My grandfather was a simple man.
He was born in the countryside in the last years of the 19th century – and the Piedmontese countryside in the 19th century was not very different from the countryside in the 18th, 17th and 16th century. My grandfather’s first brush with the twentieth century was the Great War, in which he fought as part of the Mountain Artillery.
The shock was terrible, but he survived, and moved to Turin, the industrial hub of the country, to become a mechanic. He worked in a factory by day and attended a night school to get his certification as a professional mechanic.
When the Fascist Regime took power in Italy, soon my grandfather lost his job, because he refused to join the Party. He did some small freelance jobs as a mechanic and a general handyman, but during his free time, he sat down and read the whole encyclopedia, from cover to cover. Continue reading →