1. The Fascist Regime, Culture and the Periodical Press

From the Press Office to the Ministry of Popular Culture

The role of Mussolini’s regime in controlling the press, manipulating the news and intervening in cultural production was linked to its view of the press as a tool of the Fascist State, a means for directing the political and social conscience of Italians for the greater good of the Nation.² The press therefore performed a crucial role within the Fascist apparatus. It was a means of propaganda for disseminating its policies and ideology and the instrument through which the regime removed any hostile voices and imposed its own. Between 1923 and 1928 Mussolini’s political machine started systematically to exercise and perfect its control over the press, mainly through the Ufficio Stampa del Capo del Governo [Press Office of the Head of the Government] and through the approval of a series of laws and decrees created ad hoc. Royal Decrees (R.D.) no. 3288 (15 July 1923) and no. 2307 (31 December 1925),³ for example, established the first forms of control by giving Prefects the power to confiscate and suppress any publication the content of which was judged to be against national interests.⁴

The decree of 1923 introduced the figure of the gerente responsabile [manager-in-chief] for periodical publications, who had to be approved by the competent Prefect. This regulation, which excluded Members of Parliament from the role, gave the government the power to control periodicals because the Prefects could potentially refuse to approve a gerente. In 1925 R.D. decree no. 2307 increased the government’s control by assigning legal responsibility for periodical publications to the direttore responsabile, the editor-in-chief, who was expected to oversee everything that was published in a given magazine and was legally responsible for all content. The editor-in-chief had to be approved by the procuratore generale of the Corte d’Appello [Attorney General of the Court of Appeal], who needed to know the personal details of the owner and printer of each periodical. In March 1926 the new regulations for the periodical press were approved, establishing that the Court of Appeal would need to carry out a background check on the editor-in-chief before approving him and passing on the information to the Prefect.⁵ Through these decrees the Fascist regime obtained detailed information on who was working for any publication and the power to approve or decline any request for a new publication based on the arbitrary decision of the Prefects. Finally, in 1928 R.D. 384 established the rules for the Albo professionale dei giornalisti [Professional Register of Journalists], which extended the regime’s power of control over journalists:

In nessun caso possono essere iscritti e, qualora vi si trovino iscritti, devono essere cancellati, coloro che abbiano svolto una pubblica attività in contraddizione con gli interessi della Nazione. […] Prima di provvedere sulla iscrizione il Comitato domanderà al Prefetto della provincia, in cui il richiedente risiede, un’attestazione sulla condotta politica di questo ultimo, per stabilire se alla iscrizione osti il motivo indicato nel secondo capoverso dell’art. 5.⁶

[In no case may those who have engaged in public activity in contradiction to the interests of the Nation be registered and if they are found to be registered therein they must be removed. […] Before registering, the Committee shall request from the Prefect of the province in which the applicant resides a statement on the latter’s political conduct, to determine whether the reason indicated in the second paragraph of Article 5 precludes registration.]

These decrees show how, within five years of coming to power, the Fascist regime had built a system of press regulation that granted the government widespread control over the press, both daily and periodical, including editors, journalists and authors. Between 1925 and 1926, moreover, Mussolini carried out a process of fascistizzazione integrale [full Fascistisation] of the daily press. Rather than eliminate all newspapers that were against or not openly in favour of the regime, Mussolini forcibly took them over and used the prestige of established publications such as La Stampa and the Corriere della Sera to build control and create consensus among the Italian population. During this process the Press Office became the institution through which Mussolini distributed his orders to the press – the veline [flimsy papers], so-called because of the thin paper on which they were written; together with the Agenzia Stefani it constituted the regime’s operational arm for controlling the press and manipulating information.⁷

At the same time Mussolini also unified and brought under central control the press of the Partito Nazionale Fascista [Fascist National Party], which produced many local publications that had enjoyed, until then, a certain autonomy. As a result, by 1926 the daily press was an instrument with which to build consensus around Mussolini and the regime and a major means of propaganda. In the aftermath of the approval of the leggi fascistissime [ultra-Fascist laws] in 1925–26, the press was declared an element of the totalitarian State: ‘In un regime totalitario, come dev’essere necessariamente un regime sorto da una rivoluzione trionfante, la stampa è un elemento di questo regime, una forza al servizio di questo regime’ [In a totalitarian regime, as a regime that has arisen from a triumphant revolution must be, the press is an element of this regime, a force at the service of this regime].⁸

The attention Mussolini, a former journalist, paid to the press, and particularly to controlling its specific operations rather than simply silencing any voices hostile to the Fascist authority, demonstrates that he had understood the importance of this medium – and subsequently of emerging mass media such as radio and cinema. Indeed, he used them to disseminate an ideal image of Fascist Italy both within and outside Italy. Moreover, it shows the regime paid particular attention to modern media and their role within society, seen as playing a crucial role in the building of the popular consensus. By the end of the 1920s Mussolini’s government had imposed on the press its rhetoric and, through disposizioni e ordini alla stampa [dispositions and orders to the press], intended to shape a new ‘Fascist culture’ to replace the old, liberal Italian culture. Thus, according to this project, the press had a key role:

Il Gran Consiglio, esaminato il problema della stampa in funzione di regime di Partito […] riafferma la funzione educativa della stampa e la necessità che essa sia permeata e modellata dallo spirito fascista […]; e riconoscendo la necessità che il regime possa contare incondizionatamente sui più importanti organi giornalistici, affida al segretario generale del Partito l’esame del problema, fermo restando il concetto che i posti di direzione e di comando devono essere affidati a camicie nere fedelissime.⁹

[The Grand Council, having examined the problem of the press as a function of the regime of the Party […] reaffirms the educational function of the press and the need for it to be permeated and shaped by the Fascist spirit […]; and recognising the need for the regime to rely unconditionally on the most important journalistic organs, entrusts the Secretary General of the Party with the examination of the problem, without prejudice to the concept that the posts of leadership and command must be entrusted to loyal Blackshirts.]

