Nothing but snow and icy wind

‘Finally reach Camp 3 at 6 a.m., almost totally exhausted. While the others prepare something to eat. I massage Canali’s feet. The pains begin to lessen. Outside the tent there is nothing but snow and icy wind, and so it remains for the entire day. We stay in the tent for just so long and then decide to continue our descent. To remain much longer at this height would be extremely dangerous, especially for Canali. Yet, as we attempt to go a few paces beyond the tent, we are soon driven back, convinced that to descend under such conditions is tantamount to suicide.’ This is from a dramatic diary kept by Riccardo Cassin, one of the most famous mountaineers of the mid-20th century, on the descent from a pioneering a climb - now called Cassin Ridge - on Mount McKinley, the highest mountain in North America. Cassin died 10 years ago today, having reached the ripe old age of 100.

Cassin was born in 1909 in the village of San Vito al Tagliamento, then in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, but now part of Italy, 80km northwest of Trieste. When only three, his father emigrated to Canada where he died within a short time. Cassin left school at the age of 12 to work for a blacksmith; aged 17 he moved to Lecco where he took a job at the steel factory. Although he was interested in boxing for a while, he turned to climbing in his early 20s, and by 1935 had made the first ascent of Piccolissima of the Tre Cime di Lavaredo in the Dolomites. He started climbing on the granite of the Western Alps in 1937, and the following year made one of his most celebrated ascents, Walker Spur on the north face of the Grandes Jorasses in the Mont Blanc massif. He became one of the leading mountaineers of the inter-war period, making a total of 2,500 ascents, of which over 100 were first ascents. In 1940, he married Irma with whom he had three sons.

During the war, Cassin fought with the partisans against the German occupiers, being decorated for his actions in the partisan campaign during the years 1943-45. From 1947 or so, he started designing and producing mountaineering equipment, pitons, ice aces, caribiners and harnesses. In 1954, Cassin felt slighted by Ardito Desio, the chief expedition leader for the Italian Alpine Club, who left him out of the Italian expedition that made the first ascent of K2 in 1954; thereafter, he concentrated on organising and leading expeditions himself. In 1961, he planned the expedition that made the first ascent of (what is now known as) Cassin Ridge on Mount McKinley in Alaska, an achievement that earned him a telegram of congratulation from President Kennedy. In 1967, Cassin’s production firm became a limited company, and, in 1997, the Cassin brand was bought by CAMP, one of the world’s leading manufacturers of equipment for climbing and associated activities. Cassin lived to be 100 years old, dying a few months later on 6 August 2009.

The Guardian obituary has this assessment: ‘Tough, warm and good-humoured, Cassin had an obstinate, down-to-earth approach to the practicalities of climbing, underpinned by shrewd intelligence and an artist’s eye for the most beautiful routes up the most difficult peaks. Cassin’s legacy is a series of new climbs completed around the world before and after the second world war, climbs that still dominate the sport's consciousness as immutable landmarks.’ Further biographical information can also be found at Wikipedia, Summit Post, or in obituaries at The Independent and The New York Times.

Cassin kept a diary of the Mount McKinley expedition in 1961, and filled it in with some notes afterward. The diary was published within a few weeks by Life magazine (25 August 1961), and this is freely available at Googlebooks. Here are a few extracts.

17 July 1961
‘The weather is bad from early morning on; the air is thick with snow and the wind threatens to carry away everything at Camp 1. To the right and to the left of us there are almost sheer walls and we remain tied together at all times. Beneath us awaits 6,000 feet of nothing.

Toward 5 p.m. the snow stops and the storm calms down a bit. We don’t lose a minute. All of us leave at once for Camp 2, carrying food and equipment. We climb on two separate ropes for three hours, three men to each rope.’

18 July 1961
‘We leave very early, carrying two tents, food and other supplies. At about 7 p.m. we finally arrive at the site selected for Camp 3. We set up the tents in the face of freezing winds.’

19 July 1961
‘It’s decided that today we'll set out for no less than the summit. Canali and I are tied together. From the spur we pass slightly leftward to the mouth of a couloir [gorge] filled with snow and ice where we are able to climb more swiftly. It is no longer snowing, but strong winds attack us from the west without respite and make every forward step a torture. Icicles bristle from the rocks on either side and cut our faces. By 10 p.m. we have finally reached the base of the rocks that stand between ourselves and the summit.

We are exhausted and numb from the cold. The temperature is down to 30-40 below zero.

Our crampons [spiked boot-attachments] and boots are frozen together into a single mass, and for the first time Canali complains that his feet are cold.

It is Zucchi now who takes the lead; he struggles desperately and nothing can stand in his way. The summit cannot be far away now. Canali does the best he can to reactivate the circulation in his feet which he knows are little by little freezing up.

The summit is close and an unconquerable will takes hold of us and aids us tremendously in our progress. Finally at 11 p.m. and almost in darkness we reach the mighty summit. Filled with emotion, we throw our arms about each other. The icy wind prevents us from opening our mouths to speak, even for a moment; but in our eyes is written anything that our lips might speak.

But we cannot wait, we must descend again directly. Alippi, I, Canali, Perego, Airoldi and Zucchi, in this order, take leave of the summit after spending barely 15 minutes atop it.

Canali is not well. I ask him what’s wrong and he fails to answer. He begins to vomit, although he has had nothing to eat for 17 hours.

Once off the rocks immediately beneath the summit, we descend the steep couloir, all roped together.

Suddenly I hear sounds of scuffling behind me. I turn about and see Canali falling down the couloir. In an instant I plunge my ice ax into the hard snow, whip the rope once quickly around it and rapidly bring Canali to a halt. I begin to wonder whether he can proceed much further. For safety’s sake I change our order on the rope. I remain last with Canali close to me so as to keep a better eye on him. Several times during the descent of this very steep couloir, I must take pains to prevent him from slipping.

We reach the base of the couloir and begin the traverse to Camp 3. I try to give Canali a couple of vitamin tablets but he refuses them and continues to complain of the terrible cold in his feet.

The wind continues to harangue us without respite and the snow begins to fall again. But we keep on descending as the storm becomes more and more violent.’

20 July 1961
‘Finally reach Camp 3 at 6 a.m., almost totally exhausted. While the others prepare something to eat. I massage Canali’s feet. The pains begin to lessen. Outside the tent there is nothing but snow and icy wind, and so it remains for the entire day. We stay in the tent for just so long and then decide to continue our descent. To remain much longer at this height would be extremely dangerous, especially for Canali. Yet, as we attempt to go a few paces beyond the tent, we are soon driven back, convinced that to descend under such conditions is tantamount to suicide.’

21 July 1961
‘Until 11 a.m. the weather continues to be unspeakable, but then calms down a bit and we set out. But though the wind is no longer tormenting us, the snow begins to fall more and more thickly.

Canali can no longer get into his shoes. There is now no alternative for Canali but to change to a pair of boots lined with reindeer fur; but it is impossible to attach crampons to such boots. They are too soft and the toe folds up, rendering the crampons useless.

Both for Canali and for his companions on the same rope, it is extremely difficult to go on in this manner. Yet there is no other way. Canali’s own efforts at this point are superhuman and heroic, and even Zucchi and myself seem to exceed our own capacity in assisting him.

In this way we finally reach the glacier halfway down the wall.

