Roads and ruins:  Fascism and the Roman cityscape.
Published: 2006
Language: eng
Number of pages: 259
ISBN-13: 9780494218860
Description: This dissertation examines the historic centre of Rome as it was left by the fascist regime between 1922 and 1943. In its two decades in power, the fascist state submitted the Roman cityscape to a massive series of demolitions literally rendering the Eternal City unrecognizable. From its inception, the fascist movement was obsessed with Rome seeing it both as enemy city and promised land. The regime's Master Plan of 1931 pretended to give to Rome the latest in urban planning, all the while using Rome's heritage to advance the cause of Romanita.The research was conducted in the state and municipal archives in Rome in 2000. The sources are varied, ranging from private letters, to architectural drawings, to correspondence sent to the government offices in charge of implementing the fascist state's urban plans. The thesis also uses extensive memoirs and diaries, as well as photographs and newsreels accessed at the Archivio LUCE in Rome.Much has been written on fascism's approach to Rome both in terms of urban studies and propaganda. Rather than focus on the intentions of the regime in these two areas, this thesis will instead analyze the landscape produced by the regime in its pursuit of these aims. An examination of that landscape reveals two dominant symbols which characterized the fascist landscape: roads and ruins. On the one hand the dynamic mobility of modernity, while on the other the decaying symbols of antiquity. This thesis is an exploration of the confluence of these symbols and the what they revealed about the cultural impulses behind fascism.The starting premise of the thesis is that fascism was primarily a cultural phenomenon, arising from the experience of the Great War. From this premise, the dissertation examines how the landscape of the war was interiorized by fascists and then reproduced in the movement's encounter with the Eternal City, a process which found its full realization in the days of Adolf Hitler's famous visit to Rome in 1938.
Notes: Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 68-01, Section: A, page: 0308.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Toronto, 2006.

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