L'attentato a Mussolini ovvero Il segreto di Pulcinella [The Attempt on Mussolini: or the Secret of Pulcinella]. New York: Casa Ed. "Il Martello", 1925.
Title
L'attentato a Mussolini ovvero Il segreto di Pulcinella [The Attempt on Mussolini: or the Secret of Pulcinella]. New York: Casa Ed. "Il Martello", 1925.
Description
The premiere performance of this play opened at the Central Opera House, located at 205 East 67th Street in New York on Sunday, December 13, 1925. It was based on actual historical circumstances — namely, a staged attentato, or attempt (to assassinate Mussolini).
When its opening was announced in advance, the Fascist Party ambassador to the U.S. asked the State Department, which considered anarchists like Tresca to be troublesome “Reds,” to prevent the performance from taking place. FBI agents and Bomb Squad officials invaded the theatre on that opening night, and stopped the opening curtain on the specious grounds that the performance would violate New York’s Sunday “Blue Laws.”
Tresca took the stage, faulted the government’s prohibition for acting at the behest of Mussolini, whose fascist dictatorship, he exclaimed, was in the thrall of high-finance capitalism.
The New York press, which normally disapproved of anarchists like Tresca, expressed sympathy in this case for the anti-fascists, raising questions as to why a foreign government was being placated by American authorities in this way.
The claimed attempt on Mussolini’s life was the pretext for the repressive “emergency laws” in Italy of November 1926.
When its opening was announced in advance, the Fascist Party ambassador to the U.S. asked the State Department, which considered anarchists like Tresca to be troublesome “Reds,” to prevent the performance from taking place. FBI agents and Bomb Squad officials invaded the theatre on that opening night, and stopped the opening curtain on the specious grounds that the performance would violate New York’s Sunday “Blue Laws.”
Tresca took the stage, faulted the government’s prohibition for acting at the behest of Mussolini, whose fascist dictatorship, he exclaimed, was in the thrall of high-finance capitalism.
The New York press, which normally disapproved of anarchists like Tresca, expressed sympathy in this case for the anti-fascists, raising questions as to why a foreign government was being placated by American authorities in this way.
The claimed attempt on Mussolini’s life was the pretext for the repressive “emergency laws” in Italy of November 1926.
Creator
Carlo Tresca
Publisher
Casa Ed. "Il Martello"
Date
1925
Format
22 x 14.5cm; 32 p.
Language
Italian
English
Citation
Carlo Tresca, “L'attentato a Mussolini ovvero Il segreto di Pulcinella [The Attempt on Mussolini: or the Secret of Pulcinella]. New York: Casa Ed. "Il Martello", 1925.,” Italian-Language American Imprints: The Periconi Collection, accessed April 26, 2024, https://italianamericanimprints.omeka.net/items/show/352.
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