Alippi, who has given his reindeerskin boots to Canali, is now shod in four pairs of woolen socks, and he too, unable to use crampons, must submit to a continuous martyrdom.

At one point I was standing close to Perego in an effort to ease Alippi down a slope when suddenly the latter slipped and all but dragged the three of us down the wall. Fortunately he fell onto a stretch of soft snow.
 
We reach Camp 2. Perego, Alippi and Airoldi prefer to bivouac there. But Canali's condition has me greatly worried. Visibility is still zero and, to make matters worse, all of our tracks upward are now concealed by fresh snow.

At this point the spur is extremely narrow and steep, and on both sides the slope falls off perpendicularly. We are forced to grope for foot and handholds under the snow. Fortunately these suffice. The effort is killing. At long last we arrive at Camp 1, completely done in. We know that Base Camp means salvation, yet Canali’s condition is such that we cannot proceed a step further at the moment.

Yet even here our difficulties are not over. None of the provisions left at this camp can be eaten without being heated first, and our stoves no longer function. After a great while we succeed in melting a liter of snow, but nothing else.

I set to work massaging Canali’s feet. The drugs that I’ve given him begin to work. Zucchi and I are despondent at being unable to do more for him. At Base Camp we have everything, but we are too exhausted to get there. We attempt to sleep, but Canali moans throughout the night and we remain awake.’

Leonardo da Vinci’s notebooks

Leonardo da Vinci, the great Florentine artist, scientist, inventor and designer, died half a millennium ago this very day. Celebrated the world over by historians and scholars as the ideal of the ‘Renaissance Man’, he outshines every other individual from history in terms of the range of his prodigious talent and legacy. Although he cannot be classed as a diarist, like his near Florentine contemporary Landucci Luca, who was one of the very earliest of European diarists, Leonardo was a prolific keeper of notebooks. Alas, these notebooks, sometimes called journals, contain little about his personal or private life, nor were most of the many thousands of pages that make up the notebooks ever dated. All but one of these journals are in major libraries or museums, and several of them have been fully digitised and can be viewed online.

Leonardo was born, an illegitimate child, in 1452 near the Tuscan hill-town of Vinci. His father had a flourishing legal practice in the city of Florence. Aged 14, Leonardo was apprenticed to the sculptor Andrea Verrocchio, and by 1472 he had joined the brotherhood of Florentine artists. He worked as an artist in Florence for a decade or so, but became increasingly interested in more technical uses for his drawing ability - such as for anatomy and engineering. In 1482, with permission from the ruling Sforza family, he moved to Milan, where he undertook many commissions for Ludovico Sforza, Duke of Milan (preparing floats and pageants for special occasions, for example, creating designs for a dome in Milan cathedral, and designing a model for a huge equestrian monument of his predecessor). In 1499, when the French invaded, he fled to Venice where he was employed as a military architect and engineer.

The next few years saw Leonardo back in Florence (though he spent some time in Cesena in the service of Cesare Borgia, the son of Pope Alexander VI, creating military maps). He rejoined the Guild of Saint Luke and spent two years designing and painting a mural of The Battle of Anghiari, with Michelangelo designing a companion piece. By 1508, he was back in Milan where he bought his own house. From 1513 to 1516, under Pope Leo X, he spent much of his time living in the Belvedere in the Vatican in Rome, where Raphael and Michelangelo were also employed. In 1516, he entered the service of King Francis I of France. He was given the use of the manor house Clos Lucé (now a public museum) in the Loire Valley close to the king’s residence, where he lived with his friend Count Francesco Melzi. Here, Leonardo died on 2 May 1519.

As one of the world’s most famous individuals in all of history, there is a wealth of information about Leonardo, his life and his work, available on the internet: Wikipedia, Encyclopaedia Britannica, The National Gallery, a Leonardo dedicated site, The Art Story. And here is a random selection of some of the many articles/events celebrating the 500th anniversary of Leonardo’s death: The Telegraph, CNN, Royal Collection Trust, Fox News, i.Italy, National Geographic, The Guardian, The Getty Museum, Bodleian Libraries, Indian Express, The Louvre.

Astonishingly, only 15 artworks attributable to Leonardo have survived. However, he left behind a vast quantity of extraordinary notes and sketches (some 7,000 pages are extant). Over the centuries, these have been collated, and are now formally called his codices, but they are also referred to as his notebooks or journals. Although the world’s oldest diaries can be traced to Japan a millennium ago, the earliest diaries in Europe extant today started to appear in Florence, in fact, during the 15th century - particularly those kept by Landucci Luca and Nicolo Barbara. Leonardo’s notebooks cannot be considered diaries in the sense of comprising dated entries about his daily life, and yet the coincidence of Leonardo’s output coinciding with the first diaries is notable, as is their sheer volume (not to even mention their, literally, marvellous content).

According to Wikipedia, ‘Leonardo’s notes and drawings display an enormous range of interests and preoccupations, some as mundane as lists of groceries and people who owed him money and some as intriguing as designs for wings and shoes for walking on water. There are compositions for paintings, studies of details and drapery, studies of faces and emotions, of animals, babies, dissections, plant studies, rock formations, whirlpools, war machines, flying machines and architecture.’ According to the British Library (see below), its notebook features many topics ‘including mechanics, the flow of rivers, astronomy, optics, architecture and the flight of birds’. More specifically, it includes a study for an underwater breathing apparatus, studies of reflections from concave mirrors, and drawings for the design of a mechanical organ.

Almost all the codices are held by major collections such as the Royal Library at Windsor Castle, the Louvre, the Biblioteca Nacional de España, the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Biblioteca Ambrosiana in Milan and the British Library. Bill Gates owns the only codex in private hands, and it is, apparently, displayed once a year in different cities around the world. Universal Leonardo is an excellent source for information about the codices, with a summary of their contents, their location, sample images etc. The initiative was launched back in 2006 by the Council of Europe and supported by Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design. Led by Leonardo scholar Professor Martin Kemp from Oxford University and Professor Marina Wallace from Central Saint Martins it has aimed to be the most comprehensive set of exhibitions and website ever devoted to the Italian genius.

Most of Leonardo’s writings are in, what’s called, mirror-image cursive, making it very difficult to read; he also used a variety of shorthand and symbols. Conveniently, though, topics are covered with text and diagrams on single sheets - thus, as it happened, latter collation of the sheets was independent of missing pages or disorder. But that said, many of the single pages are confused in themselves. According to Dr Richter (see below): ‘A page, for instance, will begin with some principles of astronomy, or the motion of the earth; then come the laws of sound, and finally some precepts as to colour. Another page will begin with his investigations on the structure of the intestines, and end with philosophical remarks as to the relations of poetry to painting; and so forth.’ 

Content from Leonardo’s notebooks first appeared in English in 1883, when the publisher Samson Low et al brought out The Literary Works of Leonardo da Vinci by Dr Jean Paul Richter. Both volumes, 500-600 pages long, can be read freely at Internet Archive (vol. 1, vol. 2). Two decades later came Leonardo da Vinci’s Note-books - Arranged and rendered into English with Introductions by Edward McCurdy (sic) (Duckworth, 1906). And 30 years after that, the author revised his book, quadrupling its pages from 300 to over 1200 (in two volumes) and this time calling it The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci - Arranged, Rendered into English and Introduced by Edward MacCurdy (sic) (Jonathan Cape, 1938). The two volumes (vol. 1 and vol. 2) are also available at Internet Archive. Both Richter and McCurdy opted to arrange Leonardo’s writings in sections by topic (i.e. without relation to their codex source). In his first attempt, McCurdy chose to compile Leonardo’s writing in four main subject areas: life, nature, art, fantasy; 30 years later he opted for 50 topics and subjects. More recently, Oxford University Press has published Notebooks edited by Thereza Wells and Martin Kemp.

