the piece-work assignments which starved him andbrahh him . . . his dismissal,engineered by the Cierk «f tag After-Work Club whom he had not wanted to pay f3 his membership card...
...ever, it ean be done if there is a desire *• *• part of Labor for such inexpensm tehee* Bat as long aa Labor prefers to speed its *w* and nickels (aad quarters, too) for th>_ias> sines that provide amusement and ****** to our ten year olds, it most hot expect taste printers will go out of their way t* SpP books that will remain to their *toss-k*s*JMl cause Labor dee* net care s damn about SB* "highbrow stuff" and prefers the oWf** fodder which is opium for the saMtosssfcr And stow to toy point—why has ever aheughl sariseady of stertteg a^JhShVgto Month Club (Harry Scherman wiD P**** " if for a rasas ant I borrow his title) f«J*** Not-just another act ef books deeliag *** immediate problems of hours and wsg*>***j Gospel according to St...
...ton days rest.- . 17th Year of the Fascist Era . sulphur poisoning...
...England, the Scandinavian countries, Holland and Switzerland...
...Wish the wage...
...aanr by^whfch to steer their coursej*^^^*^ to Snd their way with a much b*tt*r of getting where they want to go ****/-> stole for these tf left to their own lhaato»T* periences and lack of concrete knowtoig*v...
...It had, been troubling him for the last few years, following, step by step, the course his piece work bed taken...
...Giuseppe Cantalupo and Giovanni Bard, Giovanni" the Soldier...
...What...
...It will be told that I em talking through my hat that through our radios We are kept so carefully an courant trith what jg happening at every moment and in' every part of the world that we now have become actual eye-witnesses of every memorable event in every part of the globe...
...MEDICAL CBNWE& Hours from 10 to...
...After a little while he felt Ms feet damp...
...There was no bans, for' those who walk about in cities are divided one from another by invisible walls with spiked and jagged glass on top...
...He stooped to look...
...The doctor was young and fat...
...He did not feet like going home, somehow, and then, when he came to think of it, his workman's pass was no good until after noon...
...Mis* Frances Keene...
...Cantalupo lost control...
...A police wagon had drs-*n as nearby, and ¦v>s/hbing w***W have been over qtickly...
...A cry rang oat warning ef reinforcement* Tki Syndicate managers had telephoned for help from the kef-racks of a nearby cavalry regiment Everyone scatter** throughout the neighborhood and tried to assiope an It-different air as rapidly as possible...
...His earlier sensations came flooding back, and his backache returned with the rest " The wound in his side made his leg feel all wans...
...eke Utile bey naked...
...A »r*b*-#** Gospel in many ways but not th* sal...
...Backache...
...toUphoniog the fany *™ of the Political Security Branch of the Fascist Is*, dustnai Syndicate . . . which was in the same bafldia* Before 1822 it was only "the employment t-rtau...
...And two or three weeks later* millions of books come rolling from the presses which bea.r the final tale of how it really happened and all of those books are written by bright young men and women who were "actually there" and who ean prove it by their publishers' contracts, signed half a year before anybody had so much as suspected that the Solomohs or Staten Island (off Cape Horn, not off New York, N. Y.) would ever be a scene Of battl...
...She wanted to know why t^to^stetb^^ ''rhm^'^Bjr^U jaeaJSs^s|iy^ .ffiwsflff ill sulphur smell...
...I want American Labor to understand that its piffent altitude of todifference about anything nnnwacrtod with the cultural aspects of life is hound to keep it in e position where it'ban lusfa|ajljd teaks its influence felt as that influence should make itself felt I want American Labor to look at thee* countries to Europe where the Labor Parti (visually the Socialist party) was able to take over and to do this in a perfectly peaceful aad matter-of-fact way because it bad prepared itself for its new task by being Just a little bit better informed than those it replaced, I also want to*make the suggestion that Labor now cease to vie...
