What We Are Not

In his latest novel, with a title that recalls the celebrated poem of Eugenio Montale, Gianni Biondillo tells of a generation of architects who adhered to rationalism, convinced of its innovative charge, and that Fascism too could revolutionise Italian society. These women and men fought against Italian academicism, linked to Rome and centralised. In the first part of the book, the author talks about the enthusiasm and ideas of these young architects who gathered between Milan and Como from all over Italy, authentic experimental laboratories for the avant-garde. These ideals were betrayed by the reality of Fascism, however, and their faith crumbled for good following the racial laws, the increasingly close link to Nazism and the beginning of the war. Many therefore joined the resistance movement or fled abroad to avoid deportation. The second part of the novel revisits the years of the war and the fight against the regime, which led many of the book’s main characters to take a firm stand against Fascism and be subjected to imprisonment, torture and deportation.

Quello che noi non siamo
Gianni Biondillo
Guanda, 2023