The Guardian, The Journaling Habit and Owlcation all have useful articles on Leonardo’s notebooks. Otherwise, several of the codices can be examined online in all their glorious detail: the British Library, for example, has digitised its holding, the Codex Arundel (Turning the Pages, full manuscript); and the Victoria & Albert Museum has done the same with its holding, the Codex Forster.

A pope's unworldly diaries

Exactly 40 years ago today, the Polish archbishop Karol Józef Wojtyła became Pope John Paul II, the first non Italian pope in more than four centuries. His was a globetrotting papacy - he preached the Catholic religion in many parts of the world never visited by a pope before, often to huge crowds. After his death, two spiritual diaries came to light, and these have recently been published in English. Although they might offer the initiated insight into his inner religious life, there is nothing in them to shed light on his worldly existence.

Karol Józef Wojtyła was born in the Polish town of Wadowice in 1920, the youngest of three children. His mother died when he was eight. He went to a local school in which there was a significant Jewish presence. Aged 18, he moved with his father to Krakow where he enrolled in the university to study languages, for which he had a natural talent. He volunteered as a librarian, and enjoyed sports and the theatre. He served two months military training but, famously, would not hold or fire a weapon. During the war, he worked for a restaurant, a quarry, and a chemical factory, determined not to be sent to Germany. In early 1944, he was in a traffic accident, and spent two weeks in hospital, during which time he decided to become a priest. He hid in the house of an archbishop for the rest of the war. He was ordained as a priest in November 1946, and then moved to Rome for doctoral studies at the Pontifical University.

Wojtyła returned to Poland in 1948, serving in various parishes, teaching at university level, writing for the Catholic press, and even taking students on leisure expeditions (even though priests were not allowed to accompany groups of students during the Stalinist era). In 1958, he was created a bishop, the youngest in Poland. He took part in the Second Vatican Council, making important contributions, and participated in assemblies of Synod of Bishops. In 1964, Pope Paul VI appointed him Archbishop of Kraków, and three years later he was further promoted to the Sacred College of Cardinals. When Pope Paul VI died in 1978, the subsequent papal conclave elected Pope John Paul I, however he died a month later; a second conclave met in October. A split vote between two strong candidates led to a compromise in favour of Wojtyła, who won on the eighth ballot on the third day (16 October) - taking the name John Paul II in tribute to his predecessor. Thus he became the first non Italian pope in over 400 years.

John Paul II liked to travel, and to use his many languages. He made over 100 trips to over 100 countries, always attracting large crowds. Early on in his papacy, his visit to Poland, where he  encouraged opposition to Communism - soon after the Solidarity movement was launched. He was the first pope to visit many countries, including the UK and Cuba, and the first to pray in an Islamic mosque. He did much to foster relations with the Jewish world, and he set up the annual World Youth Day celebration - during its tenth anniversary he offered mass to a crowd of over four million people in Manila, Philippines. In 1981, he was badly wounded in an assassination attempt. A year later, a second attempt led to him using a bullet-proof trailer known as the ‘popemobile’. He died in April 2005. Subsequently he was made venerable, then beatified and canonised - creating him a saint, with his saint day celebrated on the anniversary of his papal inauguration. Online biographical resources include Wikipedia, Encyclopaedia Britannica, the Vatican, the BBC, John Paul II National Shrine, Biography.com, and Catholic Online.

From his early years as a priest until two years before his death, Wojtyła intermittently kept a spiritual diary. This was first published in Poland in 2014, and was quickly translated into other languages, but only into English in 2017. The English edition - translated by Joanna Rzepa - was published by William Collins as Pope St John Paul II - Karol Wojtyła: In God’s Hands, The spiritual diaries 1962-2003. ‘Not since the publication of Journal of a Soul, the spiritual autobiography of Pope John XXIII, have we had such privileged access into the spirituality of a pope,’ says George Stack, Archbishop of Cardiff, in his introduction. (For more on Pope John XXIII’s diaries see A pope’s view of Mussolini.)

In a preface (first published in the Polish edition), the then Archbishop of Krakow, Stanisław Dziwisz, explains that John Paul II left instructions for his two notebooks to be burned. However, Dziwisz adds, he did not ‘dare’ do so: ‘I did not burn John Paul’s notes because they are a key to understanding his spirituality, that is, what is innermost in a person: his relationship to God, to other men and to himself. They reveal, so to speak, another side of the person whom we knew as the Bishop of Kraków and Rome, the Peter of our times, the Shepherd of the universal Church. [. . .] They allow us to get a glimpse of the intimate, personal relationship of faith with God the Creator, the Giver of life, the Master and Teacher. At the same time, they present the sources of his spirituality - his inner strength and his determined will to serve Christ until the last breath of life.’

Almost all the entries in the two notebooks were written by Wojtyła during retreats (as listed in the book). Here are several extracts, which, unfortunately, for the non-spiritual among us, give little insight into the man’s worldly thoughts or existence.

8 July 1962
‘The following key inner topics have been put together and discussed with the father:
1. death
2. power
3. creativity
4. people.’

2 September 1962
‘The recollection of these topics and novum [novelty] (as if a common denominator was found for all the experiences and reflections): I am very much in Gods hands - the content of this ‘Totus Tuus’ [‘Entirely Yours’] opened, so to speak, in a new place. When any concern ‘of mine’ becomes in this way Mary’s, it can be undertaken, even if it involves an element of risk (though one must not overdo it: in human terms, i.e. on the human side, the issue needs to be dealt with thoroughly). At a certain point, however, one needs to abandon human calculations and somehow grasp the Godly dimensions of every difficult issue. A peculiar iunctim [junction] of issue 4 with issue 2 begins to emerge here.

I discussed all this with the father too.’

18 August 1965
‘Morning prayers [illegible]; (Rosary); Lauds; Holy Mass; thanksgiving; Matins; Prime; Act of Consecration to the Blessed Virgin Mary

Meditation: Referring back to the retreat of 1963,1 wish to expand on the topic of ‘justification’. I find this topic academically (theologically) appealing and at the same time internally, personally important. The topic develops into a reflection on theological virtues, i.e. divine virtues.

Faith. The catechisms definition: ‘to accept as true all that God has revealed to us and that holy Church proposes for our belief’ can be interpreted and even experienced in different ways. The intellectualist (ideological) interpretation is different from the personalist (charitological) interpretation. It is not only about the sum of truths (propositions) which the mind accepts through the authority of ‘God who reveals them’ - and more directly: Christ, the Church (cf. motiva credibilitatis [compare motives of credibility]). It is about the specific supernatural relationship of man - a person - with the personal God (Trinitas SS [the Holy Trinity]). The nearer foundation of this relationship is the mind (reason). The proper subject matter of this human faculty is truth. Faith is a readiness, indeed, it is an act of reason which is ready to accept God’s truth as its own truth. Communicatio in veritate cum Deo [Communion with God in truth]. It is probably the highest act - one of the highest acts - in a relationship of a person to a person. This readiness to communicate in truth becomes, in a particular way, renewed through revelation, and in general with its help (in its extension lies theology). Faith consists in the acceptance of revelation, but it is possible thanks to the readiness of the mind mentioned above, which revelation takes for granted and simultaneously makes fully possible.

