Volume 35, Number 5 · March 31, 1988
La Forza del Destino
By Adrian Lyttelton
Memoirs of a Fortunate Jew: An Italian Story
by Dan Vittorio Segre, translated by Dan Vittorio Segre
Adler and Adler, 273 pp., $16.95
The Italians and the Holocaust: Persecution, Rescue, and Survival
by Susan Zuccotti
Basic Books, 334 pp., $19.95
The ironic title of Dan Vittorio Segre's autobiographical sketch, Memoirs of a Fortunate Jew, offers a clue not only to his own history but to that of Italian Jews in general. Between 1870 and 1922, under the liberal regime, the good fortune of Italian Jews was unique in Europe. Nowhere else did Jews find such an easy entry into the ruling class. They were present in the highest ranks of the army, the navy, and the diplomatic service.[1] Social discrimination was negligible, and the idea of persecution unthinkable. The weakness of Italian nationalism helps to explain the convergence between the Jews and Risorgimento liberalism. The enthusiasm of the Italian liberals of Cavour's generation for Jewish emancipation had been at first somewhat ambivalent in its motives. They had a negative view of traditional Jewish culture and regarded emancipation as a way of reforming the character of the Jews so that they could become worthy citizens of the new nation.[2] However, Jewish reformers also wished to make a clean break with the demeaning misery of the ghettos, and were therefore ready to accept the liberals' terms.
Review, 4307 words
To read the full text of this piece, please choose one of the following options:
|
If you are already a subscriber to the Review's electronic edition, please sign in: |
To subscribe to the electronic edition, please press the button below. |
To purchase access to this article for $3, please press the button below. |