Notes

1. See figure 21 to see this article as it was published then

2. See figure 22 to see Canto 73 as it was published then

3. For an English translation of The Salo Cantos, see the Appendix

4. A Blackshirt was a term for a Fascist soldier originating from their black uniforms.  The uniforms were the first recognizable way to distinguish the Fascists from others and later to distinguish hierarchically between the soldiers.  Considered to have a great psychological effect on the soldiers, the uniform often sparked heated arguments over slight variations in attire, such as hard or stiff collar, red scarf or no red scarf, etc. (Finer 406)

5. I have translated all articles from Il Populo di Alessandria and Meridiano di Roma to the best of my ability. They are published in Italian, but have been collected, and are chronologically ordered, in Ezra Pound’s Poetry and Prose, V. VIII. 

6. July 25, 1943 is the day of Mussolini’s dismissal from the Fascist Grand Council, a dismissal backed by Victor Emmanuel III and Marshall Badoglio.

7. The day that Marshall Badoglio surrendered to the Allies.  Two days later, Pound fled the Tirol only to return to Rapallo later.

8. The Republic of Salo

9. The invaded territory Pound refers to here, demarcated by the Gustav line, stretches south from about Ravenna in the East to Forte dei Marmi in the West.

10. For the rest of the article, see the Appendix.

11. Six months later, in the Political Testimony of Mussolini,  Mussolini testified to the mayhem within the party in the final days (April 25, 1945): “Today alone I see who truly was faithful, who was truly a Fascist…it was easy to cry hosanna in 1938! I have memories of people who knew nothing other than pleasing me!  And at the first apparition of the storm, first they wisely pulled back to see how the events would develop.  Then they aligned themselves on the side of the adversary.  How sad.  But what a comfort finally to be able to see that there are the pure, the true, the sincere.  To betray the idea, to betray me..but to betray the Country.” (43)

12. According to Herman Finer, Il Duce’s decidedly Roman features gave him an aura that many thought harked back to the days of the Roman Empire.  His hard demeanor was considered Roman rather than Italian, and was a factor in encouraging many to believe that he could lead Italy back to former glory. (Finer 408).  For a photo of Mussolini, see Figure 16.

13. This is my translation of the original letter published in Niccolo Zapponi’s L’Italia di Ezra Pound, p. 210.