Customer Reviews

In Search of a Glorious Death

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I previously read two works by Mazzantini (and loved them!) and I must confess I really disliked this one. For people who do not know him, the author fought in WWII on the fascist side against the Resistance fighters and was captured at the end of the war and almost executed by an angry mob.
Unfortuantely,the books is written in a very non-chronological fashion and impressionistic fashion (emphasis on feelings of confusion, sadness, resentment at war, increasing disillusion with the Fasist cause). Mazzantini weaves into his narrative memories of his youth, of captivity, of his parents, of his feelings, of his comrades, in a very un-systematic fashion. The reader comes to appreciate the pain, the depression, the PTSD this author suffered, but feels frustrated about the lack of clear exposition of the facts: what battles did he fight in? Where? Did he even ever discharge his rifle? The portraits of his comrades are sophisticated and impressionistic; the moods he experienced are described in painstaking detail; disgust with war, and with the fascist ideology are given ample space. All in all a very sad, dark, depressing anti-heroic book (more like Remarque's "Nothing New on the Western Front", rather than its opposite, namely E. Junger's "Storms of Steel").

Deborah, it would be great to hear from you!