Wu Ming Read online

  There is all a best-selling novel is about: Impossible love stories, enduring friendship, tangled family relationships... Only, unlike what happens in the typical North-American flick, this time the good are the “bad”, i.e. the poor, the oppressed, the idealists.

  ––El Pais, Spain

  54 plays with the forms of espionage novel, the noir genre, and social realism. It seeks to transcend those forms, and it does: this is mutant fiction, a living narrative organism composed of various bodies that aim at multiple endpoints. The most accomplished: a spy story on the surface, with an eye on the ordinary citizen, who acts as witness or protagonist of history. This happens at a level where myths––the archetypical hero, but it goes beyond that––are described as doubtful and ambiguous constructions. It makes sense then that Cary Grant reads Casino Royale––the first James Bond novel with perplexity and amazement, before he meets Marshall Tito and ends up talking with him about the personality cult.

  ––Qué Pasa, Chile

  54... is a sprawling epic... The plot is a formidable feat of imagination that moves restlessly between Bologna, Naples, California, Moscow, Dubrovnik and Marseilles... Daring... A more accomplished piece of work [than Q]... 54’s scope is no less ambitious, but has a refreshing lightness of touch. The portrait of a world-weary Cary Grant... is utterly convincing.

  ––The Times, UK

  This new work amply confirms their talent... Utterly convincing. What emerges is an epic about identity and celebrity, communism and corruption… A stupendous, charming, provocative and profound novel. It makes most modern books seem paltry in comparison.

  ––Scotland on Sunday

  Centred around beautifully written human relationships, Wu Ming explore European and American politics and history, weaving distinct narratives––separated by time, place, and characters together as Don DeLillo did in Underworld. It’s an exciting read, not only due to the language and various writing styles but also because of the powerful––and often conflicting––ideas that it contains... It seems like each member of the Wu Ming has been driven on by their peers to take risks and produce their best and most challenging work.

  ––Clash Magazine, UK

  54 is a great, sprawling epic. Serious and satirical, it can be read as a spy novel, gangster thriller and political manifesto, with enough scenes of unsavory characters, drug smuggling, shoot-outs, and doomed love affairs to resemble a Romanzo della Polpa ––pulp fiction. But this would be a shallow reading––54 is much more complicated, and simple. At its heart it is a story of the hopes and expectations we have for ourselves and each other, and how the forces of history, life and love can dash and rebuild these.

  ––The Philadelphia Inquirer

  Basically, they’re trying to write V, The Odyssey, Casino Royale, Underworld, Pereira Declares and The Godfather all at once. And have fun with all of them.

  ––Bjorn from Stockholm on World Literature Forum

  I’m gonna get this description tattooed on my butt!

  ––Wu Ming 2 from Bologna, commenting on the quote above

  54

  Wu Ming

  Translated from the Italian by Shaun Whiteside

  The Background

  Part One: Sipan

  Part Two: McGuffin Electric

  Coda

  End Titles

  ‘Postwar’ means nothing.

  What fools called ‘peace’ simply meant moving away from the front.

  Fools defended peace by supporting the armed wing of money.

  Beyond the next dune the clashes continued. The fangs of chimerical beasts sinking into flesh, the heavens full of steel and smoke, whole cultures uprooted from the earth.

  Fools fought the enemies of today by bankrolling those of tomorrow.

  Fools swelled their chests, talked of ‘freedom’, ‘democracy’, ‘in our country’, as they devoured the fruits of riots and looting.

  They were defending civilisation against Chinese shadows of dinosaurs.

  They were defending the planet against fake images of asteroids.

  They were defending the Chinese shadow of a civilisation.

  They were defending the faked image of a planet.

  home

  I The Yugoslavian front, spring 1943

  ITALIAN SOLDIERS!

  The Slovenian people have launched an inexorable struggle against the occupying forces. Many of your comrades have already fallen in that struggle. And you will go on falling day after day, night after night, for as long as you remain tools in the hands of our oppressors, and until Slovenia is liberated.