...He went in quickly, before the nurse with hex heavy self-important air, could say much to htm...
...hah played a ssadlng role and is stlfl J*™5si to spite of HeD and Hitler, and tf **™2X you continue your investigation by th* *¦ .rir^mt-tkm men have that w*Jfla S**^rwffl toH.yon to Just two ssSisrgfpi...
...has ever inspired tiie human race saatobtog to literary charm that it will attract t09J&T pr having attracted them, will engage that...
...Yes," he answered himself, moving his Hps as do all those who live alone...
...At 13, I was an apprentice mechanic at 65 centimes an hour, not counting the deductions...
...The Blaek-Shirts had barely enough time to i-rrounf the man who was shouting that be would "have -uitfc* done," who would "break their heads," when th* wcrfeik surrounded the militia...
...Pietro, Michele...
...His shoe was leaving dark stains on the pavenMBl "It is warm blood . . ." were the tost words be uttered aloud, his dry mouth forming them carefully...
...She gave one rapid, severe glance around the room and, in a sharp voice, snapped at toe four girls: "Dory't fall asleep there...
...SfbfS mske th* best of it...
...At this, the doctor flashed that sarcastic little smile which, according to his latest lady friend, made him look Hke Charles Boyer...
...MO smoking—no spitting on the floor...
...Ht * had many reasons to object.to this...
...Bat H would allow mulioaa «J who arc sow without any ir.telleetas...
...He thought it would be nice to rest or die quietly...
...A half a dozen regular anam militiamen stood around the main entrance They had a* rived just in time, for striding down the strew cane Cantalupo...
...It is because of my experience behind the high facades of Fascist reaction, each as the Syndicates, the Corporations, the Social Security offices, that I think I csn contribute something to anti-Fascist literature...
...all of you together, and hurry up...
...As he stood waiting, he murmured, "Counting it up, after all, how much money did they get out of me for Medical Aid all these years without my getting anything for It V The doctor's office was nearby...
...He began his interview...
...I used to work...
...And since I am getting a few things off my cheat I might as well add a final one...
...And that means you're sick...
...tention beyond th* second chapter...
...And so I belong to the generation that has grown up under the "new-order...
...His elongated head suffered from premature baldness which left the area above his neck quite bare...
...He is going to mention education next," they will say and they will be right I do not claim that education is the remedy for all our ills, but it surely can do wonders with an awful lot of them, and I regret to say that thus far Labor (with a few most noteworthy exceptions) has been sadly lagging ..behind bV the matter of that general and background-providing education without which nothing of any importance has ever been' done or is ever likely to be done...
...He quickened his pace, and felt the old pain in his beck start np again...
...had come running to rushed through the street, heed lowered, bumping isnsisgf paaaerbsby, muttering...
...Subalpino, Xagrini, Vit-torelli and the many others who, from their, roads of exile, have sent beck tokens of their unyielding thought to our oppressed, cities...
...Finally, a soldier...
...Who knows...
...The more they lowered the price of every turned piece, the lower he bent over his lathe...
...During the great depression, a delivery boy, typist, brick carrier...
...At least net to the sort ef responsible positions that will await tasponaito* occupants after th* war...
...One last warning...
...the wages they Odmsao...
...I was bora at the beginning of the last war...
...privilege of "the rich, the wei^**-ao snd has able," to tale President Adams' delightful phras* of almost a century and a half ago...
...The doctor Stood up and took" off his glasses...
...Because of these things, I hesitated to write these stories...
...Hothead and the others, all are comrades with whom I have worked or gone unemployed, far I served my spprenticeship ss a rev* olutionary in a big industrial center of the Po valley...
...My belief hi that Italian literature must abandon once for all the pseudo-classical Caesarism which fat responsible for raising a wall be-, tween the man" who speaks dialect, and whose hands are calloused, and the'"distinguished person" who * peeks a language swollen with adjectives, whether they be Tuscan or no...