The Way of the Cross: main theme ‘viator - comprehensor’ (‘wayfarer - comprehensor’]; The Little Hours; Reading the schemas; Vespers for Wednesday

Adoration: it somehow provides me with topics for the afternoon meditation

Meditation on practical issues: dialogue, the Church of dialogue, others separately Matins; Spiritual reading; Compline’

24 February 1985
‘6.00 p.m.: Vespers; Veni Creator [Come, Creator (Spirit)]

Talk. Meditation (1): We form a retreat community. In the centre: Christ. The Holy Spirit, who speaks ‘inside us’.

We are at the core of the Church: in Rome - and in the world. The Church prepares for Passover.

Lent - is a calling!

Topic: The symbol of faith.

In unity with the Mother of the Church from Lourdes: St Bernadette’s words: Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for me, a poor sinner.

Eucharistic Adoration; Rosary (III); Litany of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, Blessed Virgin Mary, St Joseph; Compline; Reading’

25 February 1985
‘Intentions

Meditation: ‘I am in the midst of them’.

Holy Mass; Thanksgiving; Daily prayers; Act of Consecration to Virgin Mary; Prayer to the Holy Spirit; Litany of the Polish Nation; Lauds

Talk. Meditation (2):

(Credo [Creed]) Only God can properly speak of God: many times and in various ways. . . God spoke ..., in the last days He has spoken by a Son.’

Symbolus Apostolorum [The Apostles’ Creed]: the Trinitarian structure - symbolus baptismalis [the baptismal creed].

(The ecumenical meeting near Trent:)’

A thousand pieces

‘Their way of making war is very much the same. Into the pot they cast human flesh, explosive powders, and extracts from manuals of military science, then they put on the lid of uncompromising discipline and wait for a whistle to tell them that it’s all over. Only the whistle doesn’t blow, and the pot explodes into a thousand pieces.’ This is the famous Italian Giovannino Guareschi, born 110 years ago today, writing in a diary he kept during his imprisonment by the Germans in the latter years of World War Two. Guareschi is best known for his comic short stories about Don Camillo, but his humour also shines through the tales of horrors in prison camp life.

Giovanni or Giovannino Guareschi was born in Fontanelle di Roccabianca, near Parma, on 1 May 1908 into a middle-class family. After an unsuccessful stint at the local university he worked as a doorman at a sugar refinery, but soon found his niche in writing for a local newspaper. In 1929 he became editor of Corriere Emiliano, a satirical magazine, and between 1936 and 1943 he was chief editor of Bertoldo, a similar publication. In 1940, he marred Ennia Pallini, and they had two children. During the Second World War, he was a critic of the Mussolini government, but nevertheless joined the army (to avoid prosecution), and trained as an artillery officer. After Italy signed its armistice with the Allies, he was stationed on the Eastern front. He was imprisoned, alongside other Italian soldiers, by the Germans in Poland for three years.

Subsequently, Guareschi returned to Italy and was a cofounder of Candido, a satirical magazine, which he edited until 1957 (apart from a spell in a Parma prison for libel). However, Guareschi is most warmly remembered for his novels, in particular those featuring Don Camillo, the stubborn Catholic priest, who is constantly in trouble with the local communist mayor Peppone. From 1956, he began to spend time in Switzerland for health reasons; he died 1968. There isn’t a wealth of biographical information on Guareschi available online in English, but there is a little at Wikipedia, and the World of Guareschi.

During his imprisonment during the war, Guareschi kept diary notebooks - often reading aloud their contents to other prisoners. He brought them home after the liberation, and these were published in 1949 by Rizzoli as Diario Clandestino 1943-1945 (which has its own Italian Wikipedia page). Some years later, in 1958, this was translated by Frances Frenaye for publication in English in the US (Farrar, Straus and Cudahy) and the UK (Victor Gollancz) as My Secret Diary 1943-1945. The full text is freely available online at Internet Archive.

Rather than a preface or introduction, Guareschi begins his published diary with Instructions for Use, which is worth reproducing at length.

‘This Secret Diary is so secret that it isn’t a diary at all. I say this partly in order to correct the title of the book and partly in order to allay the misgivings of anyone whom it happens to antagonize. It is not a diary in the sense of being a day-by-day account of what the writer thought and did, one of the usual compilations in which he regards himself as the center and fulcrum of the universe.

I did have the intention of compiling a diary of this kind, and for two years I jotted down everything I did or didn’t do, everything I thought and saw, including what I should have thought, even if I didn’t think it. As a result, I brought home with me three bulky notebooks, containing enough material to fill a volume of two thousand pages. As soon as I got there, I put a new ribbon in the typewriter and set about deciphering and amplifying my notes. Out of the two years I did not skip a single day. It was a tiresome and feverish job but, at the end, my diary was complete. I reread it attentively, polished it up and tried to give it a good tempo. Then I had it retyped and, after all this was done, I put it away with the intention of never looking at it again. This, I believe, is one of the wisest acts of my whole career as a writer. [. . .]

Like millions of others, better and worse than myself, I was drawn into this war. As an Italian, I found myself an ally of the Germans at the start and at the end their prisoner. In 1943 the Anglo-Americans bombed my house; in 1945 they freed me from prison and gave me cans of soup and condensed milk. As far as I am concerned, that is the whole story. I had no more influence than a nutshell tossed about on the ocean, and I emerged without ribbons or medals on my chest. I emerged as a victor, however, because I came through the cataclysm without hatred in my soul and I made the discovery of a precious friend, myself.

As for the exact course of my personal story, it was this. One day in September of 1943, I found myself, along with a group of other officers, in an internment camp in Poland. Subsequently I changed camps several times, but the story remained essentially the same. It’s no use going into all the details, because anyone who wasn’t a prisoner in this last war or the one before it will probably be a prisoner in the next. If he has not had the experience himself, then a father has had it before him or a son will have it after, or else he has heard about it from a brother or a friend.

For present purposes, the only thing of interest is that, even in prison, I remained a stubborn native of the province of Emilia, of the lower reaches of the Po valley; I gritted my teeth and said to myself: “I won’t die, even if they kill me!” And I didn’t die, either, probably only because they didn’t kill me, but at any rate I didn't die. I stayed alive in spirit as well as in body, and kept right on working. I wrote not only notes for my diary, but also a number of things for everyday camp use.

Indeed, I spent a good part of my time going from hut to hut and reading aloud the sort of thing of which the present book will furnish examples. Pieces which were intended at the time only for camp consumption and not at all for publication in the world outside the Lager. And yet, now that years have gone by, these pieces are the only ones that seem to me to have some validity. Having locked up my diary, I searched among the greasy, thumb-marked sheets of my camp writings and made up this “secret” collection.

As I have said before, it is a diary so secret as not to be a diary at all. Yet, in many ways, it seems to me to give a better picture of those days, and their thoughts and sorrows than my huge original compendium. Nothing else, I repeat, is valid or deserving of publication. This material is what you might call “authorized”.’

And here are a few extracts from the diary itself.

