There are many 'left' fascists who reject the cult of Hitler and the Third Reich as inherently reactionary and betrayal of the 'socialist' ideas of fascism. Amongst these the Italian roots of their creed are not forgotten, and indeed there are some who reject the German deviation of National Socialism in favour of the more intellectually respectable, (in their eyes at least), Italian brand. Mussolini, or so the claim goes, was an intellectual who helped to define fascism as a coherent political ideology. Fascism was a synthesis of Left and Right - a claim repeated ad nauseam by the current crop of 'left' fascists, National Bolsheviks and other bizarre cultists.
If this new biography of Il Duce does anything it punctuates the myth that is still perpetuated by revisionists and apologists for Italian fascism. The Mussolini who emerges from this book is an ambitious opportunist with inflated intellectual pretensions. Fascism, as it slowly emerged onto the political landscape, was an incoherent coalition, with conflicts of interest, bitterly competing factions and only one unifying idea - opposition to the organised working class. As Boswell shows, Mussolini barely managed to ride the wave, and that he emerged as head of the fascist party was a matter of luck as well as political judgement.
Political opportunism was the sole guiding principle of Mussolini's reign. Even the alliance with Germany was driven by his ambition rather than any ideological principle or necessity. Despite the rhetoric, Mussolini was more than willing to deal with his 'enemies', whether they be France or Britain, or, perhaps lesser known, Soviet Russia. As it was he threw in his lot with the Germans, ultimately destroying both his regime and his 'ideology'.
As one would expect from a biography, questions of political ideology are secondary, so many of these issues are not handled to any great length. There is also little here on the history of working class resistance to Italian fascism - interested readers would do well to seek out Rethinking Italian Fascism (Edited by David Forgacs, Lawrence and Wishart 1986), particularly the essay by Tobias Abse.
By the end of the book there is little that is fundamentally new that we learn about Mussolini. The broad brushstrokes should be familiar to anyone who has read any of the previous biographies of the not-so great man. The Mussolini portrayed here is a largely ineffectual dictator, over-shadowed by his German ally and whose claims to intellectual or ideological originality are as empty as the claims of his latter-day apologists.
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