The idea of the press as a means of education of the masses remained one of the leitmotifs of the regime until its end. By disseminating Fascist ideology and culture, the press was to contribute to the consensus of the masses in favour of the regime and its leader: ‘[L]a stampa nazionale, regionale e provinciale serve il regime illustrandone l’opera quotidiana, creando e mantenendo un ambiente di consenso intorno a quest’opera’ [[T]he national, regional and provincial press serves the regime by illustrating its daily work, creating and maintaining an environment of consensus around this work].¹⁰

The control over the press was perfected and extended in the 1930s, starting in June 1931 with the approval of R.D. 773, which expanded the Testo Unico di Pubblica Sicurezza [Public Security Laws] approved in 1926. These stated that any publication needed a permit from the local authority in charge of public security; forbade any mention of abortion, suicide, or crime; and established the consequences for those who violated the regulations: ‘I giornali o gli scritti periodici, con cui si contravviene alle disposizioni […] sono sequestrati in via amministrativa dall’autorità locale di pubblica sicurezza’ [Newspapers or periodicals that contravene the dispositions […] shall be administratively seized by the local public security authority].¹¹ Under this regulation, any publication could be confiscated after having been distributed; and the main focus of censorship was to provide an image of Italy as a disciplined country where there was no violence.

Two years later, in 1933, the approval of new regulations marked a new phase in the control of the Fascist regime over press and culture. That year the nomination in August of Galeazzo Ciano as head of the Ufficio Stampa, only a few weeks after Joseph Goebbels’s visit to Italy, accelerated the reform of the Press Office and promoted a more active and centralised control over press and cultural production.¹² This resulted in the evolution of the Ufficio Stampa into a Sottosegretariato di Stato per la stampa e la propaganda [Under-Secretariat of State for Press and Propaganda] in 1934, headed by Ciano; it co-ordinated Fascist propaganda and control over all means of communication and culture. The transformation of the Press Office into an Under-Secretariat was substantial: from about thirty-five people employed in the former, the number of people working in the latter reached 686.¹³ It comprised three direttorati generali [General Directorates] – per la stampa italiana [for the Italian press], per la stampa estera [for the foreign press] and per la propaganda [for propaganda] – and expanded the jurisdiction of the previous Press Office, taking over the Ministero delle corporazioni e dell’Interno [Ministry of Corporations and the Interior], the Commissariato per il Turismo [Tourism Commissariat] and the Ministero dell’educazione nazionale [Ministry for the National Education], as far as these dealt with cinema, censorship, tourism, theatre and music.¹⁴ This process of centralising control over culture – and its censorship – was consistent with the Fascist plan of shaping Italian society, but was also heavily influenced by the rise to power of Hitler in 1933 and, in particular, by Goebbels’s organisation of the Reichsministerium für Volksaufklärung und Propaganda [Reich Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda].

If 1933 is a key date for the reorganisation of the press under the control of the regime, 1934 represents a crucial date for the establishment of censorship. On 3 April 1934 a circular from the Ministry of the Interior, signed by Mussolini, ordered publishers to send to the prefectures copies of their final product to have its distribution approved: ‘[T]utti gli editori o stampatori di qualsiasi pubblicazione o disegno, anche di carattere periodico, dovranno prima di metterli in vendita aut comunque effettuarne diffusione, presentare tre copie di ciascuna pubblicazione alla Prefettura’ [[A]ll publishers or printers of any publication or drawing, even of a periodical nature, shall, before offering them for sale or otherwise making dissemination, submit three copies of each publication to the Prefecture].¹⁵ The new regulation established that any publication could be confiscated before being distributed and after its publication, in practice forcing the publishing companies to censor their publications themselves in order to avoid financial losses in the case that the government stopped distribution. This form of preventive censorship had two major consequences. First, it gave control to the government over any publication before people could read it and, purely formally, maintained freedom of press, because in theory publishers could print anything they wanted, although in practice they could not distribute their products without the prior approval of Fascist authorities. More importantly, the ministerial circular changed the centre of power over censorship from the Ministry of the Interior to the Press Office led by Ciano. This system allowed the regime to control the content of magazines and, particularly, to silence any hostile voice.

The centralisation of control over the press led to the creation in June 1935 of an autonomous administrative organisation overseeing both media and culture, instituted and shaped on the example set by Goebbels: the Ministero per la Stampa e la Propaganda [Ministry of Press and Propaganda]. It comprised six direzioni generali [General Directorates] – three more than the Sottosegretariato – and its jurisdiction was further expanded to include radio broadcasting and cultural production.¹⁶ According to Mussolini’s totalitarian project, cultural production had to be controlled and organised by the regime. It was thus between 1934 and 1935 that the Fascist system started to focus broadly on cultural production. This evolution had a crucial impact on the theorisation of ‘popular culture’, a concept the regime developed in those years to reach the masses and mould the new Italian (analysed in greater detail below). The years between 1934 and 1943, that is, from the beginning of an organised system of censorship and control of cultural production until the end of Fascist power, mark a crucial phase in the development of the popular press.