  Your leaders will lead you to believe that the Slovenian people love you, that you are being attacked only by ‘tiny numbers of communists’. This is an insolent lie. All Slovenes are in accord with the struggle against the occupying forces. Under the leadership of the Slovenian National Liberation Committee, our entire people has organised itself into a single invincible liberation front.

  ITALIAN SOLDIERS!

  Your superiors are concealing from you the desperate situation into which Mussolini has hurled the ‘Italian Empire’ by selling it to Hitler. They are hiding from you the fact that Abyssinia, for which Mussolini spilled so much Italian blood, is no longer in Italian hands. They are hiding from you the impasse that Italian troops face in all of their African colonies. They are hiding from you the losses that Italian troops have suffered in the Balkans, and the fact that western Serbia, Montenegro, most of Bosnia and Hercegovina, Lika, and parts of Dalmatia have already been liberated. They are hiding from you the terrible losses and torments inflicted upon Italian troops by the crushing weight of Russian weapons on the Russian front, and by the unbearable Russian winter. They are hiding from you the chaos that is breaking out in Italian cities as a result of the growing food shortages, the result of continuous bombing by the British Air Force, and the growing discontent of the Italian people with the policies of the warmonger Mussolini, who is plunging Italy into the abyss.

  ITALIAN SOLDIERS!

  Understand what the Italian populace at home is coming to understand more and more, that Hitler is pushing you on all fronts: in Africa, in the Balkans, in France and in the USSR, so that you will be unable to form a resistance in your own country when he attacks ‘Allied’ Italy, just as he has attacked ‘Allied Yugoslavia’. Understand what any blind man must understand today, that Italy, as long as it gives allegiance to Germany, will suffer a terrible defeat at sea, on land and in the skies, at the hands of the united forces of Russia, Great Britain and all the freedom-loving peoples of the world.

  Understand, Italian soldiers, that the only way out for you and for the whole of the Italian people is to turn your weapons against those who have brought both you and us nothing but misfortune, to turn them against Mussolini’s fascist gang! It is vain to claim that you too condemn the bestiality of Hitler and Mussolini, that you too wish to see the end of fascism and the end of the war. You must use your actions to demonstrate your love of freedom and peace, your hatred of the oppressors, both yours and ours. Otherwise what awaits you is ruin, both yours and theirs.

  ITALIAN SOLDIERS!

  The Communist Party of Slovenia appeals to you:

  Do not carry out your superiors’ orders, do not fire on the Slovenians, do not persecute the partisans, but surrender to them, do not stand in the way of our liberation struggle!

  Attack and disarm the fascist militia, the agents of OVRA and all those who are forcing you to fight against the Slovenian people.

  Destroy the Italian armed forces, destroy the stores of weapons and food unless you can give them to the partisans, destroy the means of transport of the Italian army, lorries, motorcycles, horses, roads, railways, etc.!

  Do not let the Italian armies be posted to the Russian front, to die for the lunatic Hitler and his satellites! Demand to return to your homeland!

  Desert the Italian army, our people will be glad to help you! Give your weapons and ammunition to the partisans and the Popular Defence.

  Join the Slovenian partisan units and help them, guns in hand, to bring to an early conclusion the absurd butchery of war, so that you can very soon return to your homes, to your poor abandoned mothers, wives and children, and establish a true sovereignty of the people in your own homeland.

  LONG LIVE THE COMMON STRUGGLE OF ALL PEOPLES AGAINST FASCIST BARBARISM! LONG LIVE THE USSR AND ITS INVINCIBLE RED ARMY, THE MOST POWERFUL DEFENDER OF FREEDOM AND PROGRESS! LONG LIVE STALIN, THE LEADER OF THE PEOPLE AND WORKERS IN ALL COUNTRIES! LONG LIVE THE COMMUNIST PARTY OF YUGOSLAVIA! DEATH TO FASCISM – FREEDOM TO THE PEOPLE!