31 October 1943
‘Many of the captured Russian coats which the Germans have distributed to us have a patch on the chest or back, a little, round patch covering the hole where a bullet went in and a soul went out. My coat has such a patch, just over the heart. It is made of stout cloth and carefully sewn, yet a breath of cold air penetrates the patch, even when there is no wind and a warm sun. And my heart aches, when it is pierced by this icy needle.’

10 December 1943
‘Some men spend the day covering sheets of paper with plans and sketches. They rebuild the house, shift the furniture and debate the wisdom of carving a fireplace out of the living room. This is homesickness, pure and simple; it expresses a man’s need to cast out a safety line linking him to the vital center of his life.

Some men throw themselves into lectures, and into historical, political, philosophical, artistic and literary discussions; they argue about Proust, Croce, Marx, Cézanne and Leopardi. This is the instinct of self-preservation; it reflects the necessity of injecting oxygen into the Lager’s dank, stuffy air.

There are men that wander from hut to hut, from bunk to bunk, asking for opinions on the war, how long it will last and what will come after. This may reveal a certain weakness of character, but it is due in large part to boredom and inanition. Other men do nothing but think and talk about food. And this is sheer madness. Of course we are hungry. Hunger hovers over us at every hour of the day and peoples our dreams at night. We accept it in a spirit of resignation, as an inevitable and incurable ill.

But such men are on the way to going mad. Food is the only subject of their conversation. They plan breakfasts, lunches, dinners, snacks and midnight suppers. They describe and invent sandwiches, draw up menus for sensational banquets to be held after their return home. They collect the names of good restaurants and local delicacies and compile gastronomic guidebooks, or else they write down and annotate recipes for the most complicated dishes.

The futile chatter about things to eat and the futile thought concentrated on eating only spur the appetite. In these men’s heated imaginations are bottomless pits, with stomachs the dimensions of their desires. This form of madness is fraught with anxiety. Its practitioners acquire protruding bones; their faces are yellow from the fear of being hungry rather than from actual hunger.’

3 February 1944
‘They fill a pot with water, measure out the meat and the powdered extracts, close the airtight lid, light the gas and then, when a certain valve emits a whistling sound, the soup is ready.

Their way of making war is very much the same. Into the pot they cast human flesh, explosive powders, and extracts from manuals of military science, then they put on the lid of uncompromising discipline and wait for a whistle to tell them that it’s all over.

Only the whistle doesn’t blow, and the pot explodes into a thousand pieces.’

14 May 1944
‘Today is my son’s fourth birthday. In him I relived my childhood, and now this is taken away. I count his days rather than my own, and even if I am a prisoner I wish that time could have a stop.’

28 June 1944
‘It is pouring rain; the camp is a sea of mud, and the dripping huts look like old boats rotting in some forgotten harbor. The shirts and shorts hung up to dry on a wire in front of the hut hang limp, like a charwoman’s rags.

In these parts hanging up the laundry is a futile act of faith. The weather is just as unstable as the temper of the rags called men, who are supposed to be drying out after immersion in the purifying bath of sorrow. After a brief moment of calm, they have sunk into a mood of complaint and gloom, of doubt, fear and resentment. It is just as futile an act of faith to believe in their spiritual resurrection.

The rain has ceased, and men are streaming outdoors. The camp is studded with puddles, and in them is mirrored the hopeless failure of the Italian middle class, clad in rags and pettiness.’

The Diary Junction

A Chill in the Air

Pushkin Press is today publishing a recently uncovered diary written by the celebrated English biographer Iris Origo - A Chill in the Air. While this new diary was kept during the early years of the Second World War, her only other diary, first published 70 years ago, was written during the last years of the war - see La Foce is liberated. Pushkin Press says A Chill in the Air is a ‘sad and gripping account of the grim absurdities that Italy and the world underwent as war became increasingly unavoidable’.

Iris Margaret Cutting was born in 1902, the child of an Anglo-Irish mother and a rich American father. She was educated privately in Florence, Italy, and, with inherited wealth, spent much time in her youth travelling. She married an Italian nobleman, Antonio Origo, and together they developed a rundown farming estate, La Foce, some 150km north of Rome. They had one son who died young of meningitis, and two daughters. In the 1930s, Origo turned to writing, publishing biographies of the Italian poet Giacomo Leopardi and Cola di Rienzo, a fourteenth century Roman politician.

During the war, the family stayed at La Foce where they secretly took in refugee children and helped escaping Allied prisoners. After the war, Origo lived in both Rome and La Foce, and she continued writing biographies but also autobiographical books - the first of which was a diary: War in Val d’Orcia (Jonathan Cape, 1947, but reissued in 1999 by Allison & Busby). Indeed, this has become the most admired of all of her books. She was appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1976, and died in 1988.

Today, Pushkin Press has published A Chill in the Air: An Italian War Diary 1939-1940, complete with an introduction by biographer Lucy Hughes-Hallett, and an afterword by Origo’s granddaughter Katia Lysy. Hughes-Hallett explains that there is very little of a personal nature in the diary. Rather, she says, it is ‘a curious mixture of news - both fake and genuine - rumour, comment and observation’, with radio broadcasts being a focus of many entries. Indeed, this diary style in war time of monitoring the news rather than one’s own personal life was very common, and, in fact, is similar to another recent release by Pushkin Press - Astrid Lindgren’s A World Gone Mad - see Let there be peace.

The publisher has included, at the very end of the diary entries, a note by Origo on why the diary stops when it does: ‘This diary was interrupted at this point by the birth of my daughter on August 1st. In the autumn I decided, having a wonderful Swiss nanny to help me with my baby, that inaction was no longer bearable. Surely there must be some work, directed towards the relief of suffering rather than any war aim, which even I, an Anglo-American and a non-Fascist, could find to do? In the autumn of 1940 I began to work in the Prisoner’s Branch of the Italian Red Cross - and until the spring of 1943 had no more time for writing.’

And further explanation is found in Katia Lysy’s afterword. She says that her grandmother never intended to publish any of her diaries, but was persuaded to do so with the War in Val d’Orcia because ‘she strongly believed the rest of the world should hear the other side of the story - how ordinary Italians in a remote Tuscan valley suffered the consequences of war and did not hesitate to rescue and shelter their fellow human beings at great personal risk.’ However, Lysy speculates, she must have considered her pre-war journal to be of little interest to others when compared to the later ‘world-shattering events’. In the 1980s, an Italian editor encouraged Origo to edit the earlier diary for publication, but with her health declining she never took on the task. The diary was only re-found much more recently - ‘in a promising-looking brown box bearing the legend “Unpublished” in my grandmother’s familiar scrawl’ - during a search for family photographs. And so, finally, 70 years after the first, Pushkin is publishing this second diary - as part of the ‘Iris Origo revival, following the republication of four of her books earlier this year.’

Here are three short extracts from the new book (with thanks to Pushkin Press).

5 July 1939
‘Yesterday, driving through Scandicci (where there is a large home for permanently disabled soldiers) I met, in his wheelchair, one of the most terrible “grands mutiles” of the 1914-18 war that I have ever seen. Both legs gone, blind, and most horribly disfigured - and still alive, after twenty years.
And in 1959?’

7 June 1940
‘Still no definite news. But the first outward signs of war reach our valley. In the early morning 35 bombers heading South fly over us, and in the afternoon about 50 military lorries, bound for the aviation camp at Castiglion del Lago, drive up the road from Rome. The peasants look up as they hear the rumble, say resignedly Ci siamo - and get back, while they can, to their hay.