The year 1936 marks another important change: Dino Alfieri was officially appointed in June as the Head of the Ministry of Press and Propaganda, the powers of which were expanded due to the war against Ethiopia and the consequent need for a strong propaganda campaign to sustain the war effort.¹⁷ It was also another crucial step towards the regime’s control over cultural institutions, which were used to disseminate Fascist propaganda at all levels of society. For the first time Alfieri involved cultural institutions such as the Istituto Nazionale di Cultura Fascista [National Institute of Fascist Culture], the Accademia d’Italia and the Dante Alighieri Society to counterbalance foreign propaganda (mainly French and British) against Italy by disseminating messages of an Italian civilising mission in Africa. Moreover, the Ministry of Press and Propaganda was now the highest authority in all matters of censorship, taking over the Ministry of the Interior and centralising all power of decision on the matter. One year after its creation, the government expanded the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Press and Propaganda, placing under its control sixteen cultural institutions, including the Istituto LUCE; the Ente Nazionale Italiano del Turismo [National Tourism Authority]; the Istituto nazionale del dramma antico [National Institute of Ancient Drama]; the Discoteca di Stato [State Musical Archive]; and the Enti provinciali per il turismo [Provincial Tourism Authorities].¹⁸ This centralisation of control over culture sought to enable the Ministry’s oversight of cultural production and to ensure that ‘tutto ciò che si presenta[va] alle masse attraverso giornali, libri, radio, teatro e cinema [fosse] governato da un chiaro e sincero spirito fascista’ [everything that [was] presented to the masses through newspapers, books, radio, theatre, and cinema [was] governed by a clear and sincere Fascist spirit].¹⁹

It can thus be said that between 1933 and 1936 the cultural policies of the regime were at their most extensive and systematic level and its power of control centralised in a structured administrative institution, the Ministry of Press and Propaganda. The progressive monopolisation of control over culture and the extensive use of mass media to involve all social classes can also be seen as part of the process towards the creation of a totalitarian State. However, as far as popular culture and the popular press are concerned, the importance of the creation of the Ministry of Press and Propaganda lies in its aim of educating the masses and elevating popular culture in order to overcome class distinctions and to create a Fascist culture that would put into practice Mussolini’s ambitious plan to ‘andare al popolo’ [go to the people] and reach the masses.²⁰ In 1937 the Ministry was given the new name of Ministero per la Cultura popolare [Ministry of Popular Culture], reflecting the interest of the regime in culture and eliminating the word ‘propaganda’, which by then was perceived negatively.²¹

The use of the expression ‘popular culture’ reflected the regime’s commitment and attention to cultural production, highlighting the role of Fascism in disseminating its culture at all levels of society. The word ‘popular’ indicated a culture available to everyone, reflecting the emphasis of the Fascist system on mass participation in national life and therefore mirroring the importance of the masses within the State. Thus, given the central role of the masses in Fascist ideology, the regime aimed to elevate popular culture to the status of ‘high’ culture, striving fully to integrate ordinary citizens into the nation’s cultural life. In practice, popular culture meant the education of society according to Fascist values through a state-controlled culture created centrally to disseminate Fascist ideology and change Italian habits. As stated in 1937 in Il Popolo d’Italia, popular culture ‘è, nella definizione, e dovrà esserlo nella realtà, lo sbocco conclusivo di tutta l’opera e dei complessi sforzi della Rivoluzione, per dare al popolo consapevolezza fascista, spirito fascista, slancio, equilibrio e giudizio fascista’ [is, in [its] definition, and must be in reality, the final outlet of the whole work and complex efforts of the Revolution, to give the people Fascist awareness, Fascist spirit, momentum, balance and Fascist judgement].²² It was the natural consequence of the Fascist revolution that, after bringing the people into the State, it sought to bring a new spiritual dimension to the Italians, one that matched Fascist ethics and ideals.

The creation of the Ministry of Popular Culture was thus meant to lead Italian cultural life and control all cultural production and dissemination. It was organised in seven direzioni generali [General Directorates] and one ispettorato [Inspectorate], amongst which were two General Directorates for the press: the Direzione Generale per la Stampa Italiana [General Directorate for the Italian Press] and the Direzione Generale per la Stampa Estera [Directorate General for the Foreign Press]. The first had four departments – Affari Generali [General Affairs], Stampa quotidiana e periodica [Daily and Periodical Press], Libri [Books] and Propaganda interna [Domestic Propaganda] – and controlled all kinds of publications printed and distributed within Italy. It is worth highlighting that the main sections controlling the periodical press came under Domestic Propaganda, which comprised:

• Propaganda a mezzo della stampa [Propaganda by means of the press]
• Stampa periodica, letteraria, artistica e sportiva [Literary, artistic and sports periodicals]
• Stampa periodica per ragazzi [Children’s periodicals]
• Stampa periodica illustrata e umoristica [Illustrated and satirical periodicals]
• Giornalismo radiofonico [Radio journalism]
• Stampa cinematografica [Film press]²³

Just by examining the structure of the Ministry of Popular Culture, one can see how the press was still considered a means of propaganda. The extended organisation of the new Ministry reflected the increasing importance of the institution: it had one division more than its predecessor and its functionaries grew in number from 183 to eight hundred.²⁴

In spite of the change in the name of the Ministry reflecting the idea of elevating the masses through a Fascist culture promoted by the regime, in practice the Ministry of Popular Culture bureaucratised all aspects of cultural production and dissemination. As a result, Mussolini’s idea of the press as a means through which to educate and control the masses was applied to other sectors such as radio, cinema, theatre and tourism. The fact that the structure of the Ministry of Popular Culture put all aspects of the press under the propaganda division demonstrates how popular culture was meant to control and influence public opinion, that is, to function as a new form of propaganda.²⁵ As far as the daily press was concerned, this resulted in a uniformity of information guided by and based on the veline distributed by the Ministry of Popular Culture and the Agenzia Stefani. Through this well-structured instrument, in the 1930s the Fascist apparatus was committed to carrying out a process of control of information for the alignment of public opinion with its ideology and values and for the idealisation of the leader, Mussolini.