...He was plainly bored, and shaking his head, began again...
...He had tost all physical awareness of the acute pain to hie back...
...Come in...
...But I will »rnresg*U» don* before—look at the countri...
...This gesture, mere than anything ease, irritated Cantalupo...
...The newly unemployed man studied the girls quietly...
...Death in Italy" PtOM Cairo has come a little collection of stories— "Morte di Italian...
...The Afaiavogiia, of Giovanni Verge, Toxxi's Closed Eyes, aad Fontamara by Silone already point the way...
...The old priest «*as say teg from the pulpit, as -he wagged hit pale finger: "Remember, you will always have an gnanl beside you all your life long...
...Where do you work...
...They were "waiting for something...
...These pages dsearvjr a chase*, to reach a reading, thinking, democratic pehlic And oat of that public, perhaps...
...He hated people who gesticulate when they talk...
...The New Leader la pnoud to present for the first time a.few ef these stories to the American public...
...But there's nothing to be done otherwise.'* He repeated his last words and spread his arms wide, holding Sis hands vertically ss priests do at mass...
...with oar college youth to its supercilHous contempt for any land of learning that is not immediately connected with an increase in the pay envelope...
...I lcndw this to be true but it does not sufficiently: impress me to make me change my opinion...
...There is only one antidote for this unfortunate state affairs...
...Those who were really interested in learning found the necessary leisure even if they were as poorly equipped ea Abraham Lincoln...
...Our present civilization is dominated by the philosophy of publicity and publicity would soon come to art end if it sijowed people to grasp the real meaning of the mellifluous symphony with which It fill* the ears of its listeners and the deceitful pictures with which it is in the habit of pleasing the eyes of its hapless easterners...
...And if this be the counsel of "highbrow" who lives remotely in an broayawj fax removed from the hard factors...
...And then there is the great need for silence each of us feels who has lived out years and years of life in the verbal delirium of totalitarianism...
...We;'-.continue to be the people who "know" most and "understand" ,least and because knowledge without understanding is merely an irritijtfnv %tellecttiai- ballast, our "informatory services" are mostly a waste of time and money...
...He opened his breed hand, and with the whole palm, stopped the doctor's mouth...
...The money deducted for Medical Aid...
...Nothing to be dene here...
...The crowd grew denser, a* the workers shouted sat pushed the soldiers about Everyone tried to get s crack at one of them...
...Sometimes the singing has been of dirges, and sometimes it ha* been like the stories I am seeding yea...
...In a very few minutes, the girls came out . again, their eyes lowered, scolding eaeh other in blurred whispers...
...Then, while I took courses in Philosophy st the University, a repairman...
...He closed his lips, hunched his shoulders to be mete atone...
...And at the word "fasck>" he took courage and began to yell: "Get out...
...Bet the Utile tales, the simple ehesaariss ef day-to-day...
...To which 1 shall make ' answer by referring to a wsB known kind of Italian sausage...
...morning, and n tittle crowd of astoupheef lingered on...
...IANTICIPATE the eeeal sasswer., rasher has not got the necessary leisure to read aad bosks axe too expensive...
...enough even to bete* to her eats-Fascist votoes, enough perhaps to draw comfort from the fact that all through the years ef their deafness, these voices have been staging snd werning...
...PDUCATION had long since ceased to be a...
...a hymn ad bat...
...And thanks to the chronometers the factory boss had placed in every department the price of each piece had continued to fall...
...7 J ^t> Furicus, he began to snout tike a madman He wreacsssft the door away frogs the aura* who...
...They stood in the waiting room long enougn for the health officer to fill oat the^nasmssary fejys and instructions to a tormented hand...
...cam e a grea t angel wee h tagged the Ut heumer' s knees ta his arms...
...Pee got sty, reasons...
...They * were big, old trees, foil of leaves in early autumn...
...Hie eyes narrowed when he thought of it...