The radio starts atrocity stories about the behaviour of the Allied troops in Belgium, including a detailed story of the “massacre” by French officers of some innocent Italian miners, and the statement that 1500 Belgian refugees have been murdered deliberately by British bombardments on the Belgian frontier. Such stories, however, don’t as yet go down well. Even two boys of 16 and 18, who are staying here, merely shrug and say disgustedly: “Who do they expect to believe it?” ’

3 July 1940
‘My first air raid last night. The sirens began just after midnight; I was still awake and was joined by William Phillips [her godfather, and US ambassador to Italy]. We sat talking pleasantly in the dark for about one hour, heard one distant burst of fire and then the all-clear signal. Altogether a singularly unalarming experience, except apparently to the lions in the Zoo, who went on roaring all night. But, as the first wail of the sirens was heard, my thoughts went to England and France.’

I like Mussolini, very much

According to Amazon, Enigma Books, a US imprint, is today publishing a reprint of Diary 1937-1943: The complete unabridged diaries of Count Galeazzo Ciano, Italian Minister for Foreign Affairs, 1936-1943, first published in 2002 by Phoenix. However, it is worth noting that there is no mention of this new edition on the publisher’s website. Nevertheless, it is as good an opportunity as any to celebrate - if that’s the right word - Ciano’s fascinating diaries. According to Malcolm Muggeridge they are ‘the most interesting [documents]’ to have come out of the Second World War, and the ones which ‘will probably prove in the end the most useful to historians’.

Galeazzo Ciano was born in Livorno in 1903. His father, an admiral, was later decorated in the First World War. Ciano moved to Rome, where, when only 18, he took part in the march which led to the Fascist overthrow of the Republic. He studied law, tried journalism and then settled on a career in diplomacy. In 1930, he married Benito Mussolini’s daughter Edda (they had three children), and thereafter rose to become a member of the Fascist Supreme Council. He was a secretary of state for press and propaganda, and then served in the Italian air force during the invasion of Ethiopia, before becoming minister of foreign affairs. In 1939, with Ribbentrop, he signed the Pact of Steel with Germany.

By 1943, however, Ciano’s doubts about Italy’s relationship with Germany had grown to the point where he advocated that Italy seek peace with the allies. Mussolini sacked him and the whole cabinet, and returned Ciano to the diplomatic service, as an ambassador to the Vatican. Still Ciano and other leading fascists were able to force Mussolini’s resignation. Thereafter, though, the new government prepared to arrest Ciano for embezzling, and so he fled Rome. He was captured by Mussolini sympathisers in Northern Italy, brought to trial for treason and executed in January 1944. Further biographical information is available at Wikipedia, the CIA, or the Constantine Report.

Ciano kept a diary during the entire period he was minister of foreign affairs, from June 1936 until February 1943. After his death, his widow, Edda, managed to smuggle to Switzerland the diaries he wrote from January 1939. By 1946, Doubleday, New York, had published, in English, The Ciano Diaries, 1939-1943: The complete, unabridged diaries of Count Galeazzo Ciano, Italian Minister for Foreign Affairs, as edited by Hugh Gibson with an introduction by Sumner Welles. This is freely available to read online at Internet Archive. A year later, the diaries also appeared in the UK, published by William Heinemann with an introduction by Malcolm Muggeridge.

Ciano’s earlier diaries (1936-1938), however, followed a more tortuous route to publication. They fell into the hands of the Germans, and were later destroyed, although Edda seems to have saved an imperfect copy of a German translation. This was eventually translated into English and published by Methuen as Ciano’s Diary, 1937-1938 in 1952. In 2002, for the first time, the two lots of Ciano’s diaries were put together and published by Phoenix as Diary 1937-1943: The complete unabridged diaries of Count Galeazzo Ciano, Italian Minister for Foreign Affairs, 1936-1943. The book has a preface by Renzo De Felice which is followed by Malcolm Muggeridge’s original introduction. And it is this edition that is supposedly being reissued today by Enigma Books, a US imprint, part of Casemate.

The first couple of paragraphs of Muggeridge’s introduction to Ciano’s diaries are worth reproducing.

‘Of all the documents which have come out of the 1939-1945 war and the events which led up to it, Ciano’s Diary is the most interesting, and will probably prove in the end the most useful to historians. I can imagine some future Gibbon, or even Lytton Strachey, coming upon it with a gasp of delight. This is because Ciano, like Boswell, was too vain to hide the true workings of his mind and the true character of his aspirations, and too foolish to be aware of how completely he was giving himself and those about whom he wrote away. If he had been cleverer his Diary would have been less revealing; if he had been better, his Diary would have been worse. Day by day he recorded his thoughts, hopes, conversations, all that had happened to him, against the background of his inordinate vanity, and in the end, waiting in a prison cell at Verona to be taken out and shot, engineered the publication of what he had written in the fond hope that thereby he would revenge himself on his father-in-law and former patron Mussolini.

What he achieved actually was to provide the world with one more record, incomparable in its naiveté, of how futile a pursuit is power, and how certainly those who pursue it become enmeshed in their own deceits and stratagems. For this at least he deserves gratitude. In exposing Mussolini he perforce exposed himself, and all who take the path they followed. Without knowing it, he presented Mussolini as Macbeth, with Hider for the Horrid Sisters. Duce he was, but the promise of yet greater things to come proved irresistible. Like Macbeth, he struggled sometimes against its seduction, but in the end succumbed, as many others did, to the Führer’s fearful certainty. The actual events that Ciano recounts are too near, and their tragic consequences too present, to require his confirmation. It is not his account of the play which makes his Diary so valuable, but his revelation of the character of the players and of their relationships with one another.’

For further information on Ciano’s diaries see also Warfare History Network or The Atlantic. Here are several extracts taken from the 2002 Phoenix edition.

22 August 1937
‘In order to protect my writer’s vanity, should these notes be published one day - please bear in mind that they were jotted down by me, in fits and starts, between meetings and phone calls. I was obliged and wanted to kick literature out and I limited myself to taking very short notes on the matters of which, I am, at once, either actor, author or spectator. The facts themselves will generate the interest rather than the hurried writing style.’

23 August 1937
‘Starting today I intend to keep this diary on a regular basis. The Duce told me that democracy is to Slavs what alcohol is to Negroes. Total destruction. Afterwards, there is the need for exceptional regulations following intense revolutionary upheavals.

Ingram made a friendly move regarding the torpedo attacks in the Mediterranean. I replied brazenly. He left almost satisfied.

The Chinese want airplanes for Shanghai. I practically said no. I reminded them of their behavior during and after the sanctions. Now they can no longer count on our goodwill.’

27 September 1937
‘Essen. Visit to Krupp. Very much impressed by industrial power. Arrival in Berlin. Triumphant.’

29 October 1937
‘This morning medals were awarded to the widows of those who died in Spain. A successful ceremony. But, to see so many people in mourning, and to look into so many red eyes, I had to examine my conscience, and I ask myself if this blood had been spilled for a just cause. Yes: that is the answer. At Malaga, at Guadalajara, at Santander, we defended our civilization and our Revolution. And sacrifice is necessary when bold and strong spirits must be forged within nations. The wounded were very proud. One of them who had lost both hands and one eye, said: “I ask only for another hand so that I may return to Spain.” It sounds like a reply from an anthology, and I heard it from a boy of twenty, struck down by enemy weapons, who was happy because the Duce paused with him for a moment. The Germans that were with us learned something.

