Once again, we commemorate the anniversary of the liberation of Rome by soldiers of the United States Fifth Army on June 4, 1944. With this historic moment in mind, I invited renowned historian Carlo Ginzburg, PhD, to discuss the history of the Italian Resistance and the role Italians played in opposing the Fascist regime and Nazi Germany’s occupation forces. Dr. Ginzburg taught for many years at the University of Bologna and the University of California-Los Angeles. He is the author of crucial works in the field of early modern European history such as The Night Battles: Witchcraft and Agrarian Cults in the Sixteenth and Seventeeth Centuries (1966), The Cheese and the Worms: The Cosmos of a Sixteenth Century Miller (1976), and Ecstasies: Deciphering the Witches’ Sabbath (1989), as well as Clues, Myths, and the Historical Method (1989) and The Judge and the Historian: Marginal Notes on a Late Twentieth-Century Miscarriage of Justice (1991.)
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From 1932-left to right: Cesare Pavese, Leone Ginzburg, Franco Antonicelli, and Carlo Frassinelli, the publisher. Courtesy of the Ginzburg Family.
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Leone Ginzburg, after his arrest for “Antifascist Conspiracy” in 1934. Courtesy: “Casellario Giudiziario” Archival Series.
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Leone and Natalia Ginzburg in 1938. Courtesy of the Ginzburg Family.
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Leone Ginzburg (Probably Taken in 1940). Courtesy of the Ginzburg Family.
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Natalia Ginzburg (Around 1980). Credit: Paola Agosti.
Dr. Ginzburg’s life and scholarship are deeply connected to and profoundly shaped by the history of antifascism in Italy and World War II. In this conversation, he discusses his parents, Leone and Natalia Ginzburg, resistance to the Mussolini dictatorship, his childhood in war-torn Italy, and the impact of his experiences during the Second World War on his impressive career as a scholar. A link to our conversation, recorded on May 27, 2020, is below.
Jason Dawsey, PhD
Jason Dawsey, PhD, is ASU WWII Studies Consultant in the Jenny Craig Institute for the Study of War and Democracy.
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