As for the periodical press, despite extensive control by the regime it enjoyed greater freedom than the daily press. This can be explained by the fact that periodicals were not as widely distributed and read as newspapers, were not used as a source of information and, more importantly, were not usually aimed at the masses but targeted at a specific readership. At a moment when Fascist rule aimed to reach the masses, periodicals were not the main target of the regime’s control because they were deemed to be leisure items generally not affordable for the lower classes and therefore with a limited circulation. However, in the 1930s the illustrated press was revolutionised by the use of the rotogravure, which allowed the printing of more copies at a lower cost and the reproduction of higher-quality images than traditional printing. The new product which resulted from this technique – the rotocalco – made wider dissemination possible and expanded the readership of magazines, making them available and appealing to readers from different classes and with different levels of education. A report by the Direzione Generale Stampa Italiana [Directorate General of the Italian Press] shows that in 1937 the illustrated press was kept under control by the Ministry of Popular Culture. Editors-in-chief of illustrated magazines would receive instructions on the topics which should be covered by their publications: ‘vita della famiglia, maternità, economia domestica, partecipazione alla vita fascista, allo sport, alla assistenza, ed in generale a tutto ciò che si intona con la nuova coscienza fascista’ [family life, motherhood, home economics, participation in Fascist life, sports, welfare and in general everything in tune with the new Fascist consciousness].²⁶ The bureaucratic apparatus of the Ministry of Popular Culture thus controlled every field of the press and cultural production, a control which included the content and programmes of popular rotocalchi. This was a consequence of the wide distribution which illustrated magazines had achieved at the time and which reflected the Italians’ tastes and aspirations: ‘Se si guarda alle pubblicazioni periodiche soprattutto settimanali, si vede che sono in testa con varie centinaia di migliaia di copie, proprio quelle che per il loro contenuto, soddisfano maggiormente al desiderio di […] gran parte dei lettori [If one looks at the periodical publications, especially the weekly ones, one sees that they are in the lead with several hundred thousand copies, precisely those that, due to their content, most satisfy the desire of […] a large part of the readers].²⁷ If the Fascist power wanted to revolutionise the Italian spirit, control of the production of rotocalchi had become necessary.

The ministry led by Alfieri also enjoyed a central role in Mussolini’s project of spiritually elevating the masses through the dissemination of a Fascist culture. The State’s cultural policies reflected the significant role played by the masses in the ideology of regime and its aim of creating the new man (uomo nuovo), a Fascist citizen who had internalised and acted according to Fascist morality, existing less as an individual than as a corporate element of the ‘Fascist people’. To mould the new Italian, the regime intended to create a new culture for the masses, a popular culture that reflected the modernity of Mussolini’s system of power and the increasingly important role of mass media. Therefore, the development and spread of popular culture were declared to be the main aim of the Ministry of Popular Culture and a crucial part of the process of changing the habits of Italian people: ‘[L]a rivoluzione […], dal punto di vista del costume, del carattere, delle distanze sociali, [era] appena cominciata’ [[T]he revolution […], from the point of view of custom, character, social distances [had] just begun].²⁸ In this project of cultural revolution the masses had a key role – hence the need for a popular culture and a ministry that represented the:

elemento propulsore di attività che interessano da vicino i più vasti strati sociali e che non possono in tempo fascista essere privilegio di pochi. […] [I]l rinnovamento operato dal Fascismo […] rend[e] sempre più necessario il contatto fra la cultura e le masse.²⁹

[driving element in activities that closely affect the broadest layers of society and that cannot in Fascist times be the privilege of a few. […] [T]he renewal brought about by Fascism […] make[s] contact between culture and the masses increasingly necessary.]

If in the 1920s the regime was focused on controlling and making the press Fascist, in the 1930s, after gaining control over and developing the means of communication, Mussolini concentrated on generating a culture that could shape the new man and established the Ministry of Popular Culture as its operating arm. Although the actions of the Ministry of Popular Culture were theoretically aimed at both stimulating and disciplining cultural production, in practice the Ministry only extended the government’s totalitarian control over culture by exercising its power of censorship. In 1937 Alfieri outlined the measures the Ministry should undertake to put into effect the Fascist cultural project: the expansion of the jurisdiction of the Ministry and the creation of a popular culture that would stimulate the participation of the masses in the cultural life of the nation.

The five categories of state intervention described by Stephen Gundle and David Forgacs – subvention and premiums; protectionism; promotion of export; propaganda; and censorship – coincide with the policy of intervention in culture of the Ministry of Popular Culture. Such intervention resulted in: direct economic support for Italian cultural production (‘subventions and premiums’); the limitation of imported cultural products, be they films, comics, magazines, or novels (‘protectionism’); the facilitation of foreign trade and direct support for the export of Italian cultural products (‘promotion of export’); the centralisation of State promotion of Fascist culture (‘propaganda’); and the evolution of a system of control that progressively resulted in direct, pervasive State intervention to control all cultural production and silence voices against the predominant ideology (‘censorship’).³⁰ This comprehensive intervention by the State in Italian culture was, in short, centralised in the power of the Ministry of Popular Culture. Through circulars indicating what topics should be covered and the writing style that should be adopted, the Ministry interfered with the press and conditioned the content of publications. Direct instructions on what to write were not the only way it intervened in the press. The Ministry launched a series of campaigns to mould the Fascist new man: against pre-Fascist liberal Italian culture; against dialects; praising Mussolini and depicting him as the archetype of the new man; in exaltation of romanità [Roman spirit] and the myth of the Italian race; against bourgeois habits; and, finally, against Jews. These campaigns heavily influenced cultural production and in particular the content of magazines. To give some examples from our case studies: the campaign against local dialects and foreign languages, carried out to unify the language and give the people a strong national identity and consciousness through their everyday speech, was reflected in Grazia in its column ‘Voi non dovete dire’ [You Must Not Say], which listed foreign words in common usage, highlighting their limited meaning and urging readers to use the more precise Italian equivalent instead.³¹ In 1938 the publisher Nerbini declared ‘Giornali italiani ai lettori italiani’ [Italian magazines for Italian readers] and completely changed the content of its most popular comics magazine, L’Avventuroso, to reflect the efforts by the Ministry of Popular Culture against foreign influence.³² It also published new columns glorifying the Italian imperial past, disseminating to its young readers the myth of romanità.