  Central Committee of the Communist Party of Slovenia

  Someone had written ‘SMRT FASISMU’ in red paint on the peeling wall. The men had been lined up in front of it. Their faces were blank. Closed, absent. Like the windows of the village. The captain yelled orders at the unit. The Italian soldiers assumed their positions, rifles shouldered. Almost all of them reservists. The officer was the youngest, with a well-trimmed moustache and a grey garrison cap tilted on his forehead.

  The condemned men raised their eyes to look their butchers in the face. To be certain that they were men like themselves. They were used to death, even their own, they had grown accustomed to it over thousands of generations.

  On the other side eyes lowered, reflected sensations.

  The two rows of men faced one another, motionless, like statues abandoned in a field.

  One of the condemned men rubbed a foot against his leg, a movement at once automatic and grotesque.

  The captain turned to face th
e houses and called the interpreter over.

  ‘The inhabitants of this village have given refuge to communist rebels. The same ones who cold-bloodedly murdered two Italian soldiers last night.’

  The interpreter translated.

  ‘You have been warned! Anyone who offers refuge to bandits, anyone who offers them protection and lodging, is guilty of collaboration and will pay with his life!’

  The officer let the interpreter translate once more.

  ‘Today, ten inhabitants of this village will face a firing squad. Let this serve as an example to anyone who seeks to help the bandits infesting these mountains!’

  When the interpreter had finished, the captain stood where he was, his leather boots planted firmly in the mud, as though he expected a reply from the cluster of silent houses.

  Not a sign of life. Even the air was still.

  He yelled, ‘Company! Ready!’

  An awkward movement ran through the row of soldiers, as though only some of them had received the order and the others had joined in afterwards. A rifle slipped out of someone’s hand.

  ‘That’s an order, for Christ’s sake! An order!’

  At that moment three soldiers exchanged a nod of intent and swung the barrels of their guns around. One towards the captain’s head, the other two at his fellow officers.

  ‘Stop it, all of you! No one’s going to be shot here.’

  The captain blanched. ‘Capponi, what the bloody hell do you think you’re doing? Farina! Piras! I’ll have you court-martialled!’

  The other soldiers looked on in astonishment. Shrugs, unease.

  ‘Captain, drop your gun.’

  ‘This is desertion, you’re crazy!’

  ‘Drop the gun or Farina will shoot you.’

  The officer didn’t move, the weapon was pointed at his temple, his teeth were clenched with rage. His thoughts raced, paralysing his brain.

  ‘Captain, if you drop the gun we’ll let you go.’

  He hissed, ‘Capponi, I always knew you were a fucking communist. And what do you think you’re doing? Eh? And the rest of you, what the fuck are you doing standing there like idiots? Do you want to get shot too?’

  No one replied. Eyes met, but just for a second. No clues about what to do. They knew only that if they disarmed their comrades they would have to shoot them along with the others.

  The line broke up; they went and stood, unsure what was going to happen.

  The men against the wall stared wide-eyed at the scene.

  ‘Chuck the gun away.’

  The officer’s jaw was locked so firmly that he couldn’t say a word. He took the weapon from its holster and let it fall to the ground.

  Capponi picked it up and slipped it into his belt.

  ‘You can go,’ he said, turning back to the condemned men. ‘And so can you.’

  He waved a hand and, incredulously, one after the other, they ran for the mountains.

  ‘Listen carefully, all of you. Anyone who wants to come with us, Farina, Piras and I are heading off to find the rebels. You do what you want, but as the captain said, if our men catch you, they might well shoot you, because you stood and watched. And you did the right thing, because killing people like these is a job for pigs.’

  The three men picked up their rucksacks and put them over their shoulders.

  ‘Oh, one moment, Romagna, you got us into this situation, you’ve got to get us out of it.’

  ‘No, romano. It was Cavaliere Benito Mussolini who got us into this situation. Now it’s up to each of us to make our own decisions.’

  ‘And what about us, where are we supposed to go?’

