Under the shadow
Mussolini’s War: Fascist Italy from Triumph to Collapse, 1935–1943
by John Gooch
Allen Lane, 576 pages, £30
The popular picture of Italian conduct in the Second World War is that of the decent Italian soldier: amorous, cultured, far from bellicose and eager to see the end of the conflict. This is the image presented in Private Angelo, the 1946 novel by Eric Linklater who was the official British historian of the war in Italy in its final years. It can also be found in Louis de Bernières’s 1994 novel Captain Corelli’s Mandolin, and the charming 1991 Academy Award-winning film Mediterraneo.
The reality was very different. By the time Mussolini declared war in June 1940 after a period of.