By reflecting the Ministry’s policies and dispositions, popular magazines were effectively educating their readers in Fascist values and therefore offer a clear example of the influence and control of the regime over the popular press. Despite its undeniable impact, Fascist ideology was far from being the only force that conditioned and shaped these magazines. Control became more rigid at the end of 1937, when Alfieri targeted entertainment publications such as women’s magazines, recommending publishers to focus on topics such as maternity, domestic economy and family life, that is, themes consistent with Fascist precepts. One year later, at the end of 1938, it was the turn of children’s magazines, which fell victim to a renewed campaign for cultural autarchy. On this occasion the Ministry of Popular Culture urged all publishers to eliminate foreign material from their magazines and to exalt the Italian tradition instead. Moreover, publishers and printers were required to send the Ministry a list of their publications, which Alfieri double-checked against the lists sent by the Prefects, tightening control over the periodical press.

While the aim of the Ministry was to supervise all cultural production and stimulate the dissemination of Fascist culture, in practice other forces restricted its influence. State forces such as the Foreign Ministry and Ministry of the Interior, the local power of the Prefects and personal antagonisms and interests, for example, limited Alfieri’s ambitious plan of controlling the emerging mass culture. Other factors such as the cultural economy and the audience’s taste also significantly influenced and contributed to the shaping of modern Italian mass culture.³³ These factors have to be taken into account, especially when analysing a popular product such as the rotocalchi, which were aimed at selling as many copies as possible and targeting a mass public. For this reason, they had both to reflect and to shape the taste of their readership. As a commercial product, magazines mirrored both the popular demand for specific products and the restrictions of censorship. The three case studies presented in this book – L’Avventuroso, Omnibus and Grazia – all show the ramifications of a popular culture shaped by different factors under totalitarian rule. The short history of Omnibus is a clear example of the difficulty of obtaining authorisation for new periodicals and of the personal and political plots which censored and closed down the magazine, whose use of irony and foreign models was hardly tolerated by the regime. L’Avventuroso demonstrates both state intervention and the influence of American models in shaping a popular product that targeted a young readership. Grazia reveals the complexity of the role of women within the regime, targeting women as modern consumers, presenting lifestyles characterised by fashionable clothes and sporting activities, but counterbalancing this image by articles suggesting the Fascist ideal roles of mother and wife. These magazines demonstrate the different forces that contributed to the modernisation of Italian popular culture and of the industry and society that produced it; in the second half of the 1930s it was informed by consumerism, foreign models and new lifestyle ambitions – all aspects reflected in the rotocalchi published in that era, especially those produced by the three main publishing houses of the time: Rizzoli, Mondadori and Nerbini.

The Rotocalchi Revolution

In 1924 the publisher Angelo Rizzoli, who had founded his own publishing company in Milan in 1909, bought a rotogravure printing machine, the first to be introduced into Italy; while in 1925 Arnoldo Mondadori, whose publishing company had been founded in 1907, launched the first weekly printed with rotogravure, Il Secolo illustrato. The next turning point came in 1927, when due to financial difficulties Mondadori sold his illustrated periodicals Secolo illustrato, Comoedia, Novella (1919) and La Donna (1922) to Rizzoli, who turned them into modern illustrated magazines. Novella offers a clear example of how Angelo Rizzoli conceived modern periodicals. When it was launched by Casa Editrice Italia (Milan), Novella was a collection of short literary stories and explicitly claimed not be ‘quel tipico zibaldone giornalistico-letterario-fotografico che va sotto il nome di rivista’ [that typical journalistic-literary-photographic medley that goes by the name of magazine].³⁴ In 1921 Mondadori acquired the fortnightly magazine and introduced artworks and photographs related to the short stories published. Although the novellas remained the focus of the magazine and were still written by prominent Italian writers such as Gabriele D’Annunzio, Massimo Bontempelli and Luigi Pirandello, Mondadori gave more space and relevance to images. When Rizzoli bought the periodical and turned it into a weekly publication using the rotogravure, illustrations became a key feature and novellas were replaced by popular romances written by popular authors such as Luciana Peverelli, Mura (pseudonym of Maria Assunta Giulia Volpi Nannipieri) and Milly Dandolo. More importantly, Novella started publishing photos of famous actors and actresses. Cesare Zavattini, who contributed to the magazine, recalls: ‘[B]astava pubblicare la faccia di una certa diva che Novella saliva. Era una delle chiavi di successo dei rotocalchi di Rizzoli’ [[A]ll you had to do was publish the photo of a diva and Novella would sell. It was one of the keys to the success of Rizzoli’s illustrated weeklies].³⁵ What is more, Rizzoli’s Novella also included a correspondence column which became a model for future women’s magazines and a characteristic feature of the new illustrated magazines that changed the relationship with the readership from passive to active readers. The new layout and popular content of Novella made it successful, with 150,000 copies sold weekly, turning Rizzoli into a competitive publisher and one of the leading figures in the rotocalchi revolution.³⁶

