This book is dealing with the uses of the memory of the Resistance and of the Holocaust, born in the wake of the war between the years 1945–1985. Italy is used as a case study for the understanding, shaping and the formation of the new European national identities post World War II. This title focuses on the Italian agenda and is shedding a new light on the process of reconstruction and revitalization (including the rebuilding of national self-identity).
The book traces the changes in the character and functions of historical memory during this period when national consciousness was undergoing a critical development in its search for unity.It leads to a broader venue of the tensions between the memory of anti-fascist resistance on the one hand and the shameful and disturbing awareness of the fascist past on the other.This is the first attempt of a synthesis of this kind of Italian history that combines all interdisciplinary sources: memoir literature and literary sources in general, historiographic debates as well as political discussions.