...lenium...
...He bad gone there a week ago with a co-worker who had lost some fingers in a machine press...
...At 26, I was once more a mechanic, and...
...The blood clotted and dropped ia sec net among the leaves and he dreamed...
...No one ever rose to a responnible position by asking...
...In the waiting room there were benches...
...No ana stopped him- Some passers-by smiled...
...Will he be big...
...1 " •Coming out of the factory at an odd hear for a working day, he noticed people strange to his world who were strolling slowly along the avenue...
...I want American Labor to realize that the only way for Labor to niay toe important part in the political, social and economiq.life of th* future to which it .is entitled as one of the "mam producers of our wealth is to prepare Labor culturally for tee role it will have to take upon itself aa soon as this war is over...
...He began with the uninfieeted manner of S registry clerk...
...Come Friday and Saturday and the magazines give ns the final details...
...The soldisn slowly moved in on him...
...I asked you: vkot'e the matter t" "Backache...
...Tka...
...jjj "After all, there ts that pain in your bank, isn't there...
...A career stood wide open to any one of unusual ability, but he had to have the ability and the art of rhetoric was not counted among one's positive accomplishments...
...a writer of editorials for seme of the newspapers, a contributor to the literary page...
...All this—as the reader has undoubtedly guessed a long time ago—is meant to lead up to something...
...By HENDRIK WILLEM VAN LOON THl S is perhaps the Strangest paradox in our land of paradoxes, that with more schools, colleges, academies of learning,'with more newspapers, radios snd magasines than any other country, we Still remain completely ignorant ofeou t the true state of affairs on our rapidly changing planet, and as a' result while we axe in the' possession of all the facts, we axe so' little able to interpret' them that they explain nothing, and'facts which explain nothing are as useless as a timetable of New Zealand would be to a man living in northern Sweden, t How .toisfjooes not greatly matter as long ha the sun of peace is brightly- illuminating our glorious landscape and everybody is able to pay toe final instalment on a number of articles he neither wants nor needs...
...rath-lees aa memory" wOl have re-wba Italy...
...Yet it fa eat of these sources that the anti-fascists, "phelisi...
...Many reasons, but they did him no good because of the simple fact that he did not know to whom he could talk about them...
...The next ^morning the newspapers fill in the gaps...
...Ruthless as Memory" From the Anti-Fascist Underground-A Story of "Death in Italy" Authors Note: By STEFANO TERRA THE soldier who has suffered the whistling bullet, heard the wounded comrade's groan, does not like to tell war stories...
...They were plainly scared by the many DQ NOT signs scattered about the walls...
...Jl ~2 SJfEANWHILE, the doctor was...
...At 16, a punch operator and lathe turner...
...Let him rather conclude that, having to choo&e between the forms used by the rathe turner, Giuseppe Cantalupo, aad the coagulated forms of the Literature Course st the Royal Academy^ faawo prafersed For the former is alive, the totar djnfc**^>: ^ Cairo, January, 1943...
...Jest the opposite...
...J . And I wdnt once more to repeat to those among our comrades who are waiting and working out the long night Shift that has engulfed our country, that the spirit of Gramsci and Gobetti, Matteotti and Rosselli...
...What have I get to do with that...
...x- *V...
...iissiin* will come who will want to publish Stefan* Terra's book: the book of an Itstaf sntiFaschtt working to Cairo, fighting as he always fought" ^. Van Loon's Diary How About a Book-of-the-Month Club for Labor...
...L •THE lathe turner, Giuseppe Cantolupe, was fired...
...They thought a bottle of wine had broken in his pocket...
...It was Cantalupo...
...He felt that arms to' tb*t charlatan fashion only to bully someone- He tried to heed oh to himself, bat his lungs were so full they made him shout: "And the deductions...
...There were all those difficult words of which the only understandable ones were...
Vol. 26 • June 1943 • No. 23