Milan was not the only city where new publishing companies flourished. In the last decade of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth, many publishers established themselves as players in the publishing field, such as Zanichelli (Bologna, 1859), Bemporad (Florence, 1889) and Laterza (Bari, 1901). Although Mondadori and Rizzoli are undoubtedly the main figures in the popular-press revolution of the 1930s, another publisher emerged in those years as a prominent figure: Giuseppe Nerbini, who founded his publishing company in Florence between 1895 and 1898.³⁷ Florence was already an important centre of cultural production, with active publishers such as Le Monnier (1837), Paggi (1841), Salani (1862) and Sansoni (1873). Nerbini established himself as a publisher of popular products from the beginning, targeting a wide, heterogeneous readership. A Socialist, he started printing political texts and literature inspired by or connected to his political beliefs, disseminating the work of authors such as Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, Leo Tolstoy, Émile Zola and Edmondo De Amicis. Nerbini also published entertainment novels, literature aimed at the emerging working class. Between 1914 and 1918 he put his efforts into expanding his readership, publishing American dime novels such as Nick Carter (which he later changed into Nick Porter in 1923), the quintessential Western series Buffalo Bill and the mysterious Lord Lister in 1922, amongst others. This strategy is clear in the way in which, throughout his publishing career, Nerbini concentrated on commercial products, starting with the publication of popular novels (mainly French, Russian and, from 1914, American) targeting a less-educated readership.³⁸ In particular, Nerbini’s booklets combined images and writing and used illustrations as a crucial element for the expansion of the readership, laying the basis for the development of modern mass-print culture. The most important innovation introduced by Nerbini were, perhaps, American adventure comics, which revolutionised both children’s magazines and Italian comics, as seen in L’Avventuroso.

Despite the increasing importance of these popular publishers, the editorial staff behind each magazine was quite small: as Rizzoli recalled in 1970, there were ‘un paio di direttori che facevano tutto con un piccolissimo gruppo di persone. Erano tempi in cui io conoscevo nome, cognome, famiglia di ognuno dei miei dipendenti’ [a couple of directors who did everything with a very small group of people. Those were times when I knew the first name, last name and family of each of my employees].³⁹ Mario Nerbini, who took over from his father Giuseppe in 1934, used to supervise every aspect of his comics magazines before authorising their printing and relied on regular collaborators who worked behind the scenes on several different publications, such as Emilio Fancelli (author of adventure novels, writer of Buffalo Bill adventure stories and storywriter for comics); Paolo Lorenzini (editor-in-chief and storywriter for Topolino and L’Avventuroso); and Giove Toppi and Tancredi Scarpelli (illustrators of covers, comic strips and stories). Mondadori and Rizzoli also had regular collaborators, some of whom worked for both companies, as in the case of Cesare Zavattini and Giorgio Scerbanenco. Scerbanenco, for example, worked for Mondadori’s Grazia from 1938 onwards, using the pseudonym ‘Luciano’, but had already published articles and serialised novels in Rizzoli’s Lei, Novella, Cinema Illustrazione and even in the children’s periodical Novellino. After 1945 he contributed regular columns to Rizzoli’s Annabella (‘La posta di Adrian’ [Adrian’s Mail], the responses to which were collected in the book Voci di Adrian [Adrian’s Voices] in 1969); and Bella (‘La posta di Valentino’ [Valentino’s Mail]). Zavattini offers another instructive example: in 1930 he worked for Rizzoli, writing in Cinema Illustrazione, Novella, La Donna and Il Secolo Illustrato; for Bompiani’s Almanacco letterario (1931, 1932, 1933, 1934 and 1935); and was finally hired by Mondadori in 1936 as editor-in-chief for the magazines and writer of Italian Walt Disney stories. In 1937 Zavattini became manager-in-chief of Le Grandi Firme, a fortnightly publication by Vitagliano, which was revolutionised in layout by editor Pitigrilli (pseudonym of Dino Segre) to adapt to the readers’ demands:

Oggi il pubblico non si accontenta di leggere. Vuole la fotografia. Lo stadio e il cine gli hanno insegnato a vedere. Fra le colonne di composizione tipografica e di fantasia pura, vuole qualche fotografia, ossia qualche finestra affacciata sulla vita e sulla realtà.⁴⁰

[Today the public are not satisfied with reading. They want photography. The stadium and the cinema have taught them to see. Between the columns of typesetting and pure fantasy, they want some photography, that is, some windows opening onto life and reality.]

As also stated by Leo Longanesi in 1937 in a letter to friend and journalist Giovanni Ansaldo,⁴¹ Italian readers wanted photographs, confirming the idea of modern popular magazines as a film on paper, that is to say, dynamic.⁴² Therefore, in order to keep up with the times and sell their products, publishers had to adapt to the tastes of the new readers and modernise their periodicals. Furthermore, the presence of foreign culture and the adoption of a visual layout emerge as an established model which deeply affected modern magazines. The format introduced ten years previously by Rizzoli was transformed into rotocalchi, a genre defined by the use of well-printed images that accompanied the text and caught the reader’s eye, made cheap by the use of rotogravure printing.

