Criticism: At the beginning and at the end of this excellent book, readers are informed of the critical perspectives that determined and framed its conception, writes Marco Sonzogni.
Firstly, that until a few years ago Ignazio Silone (1900-1978) was among "the most beloved folk heroes of the Italian Left". Finally, that "reading and research take place only when we are open to the possibility of learning new things, or of giving voice to impressions outside the boundaries of current wisdom".
"I am on the edge of the abyss," Silone once wrote to Luigi Orione, the priest who rescued him when an earthquake struck his home town, leaving him an orphan. In 1996, a different turmoil - the appearance of State archival documents - undermined his hitherto much-admired integrity.
The documents - allegedly in his handwriting and covering a dramatic decade in Italian history (1919-1930) - revealed that Silone was involved with the Fascist police, providing information on the clandestine structure of the Communist Party. (Ironically, the fascism of Stalin's communism was one of the reasons why Silone left the party of which, in 1921, he was a founding member.)
One of Silone's English translators, William Weaver, cogently observed that there is the risk of lining up documents "like a card player laying out a game of solitaire". As Walter Benjamin wrote in Theses on the Philosophy of History, to articulate the past historically does not mean to recognise it "the way it really was" but "to seize hold of a memory as it flashes up in a moment of danger".
The understanding and implications of archival material should not be limited to disputes over its authenticity. Sadly, this has been mostly the case in Italy, where ideological parochialism and vicious propaganda often (and dangerously) prevail over open-minded and constructive dialogue.
The position of Silone's widow - the late Dublin-born Darina Laracy (herself "caught up in wartime spying", as Desmond O'Grady wrote in her obituary) - was also unclear. At first, she vehemently rejected any suggestion of Silone's involvement with the Fascists. Then she admitted to recognising her husband's handwriting, adding that she was not with him at the time and that the documents could have been falsified deliberately.
Academics Ferroni and Canfora were among the very few exponents of the left-wing intelligentsia to accept the findings and invite Silone supporters to reread and re-study his work. Elizabeth Leake has done precisely that: The Reinvention of Ignazio Silone is the first scholarly book to raise "the many historical, literary and theoretical issues obscured by the scandalous appeal of the 'caso Silone'".
The book chronicles Silone's development as a writer in the context of the changes occurring in his life. Profoundly affected by the bitterness and ambiguity that shaped his values, Silone's "story" - as Leake points out - "was one of many tragedies and paradoxes".
The intersection of political and religious convictions, in particular, is crucial to understanding Silone's personality and writings. When he joined the ranks of the Socialist Party and later the Communist Party, the "hypnotic vision of revolution" - as astute critics have defined it - clashed with the religious values of his education.
This contrast is both symptomatic and symbolic of deeper unresolved conflicts. Appropriately therefore, and sensitively, Leake uses psychobiography and psychoanalysis (especially Slavoj iek's work) to analyse the complexity and contradictions of a mind that Silone himself (an analysand of C.G. Jung) struggled to define.
As the title suggests, this study attempts to X-ray the "self-reinvention" of one of Italy's most distinctive novelists, whose English readership equals that of Calvino, Eco, Levi and Pavese.
Leake offers a comprehensive account of Silone's "psychological and intellectual regeneration" in the 1930s, relating his "dedication to writing" to his "call for sacrifice" and "search for truth".
Three works by Silone - Voyage to Paris (c. 1929, published 1934), Fontamara (1933) and Bread and Wine (1937, revised 1955) - and the Christological evolution of their Silonesque protagonists - Beniamino, Bernardo and Pietro - are thoroughly examined.
The first work, a story from the eponymous collection, documents his "therapeutic engagement with his biological, ideological and literary figures of paternal authority" (his father, the Italian Communist Party and Sicilian writer Giovanni Verga).
The second, a novel, represents, according to Leake, "the middle phase of Silone's self-reinvention" and is centred on the potential for personal and collective redemption, in spite of the protagonist's "negativity".
The third, also a novel, revolves on the reconciliation of Catholicism and Communism: the "systems of thought", as Leake puts it, represented by the protagonist of the first two works. This cathartic combination is underscored by evident autobiographical references, previously "repressed" and "framed as folklore".
For incisive yet balanced discussions and for clarity of exposition, Leake's study will become indispensable on reading lists and in bibliographies of Ignazio Silone.
Marco Sonzogni is Faculty Fellow in Italian at University College Dublin
The Reinvention of Ignazio Silone. By Elizabeth Leake, University of Toronto Press, 200pp. £32