Product Description: The cult of the Duce is the first book to explore systematically the personality cult of Benito Mussolini. It examines practices that began before Mussolini's rise to power and which multiplied as Fascism consolidated its support among the Italian population...read more

Product Description: This new edition of Peter Neville’s Mussolini traces and analyses the life of one of the most fascinating twentieth century European dictators, Benito Mussolini, while placing his life in its historic Italian context. Engaging and accessible, the Duce’s career is traced from his roots as a journalist and socialist to his capture and execution in 1945, addressing crucial issues throughout: was Mussolini really a far right ideologist, or simply a political opportunist? How successful was he at communicating his core beliefs to the Italian people? This thoroughly updated new edition synthesises the scholarship of the last ten years to consider Italian atrocities in Africa, and the reaction to them by ordinary Italians, in addition to a consideration of the relationship between Mussolini and Hitler while other periods of Mussolini’s life are expanded upon and reconsidered...read more

In 1945, disguised in German greatcoat and helmet, Mussolini attempted to escape from the advancing Allied armies. Unfortunately for him, the convoy of which he was part was stopped by partisans and his features, made so familiar by Fascist propaganda, gave him away. Within 24 hours he was executed by his captors, joining those he sent early to their graves as an outcome of his tyranny, at least one million people. He was one of the tyrant-killers who so scarred interwar Europe, but we cannot properly understand him or his regime by any simple equation with Hitler or Stalin. Like them, his life began modestly in the provinces; unlike them, he maintained a traditonal male family life, including both wife and mistresses, and sought in his way to be an intellectual. He was cruel (though not the cruellist); his racism existed, but never without the consistency and vigor that would have made him a good recruit for the SS. He sought an empire; but, in the most part, his was of the old-fashioned, costly, nineteenth century variety, not a racial or ideological imperium. And, self-evidently Italian society was not German or Russian: the particular patterns of that society shaped his dictatorship. Bosworth's Mussolini allows us to come closer than ever before to an appreciation of the life and actions of the man and of the political world and society within which he operated. With extraordinary skill and vividness, drawing on a huge range of sources, this biography paints a picture of brutality and failure, yet one tempered with an understanding of Mussolini as a human being, not so different from many of his contemporaries.

A last surviving child of Benito Mussolini shares insights into his father's life, describing such topics as Il Duce's relationship with his family and mistresses, beliefs about education and the arts, partnership with Adolf Hitler, and anticipation of the loss of World War II.

Product Description: This new addition to the Longman World Biography series integrates the latest scholarship on the life of Mussolini with the story of Italian Fascism.   Combines the story of Mussolini, the man, with the story of Italian Fascism...read more

Product Description: This new addition to the Longman World Biography series integrates the latest scholarship on the life of Mussolini with the story of Italian Fascism.   Combines the story of Mussolini, the man, with the story of Italian Fascism...read more

Describes the last twenty months of the life of the Italian dictator, culminating with his capture and execution.

(view table of contents)

Product Description: Benito Mussolini (1883-1945) was the founder of Fascism and iron-fisted ruler of Italy for two decades. He was also an extremely able politician who won the esteem of many statesmen―including Winston Churchill and influential persons in the United States...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Product Description: Benito Mussolini (1883-1945) was the founder of Fascism and iron-fisted ruler of Italy for two decades. He was also an extremely able politician who won the esteem of many statesmen―including Winston Churchill and influential persons in the United States...read more

Records Il Duce's years as an agitator and journalist, formation of the fascist party, his years in power, and the coup d'etat that deposed him (view table of contents)

Looks at the life and achievements of the Italian dictator, attempting to show his respectable accomplishments as well as his cruelty (view table of contents)

Depicts the life of Benito Mussolini, discusses how he came to power in Italy, and describes his activities as dictator

Traces the life and political career of Mussolini, recounts the rise of fascism, and attempts to clarify the motivations of the Italian dictator

A definitive biography of Italian dictator Benito Mussolini documents his meteoric career, his ambitious drive for absolute power, his relationship with Hitler, World War II and his catastrophic downfall, and the history of Italian fascism

A depiction of the life and political career of the Italian leader, Benito Mussolini describes the rise to power and fall of the Fascist movement