The development of popular magazines in the 1930s offers a sound view of the dynamics operating between Mussolini’s regime and the publishing sector. It reveals a certain complexity in which political faiths and practical business aspects merge and fade, sometimes even overlapping. Although it would be tempting to group publishers as Fascists or anti-Fascists, a clear dividing line cannot be drawn. While throughout those years politics and ideology were a pervading aspect of public life, the cultural production of publishers such as Mondadori, Rizzoli and Nerbini seems to have followed business needs more prominently than political beliefs. In the magazine sector, the actions of these publishers reflected the changes in publishing happening throughout Western Europe and the United States, where illustrated magazines for a mass readership began to appear and develop particularly from the 1920s onwards, in parallel to the regime’s increasing control over culture and its efforts to shape public opinion. The widespread control exerted by the Fascist State over the press affected the production and content of magazines and, more importantly, represented a crucial factor for all publishers. The analysis of the relationship of Rizzoli, Mondadori and Nerbini to the authorities shows that the development of popular magazines benefited from a certain freedom until about 1938, a date which suggests the connection between censorship on the one hand and the increasing convergence of Italy and Nazi Germany on the other. It reveals the privileged channels of communication each publisher enjoyed with prominent Fascist officials, shedding light on the hidden dynamics behind cultural production under Fascism.

Angelo Rizzoli, who never joined the Fascist National Party or tolerated the membership of his employees in the Fascist Union of Journalists, was not hindered by the regime from publishing any periodical. His long list includes the satirical Bertoldo (1936–43); the film magazine Cinema Illustrazione (1926–39); the short-lived Omnibus (1937–39); the women’s magazine Lei (1933 –; Annabella from 1938); the even shorter-lived Tutto (1939), which substituted for Omnibus in content and layout; and Oggi (1939–). Apart from the ambivalent attitude of Omnibus towards the governing power, it is worth highlighting that Lei was a challenging magazine, too, due to its inclusion of photographs portraying women – mostly foreign – performing non-traditional tasks and far from the curvaceous housewife idealised by the regime. Photos of female pilots, tennis players, golf champions and Amazons were displayed on the cover of Lei, suggesting a different ideal of womanhood. In 1932 a policeman noted down the testimony of an informer, who stated that ‘quella di Rizzoli è la tipografia dell’antifascismo, […] da dove escono periodicamente stampe antifasciste’ [Rizzoli’s is the typography of anti-Fascism, […] where anti-Fascist publications are regularly released].⁴³ At the same time, Angelo Rizzoli collaborated with Mussolini’s son Vittorio (who became editor-in-chief of Cinema in October 1938) and never had a problem with censorship, at least not until he was forced to change the title of Lei to Annabella in 1938 to conform to the campaign against the use of lei as a form of address; and again in 1939, when Omnibus was forcibly closed and its substitute Tutto was accused of ignoring censorship. It was only in 1940 that Angelo Rizzoli was investigated by the political police; and although insufficient reports are held in the Italian National Archive to be certain, it appears that he was never officially accused of being an anti-Fascist. Rizzoli’s position within the regime seems to have been governed by consideration for the fortunes of his company, as he formally abandoned his Socialist beliefs and supported Mussolini’s establishment to increase his business: ‘[P]ur dando lavoro a parecchi perseguitati del regime e dicendo peste e corna del fascismo, in pubblico Rizzoli continua[va] a frequentare i gerarchi’ [[W]hile giving employment to several persecuted by the regime and vilifying Fascism as a plague, in public Rizzoli continue[ed] to hang out with party officials].⁴⁴

By contrast, both Mondadori and Nerbini actively supported the Fascist regime. Arnoldo Mondadori, for example, published leaflets on the March on Rome in late October 1922, which resulted in the appointment of Mussolini as Presidente del Consiglio; and Giuseppe Nerbini participated in the March alongside his son Mario. Nonetheless, even in these cases business choices seemed to prevail over any political faith. Arnoldo Mondadori in particular aimed to become the publisher for the Fascist State, apparently one reason behind the editorial decisions of Il Secolo, which he planned to make the newspaper of the regime in opposition to Corriere della Sera, at the time under the editorship of Aldo Borelli. However, although Mondadori’s actions and connections seemed to have gained him the favour of Mussolini himself, in 1932 an informer claimed that in the Mondadori company ‘tutti – chi più o chi meno – [erano] antifascisti’ [everyone – some more, some less – [was] anti-Fascist].⁴⁵ In 1937 Mondadori founded Anonima Periodici Italiani with the declared aim of publishing Fascist periodicals: ‘per dar vita e consistenza a questo gruppo di pubblicazioni [Il Balilla, Passo Romano, Donna Fascista e Gioventù Sportiva]’ [to give life and substance to this group of publications [Il Balilla, Passo Romano, Donna Fascista and Gioventù Sportiva]].⁴⁶ However, his book series ‘I libri gialli’ and ‘Medusa’ published many foreign authors, mainly British or American.⁴⁷ After the promulgation of the racial laws in 1938, Mondadori was accused of not supporting the regime’s racial policies because he kept on publishing Jewish authors and, as a consequence, many books in his series were blacklisted.⁴⁸ In June 1943 the pressure of censorship and recurrent requisitions led Mondadori to stop the distribution of the ‘Gialli’ series.⁴⁹ At the same time, Mondadori’s most successful women’s magazine, Grazia, launched to compete with Rizzoli’s Lei, presented a complex portrait of women. Whilst in many columns it promoted the Fascist ideal of the ‘exemplary wife and mother’, it also offered alternative representations of women. This editorial strategy suggests that Mondadori prioritised his company’s profits over his allegiance to Mussolini and the regime, or at least treated these as competing factors.