The Duce does not believe that I should go to Brussels. All things considered, he is right. The unprepared meeting with Eden, would be useless and perhaps damaging for the disappointment that it would create. If it is to be, the occasion can always we found later on. I spoke to Perth about it. He was not very convinced by my arguments. Personally he wanted the meeting, which, according to him, would have clarified the situation a lot.’

6 November 1937
‘This morning we signed the Pact. One could sense an atmosphere very different from the usual diplomatic ceremonies. Three nations engaged down the same path, which could lead to war. A necessary fight if we want to break this mold that suffocates the energy and aspirations of young nations. After the signing we went to see the Duce. Few times have I seen him so pleased. It is no longer the situation of 1935. Italy has broken its isolation and is at the center of the most formidable political and military alliance that has ever existed.

In the afternoon a three-man meeting between the Duce, Ciano, and Ribbentrop. It was a meeting of great interest: I took minutes in a notebook.

In the evening gala dinner at the Palazzo Venezia. The two very pro-fascist Japanese military attaches were beaming. They wish the military pact well. They were happy when I told them, in the presence of the Duce, that they will have to occupy Vladivostok, which is a pistol pointed against Japan.’

12 February 1939
‘The Duce agreed to take part in the funeral of the Pope, which has been set by the nunciature for the 17th. That decision pleases me, because it will make a good impression on the conclave participants. In some American circles it is rumored that the Camerlengo has a document written by the Pope. The Duce wants Pignatti to find out, and, if it is true, to try to get a copy of the document “in order to avoid a repetition of the Filippelli incident.”

Calm, for the time being, in other areas.

Gorgeous Sunday of a Roman winter, warm and sunny. I spent most of it at the golf club.’

16 February 1940
‘François-Poncet, whom I had not seen for a long time, complains about our press attacks, and especially those appearing in the Popolo d’ltalia. French newspapers, for the time being, are not reacting, but relations between the two countries are suffering from this nonetheless, and the atmosphere of better understanding which we had established in the last few months has been upset once again. I used some kind words, but nothing more, since the press campaign is desired and directed personally by the Duce, my influence being very limited.

Donegani is worried about the coal problem. If our supplies are reduced or cease entirely in the next few days, industry will suffer a sudden stoppage with dire consequences in the field of production and labor.

I receive Sidorovici, leader of the Romanian Youth Movement. Some leader! He is a big hulk, a preposterous creature devoid of any interest.’

29 March 1940
‘A report presented by Melchiori, who has spent a month in Germany, has had a profound influence on the Duce. I do not know the value of this individual’s observations. He is a shining example of amorality, greedy ambition, ineptitude, and ignorance, who does not know a single word of German and spends his time in the anterooms of the consulates and the embassy begging for secondhand information, which he then cooks up in a rather vulgar style. The trouble is that Mussolini takes him seriously. Few documents have struck him lately as much as the Melchiori report, in which even though he reaches the conventional conclusion of “an unavoidable German victory” he also points out the difficult living conditions of the German people. This report has not substantially modified the decisions of the Duce, but for the first time he admits that Germany is not resting on a bed of roses, and that the failure of the offensive or a long-drawn-out war would mean defeat, and hence the collapse of the German regime. “I do not understand,” he said, “why Hitler does not realize this. I myself can feel that Fascism is wearing out - a wear and tear which is not deep, but is nevertheless noticeable, and he does not feel it in Germany, where the crisis has already assumed rather alarming proportions.” ’

29 June 1940
‘Balbo is dead. A tragic mistake has brought about his end. The antiaircraft battery at Tobruk fired on his plane, mistaking it for an English plane, and shot it down. The news saddened me very much. Balbo did not deserve to end up like this. He was exuberant, restless, he loved life in all its forms. He had more dash than talent, more vivacity than acumen. He was a decent fellow, and even in political clashes, in which his partisan temperament delighted, he never stooped to anything dishonorable and to questionable methods. He did not desire war, and opposed it to the last. But once it had been decided, he spoke with me in the language of a faithful soldier, and, if fate had not been against him, he was preparing to act with decision and daring.

Balbo’s memory will linger for a long time among Italians because he was, above all, a true Italian, with the great faults and great virtues of our race.’

26 September 1940
‘I am on my way to Berlin. On Hitler’s order the train is stopped at Munich. Attacks by the Royal Air Force endanger the area, and the Führer does not wish to expose me to the risk of a long stop in open country. I sleep in Munich and will continue by air.’

23 May 1942
‘The Duce telephoned indignantly, charging that the Japanese ambassador, Shiratori, made certain unacceptable statements: the dominion of the world belongs to Japan, the Mikado is the only god on earth, and that both Hitler and Mussolini must come to accept this reality. I remember Shiratori during his short stay in Rome. He was a fanatical extremist, but, most of all, he was very uncouth.

Bismarck has confirmed to d’Aieta that Himmler is playing a personal game by inciting people to grumble. Is this true? For the time being I think that the rumor must be accepted with a lot of caution.’

8 February 1943
‘I hand over my office at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs. Then I go to the Palazzo Venezia to see the Duce and take leave of him. He tells me “Now you must consider that you are going to have a period of rest. Then your turn will come again. Your future is in my hands, and therefore you need not worry!” He thanks me for what I have done and quickly enumerates my most important services. “If they had given us three years’ time we might have been able to wage war under different conditions or perhaps it would not have been at all necessary to wage it.” He then asked me if I had all my documents in order. “Yes,” I answered. “I have them all in order, and remember, when hard times come - because it is now certain that hard times will come - I can document all the treacheries perpetrated against us by the Germans, one after another, from the preparation of the conflict to the war on Russia, communicated to us when their troops had already crossed the border. If you need them I shall provide the details, or, better still, I shall, within the space of 24 hours, prepare that speech which I have had in my mind for three years, because I shall burst if I do not deliver it.” He listened to me in silence and almost agreed with me. Today he was concerned about the situation because the retreat on the Eastern Front continues to be almost a rout. He has invited me to see him frequently, “even every day.” Our leave-taking was cordial, for which I am very glad, because I like Mussolini, like him very much, and what I shall miss the most will be my contact with him.’

The Diary Junction

Signalling with Marconi

‘Signalling with Marconi and Parallel-Wire systems to Lavernock Point.’ This is George Kemp’s inauspicious diary entry for 13 December 1897, the day the Italian radio pioneer, Guglielmo Marconi, made telecommunications history. Marconi, who died 80 years ago today, certainly kept notebooks and diaries himself, though they are brief and coded and considered largely inscrutable by biographers. Of more use to biographers, especially those wishing to trace the evolution of Marconi’s technical innovations, are the diaries kept by Kemp, his first assistant and lifelong friend.

Marconi was born in 1874 into a wealthy Bologna family, and, although mostly brought up in Italy, he spent several years living with his Irish/Scottish mother in Bedford, England. As a boy he took a keen interest in physical and electrical science, studying the work of physicists Maxwell and Hertz. Another physicist who was also a neighbour, Augusto Righi, let Marconi attend lectures at the university of Bologna. In 1895, he began experiments at his father’s country estate at Pontecchio, and succeeded in sending wireless signals over a distance of one and a half miles. The following year, he took his apparatus to England where he was introduced to William Preece, engineer-in-chief of the Post Office, and was granted the world’s first patent for a system of wireless telegraphy.