  Farina passed them with a box of ammunition he had removed from the truck they had arrived in. ‘You come into the hills with us.’

  ‘Where the bandits are? But they’ll shoot us!’

  Capponi shook his head. ‘Don’t you worry, they won’t shoot us. You follow me.’

  ‘Yeah, don’t worry,’ he said. He headed towards the truck, cursing.

  ‘What are you doing? Are you going with them?’ asked one of the others.

  The Roman shrugged. ‘What am I going to do here?’ He pointed to the captain. ‘I don’t trust him one bit. Whatever happens he’ll bang us in the slammer. And he’s just as capable of having us lined up and shot. Never liked him anyway.’

  He picked up his rucksack again. ‘If my wife could see me now . . . Fuck the lot of you, your father and your –’ As he turned around he caught a sudden movement, the captain taking something out of the interpreter’s belt.

  ‘Oi!!!’

  Vittorio Capponi fired first, and the captain fell flat, his skull shattered. A dark object rolled at his side.

  ‘It’s a hand grenade!’

  They all threw themselves on the ground, hands over their heads, holding their breath.

  Nothing happened.

  After a while someone opened his eyes again.

  Then he stretched his neck.

  Finally he risked going over to it.

  They were all frozen, looking at the spot where the officer’s body lay, and which could have sucked their lives away.

  Someone thanked the Madonna del Carmine for making the Duce’s weapons so crap.

  Someone else spat.

  The interpreter sat where he was with his hands in the air. ‘Don’t shoot, ’Talians! Don’t shoot, me innocent!’ But no one paid him any attention.

  Farina nodded to Capponi to move. ‘Come on, Romagna, let’s get going.’

  The three of them set off up the path at a fair old pace, with the Sardinian in front as a scout.

  The Roman, unconvinced, followed them, stumbling and turning around several times to look at the corpse, almost as though he expected to see it getting back up. The others said nothing. Dejected gestures. Finally, one at a time, they picked up their rucksacks and set off in Indian file behind the others.

  II Free territory of Trieste, 5 November 1953

  The architect and poet Carlo Alberto Rizzi left home at ten o’clock in the morning. His beard perfectly trimmed, tall, slim and as proud as though he were posing for an equestrian statue, he looked around for a moment, adjusted the tricolour flag bundled up under his duffelcoat and finally set off towards Sant’Antonio Nuovo, where the students would shortly be assembling.

  The sound of distant voices, shouting and singing, carried on the wind. The city was demonstrating against General Winterton’s abuse of power, and for the restoration of Trieste and all the occupied territories. The processions had been organised the previous evening, and couriers had run from house to house in defiance of the checks by the Anglo-Americans who had occupied the city for nine years.

  Nine years, during which Rizzi had sent letters to the papers, dispatched petitions to the authorities and declaimed fiery patriotic poems in theatres and cafés.

  At the age of forty-six, Rizzi thought of himself as ‘a liberal of the old stamp’, and he grieved for his city, occupied by the Germans in ’43, by Tito in ’45 and by the Anglo-Americans shortly after that.

  The great powers didn’t want the people of Venezia Giulia, Istria and Dalmatia to be able to choose their own fate, as Italians among Italians. Trieste had become a limbo, scornfully known as the ‘Free Territory’. Neither here nor there, neither fish nor fowl: the city and the northern territories assigned to the Allied military government and identified as ‘zone A’; to the south of the city boundaries, ‘zone B’ administered by Yugoslavia. The humiliating imposition was sanctioned by the so-called ‘Peace Treaty’ of ’47. But whose peace?

  The streets of Trieste were patrolled by the police force of the AMG, whose riot squad had been nicknamed ‘Tito’s Fifth Column’ because of the violence with which it suppressed the demonstrations by the Italians. As to Zone B, Tito used an iron fist to eradicate every last trace of Italian identity.

  It was time for them to regain their lost dignity. Perhaps that very day, 5 November, would be the day of truth.