Like Arnoldo Mondadori, Giuseppe Nerbini openly supported the Fascist State. Although he published popular romanzi d’appendice (feuilletons) characterised by national-popular content and read by the lower classes, Nerbini’s real success came when he introduced American adventure comics into Italy through the revolutionary magazine L’Avventuroso. After Italy’s invasion of Ethiopia in 1935, when the publication of foreign material began to be condemned by the regime for being against the interests of the Italian ‘race’ and the Fascist campaign for cultural autarchy had as its aim the liberation of Italian culture from foreign influence, the popularity of American comics was nevertheless on the rise. When in 1938 the authorities banned American comics, Mario Nerbini, who had been specifically accused of printing material not suitable for children, sought the help of Mussolini himself through his private secretary Osvaldo Sebastiani, highlighting his Fascist faith in order to keep publishing his comics magazine.⁵⁰ Despite his close connections within the Fascist apparatus, Nerbini was not able to save his magazines from censorship. The ban on foreign comics caused his magazines to suffer a massive fall in the number of copies sold. Such a contradictory relationship with the regime, supported on the one side but defied on the other for the sake of business, appears to have been confirmed by an attack in 1941, when the company’s offices were destroyed and archives and magazines allegedly burnt by some squadristi (Blackshirts) who were displeased with Nerbini’s publication of American comics.

All three publishers, Nerbini, Mondadori and Rizzoli, knew Mussolini personally and enjoyed strong connections to prominent figures within the Establishment. Nonetheless, they all suffered from censorship and put their business interests before any political beliefs, complying with the regime’s restrictions only when they had to. They were also self-consciously producing cultural products consistent with models coming from other European countries and the United States, adopting the same successful formulas and editorial patterns that had secured these models a faithful readership and developing modern mass-produced – and mass-read – magazines. Their activities also confirm the margin of freedom experienced by the periodical press compared to the daily press and the book industry; and, above all, demonstrate that publishers’ output was predominantly business-oriented, highlighting the nature of magazines as commercial products. The magazines launched by Nerbini, Mondadori and Rizzoli were intended to reflect their readers’ tastes and sell as many copies as possible, thus mirroring the modernisation of taste and values within Italian society as much as any imposed set of Fascist beliefs and values did.

Readers, too, were part of the relationship between magazines and the regime. Magazines like L’Avventuroso and Grazia, for example, were read mainly by young people born in the 1920s, which means they were a product of the education programme of the Fascist State. Grazia, for example, was taken as a point of reference – a guide to modern times – by young women who were growing up in a context completely different from that of their mothers. These young readers sought advice from columns in Grazia and other women’s magazines on adapting traditional models of behaviour to modern times and needs. They approached magazines not as their mothers had done – simply as readers of stories – but in a new way that saw them as active consumers of the information in these publications: they not only relied on the guidance provided, but interacted with them by writing letters, sending photographs and participating in competitions, thereby contributing to the creation of the magazine itself. Similarly, the young men growing up reading L’Avventuroso fell in love with American comic heroes; and while they were being educated by the Fascist State and integrated into its organisations, these American stories nevertheless did become part of their patterns of play and their exotic imaginary, as had happened at the beginning of the century with Buffalo Bill.⁵¹ Readers educated by Mussolini’s regime became the affectionate readership of popular magazines that were disseminating images and lifestyles that did not entirely coincide with the Fascist precepts. Hollywood represents possibly the clearest parallel example of this, with photographs of film stars attracting readers – as Zavattini noted – and setting new models of beauty, as extensively described by Irene Brin:

Marlene Dietrich […] inaugurò, al momento di partire per l’America, un ampio e fumoso velo da viaggio […], e le signorine, fatte audaci, se ne ispiravano per il loro primo ballo. Gloria Swanson […] si era fatta la promulgatrice del fasto sportivo, e fu probabilmente merito suo se i cappelli di feltro, ed i maglioni sobriamente decorati con una mazza da golf, divennero rapidamente popolari.⁵²

[Marlene Dietrich […] inaugurated, when she left for America, a broad, smoky travel veil […], and young ladies, made bold, were inspired by it for their first dance. Gloria Swanson […] had made herself the promoter of sporting splendour and it was probably thanks to her that felt hats, and sweaters soberly decorated with a golf club, quickly became popular.]

Considering the popularity of a magazine such as Novella, which made film-star photos its key feature, and that almost any rotocalco published photos of Hollywood stars, the influence on Italian women of American models of beauty is not surprising. Once more rotocalchi show their tendency to mirror Italian society’s popular models and habits in the 1930s alongside a reflection of the regime’s influence and control, thereby representing a useful means of studying the multifaceted impact of Fascism on Italian culture at a popular level.

The steps that led to the creation of the Ministry of Popular Culture and its centralised system of control went hand-in-hand with the Fascist effort to create a popular culture that reflected its values and ideology. As Giovanni Amendola remarks, the aim of Italian Fascism was ‘to monopolise the control of Italian consciences’, an aim which found practical application in the creation of the Ministry of Popular Culture and the campaign for cultural autarchy. In this sense, popular culture was meant to be an expression of the totalitarian project and the Ministry of Popular Culture the tool with which to monopolise control over cultural production and consumption and ultimately the Italians’ conscience. The rotocalco offered a form of culture that became popular in the sense of being available to, and consumed by, a wide readership; and in a way its popularity did influence Italian consciences by disseminating models of beauty, literary genres, authors and, ultimately, a set of values and morals. Considering that illustrated weeklies represent a significant aspect of the emerging mass consumerism in Italy, the regime’s efforts to control their content is consistent with the idea of shaping the Italians’ private consciences to create the ‘new Italian’. In short, because of their popularity and wide dissemination, rotocalchi offered a unique opportunity to the Fascist system to apply its theories of control over cultural production and consumption. In practice, the content, transnational influences and cultural effects on readers of rotocalchi allow reflection on the effectiveness and limits of the structured system of control established by the regime and the Ministry’s efforts towards the creation of a purely Italian culture.

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