Tuesday, April 21, 2009

Edda Ciano

From Yahoo News:
Thirty-six passionate letters discovered on the Italian island of Lipari have revealed an illicit love affair between the daughter of former Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini and a prominent Communist partisan.

Written in French, English and Italian, the secret correspondence has inspired a new book: "Edda Ciano and the Communist. The unspeakable passion of the Duce's Daughter."

The letters, dated from September 1945 to April 1947, chart the affair between Mussolini's eldest child and Leonida Bongiorno, a regional Communist leader and son of an influential anti-Fascist.

Edda had previously been married to Galeazzo Ciano, a loyal Fascist who rose to become foreign minister but executed by his father-in-law after dissenting in July 1943. Despite Edda's appeals, Mussolini had Ciano tied to a chair and shot.

After the Fascist regime fell toward the end of World War Two, Edda was held in detention on Lipari, off Sicily.


1 comment:

Lucy said...

Fascinating! Thanks:)