Marconi demonstrated his system successfully in London, on Salisbury Plain and, most significantly, across the Bristol Channel (on 13 May 1897); and later, in July, he formed The Wireless Telegraph and Signal Company Limited. That same year, he gave a demonstration to the Italian Government at Spezia where wireless signals were sent over a distance of twelve miles; and, in 1899, he established wireless communication between France and England across the English Channel. He soon erected permanent wireless stations in several places on the south coast. In 1900, he took out his famous patent No. 7777 for ‘tuned or syntonic telegraphy’ and, on an historic day, 12 December 1901, determined to prove that wireless waves were not affected by the curvature of the Earth, he used his system for transmitting the first wireless signals across the Atlantic between Poldhu, Cornwall, and St. John’s, Newfoundland, a distance of over 2,000 miles. A year later, a transmission from a Marconi station in Glace Bay, Nova Scotia, Canada, became the world’s first radio message to cross the Atlantic in the other direction. In 1905, Marconi married Beatrice O’Brien in 1905, and they had three children.

Marconi expanded his company rapidly, developing inventions, and building high-powered stations on both sides of the Atlantic to communicate with ships. In 1904, he established a service of transmitting news to subscribing vessels at sea, and a few years later he launched the first transatlantic commercial service between Glace Bay and Clifden, Ireland. In 1905, he patented his horizontal directional aerial and, in 1912, a ‘timed spark’ system for generating continuous waves. Marconi’s company played a significant role in saving lives after the sinking of the Titanic, a development which brought Marconi himself some fame. He was awarded the Nobel Prize, shared with Professor Karl Braun, in 1909. In 1913, the Marconis moved back to Italy.

In 1914, Marconi was commissioned in the Italian Army as a Lieutenant, and placed in charge of Italy’s military radio service. He was later promoted to Captain, and in 1916 transferred to the Navy in the rank of Commander. He was a member of the Italian government mission to the United States in 1917, and in 1919 was appointed Italian plenipotentiary delegate to the Paris Peace Conference. He was awarded the Italian Military Medal in 1919 in recognition of his war service. Marconi continued to experiment, extending  knowledge and uses of shorter and shorter radio waves. In 1924, his company obtained a contract from the British post office to establish shortwave communication with the countries of the British Commonwealth. In 1927, having had his first marriage annulled, he married Maria Cristina Bezzi-Scali and they had one child.

In 1930, by which time Marconi had joined the Italian Fascist party, Benito Mussolini appointed him president of the Royal Academy of Italy, which made Marconi a member of the Fascist Grand Council. He received many honorary doctorates and other international honours and awards, including Honorary Knight Grand Cross of the Royal Victorian Order in England, and the hereditary title of Marchese in Italy. He died on 20 July 1937, and was given a state funeral. The following day, all BBC transmitters and wireless Post Office transmitters in the British Isles observed two minutes of silence in his honour. Further information is readily available online, not least at Wikipedia, Nobel Prize, Electronics Notes, and Encyclopædia Britannica.

Marconi was an inveterate keeper of notebooks which rarely, it seems, had the character of a private diary. Such notebooks from his teens (and other archival materials) were discovered in the 1990s at Villa Farnesina (which had been the home of the Royal Academy under Marconi’s presidency). Some information on these early notebooks (and photographs) can be found at the Guglielmo Marconi Committee’s website. Although the text is in Italian, Google Translate provides a reasonable text in English. 

Otherwise, there is information in English about Marconi’s adult notebooks/diaries in various biographies. Marc Raboy, in his much-respected and very recent work Marconi: The Man who Networked the World (Oxford University Press, 2016), summarises: ‘Every life has its store of secrets and mysteries, which is perhaps why people get so exercised at the thought of some government agency having access to their phone records or hard drives. Marconi’s diaries hold clues to questions unasked and unanswerable, often hinting at relations and interests that then vanish without a trace. There is a backstory to Marconi’s elusive life that we can only begin to glimpse. He loved recounting and reinventing it, but he also took great care to keep parts of it shrouded in obscurity. He would record meetings and make notes to himself in small leather-bound diaries, but he often used a series of indecipherable codes meaningful only to himself; a word, a name, a single letter, a number or an X. The diaries are inscrutable, strewn with references to people who turn up nowhere else in any of the accounts of his life. One of these ephemeral figures was Betty - whose full name was Marion Elizabeth Jessie Marconi Clover. Marconi would occasionally make a note regarding his children - Degna, Giulio, Gioia. . . and, once in the same breath, Betty Clover. On the surface, what could be more reasonable than taking one’s fourteen-year-old goddaughter to Cartier, London’s finest jewellery dealer (as he recorded doing on January 24,1925), or so it would appear.’

Raboy includes more than a dozen mentions of Marconi’s notebooks/diaries in his index, but, as far as I can tell, he only quotes from the diaries once - and in this context: ‘Marconi also carried around a small pocket diary in those days that he used occasionally for recording experimental notations. The notations are often stripped of any context and not necessarily placed on the pages bearing the dates when they were made. But under December 12, 1901, partly obscured by other notations that he may have made earlier or later, he has written: “Sigs at 12.30 1.1 OX and 2.20,” and on December 13, 1901: “Sigs at 1.38.” These entries are the only ones in ink; the others are in pencil. In later years, Marconi frequently referred to these notations, as well as Kemp’s diary, as evidence of the time and date the signals were received. What is perhaps most unusual is that neither Kemp’s nor Marconi’s diary indicate they felt that anything extraordinary had taken place. The entries are matter-of-fact and unadorned. In later years, they both embellished the story, turning it into drama.’

Kemp - George S. Kemp - was Marconi’s right-hand man for many years. Marconi always considered Kemp his first collaborator and a valued friend; indeed emp was still employed by the Marconi company when he died on January 2, 1933, at the age of seventy-five. Marconi was one of the witnesses to his will. From 1887 to 1932, he kept a diary recording his work with Marconi. The diary is a considered a precious resource for understanding Marconi’s research in the early days, and is referred to and quoted from often in Raboy’s biography.

Similarly, Gerald Garratt has much to say about Kemp in his work (available at Googlebooks) The Early History of Radio: From Faraday to Marconi (Issue 20 of History and Management of Technology Series - Institution of Electrical Engineers, 1994): ‘A name that does not appear in any of the contemporary accounts is that of G. S. Kemp, to whom we are chiefly indebted for the day-to-day account of the Lavernock trials. Kemp had joined the Royal Navy at the age of fifteen and, when he was discharged in 1895 at the age of thirty-eight, he joined the staff of the Post Office as an assistant in the Engineer-in-Chief’s Laboratory. In that capacity, he had been instructed to assist Marconi in the earlier experiments on Salisbury Plain. With the decision to hold the more extensive trials in the Bristol Channel, Kemp was made responsible for transporting and setting up the apparatus at Lavernock and Flat Holme. Following his life-long habit, Kemp recorded brief details of his daily activities in a pocket diary. It is to this diary - and particularly to the expanded and edited versions that Kemp prepared for the Marconi Company in about 1930 - that we are indebted for the details which follow.’

Garratt’s text then continues (I have italicised the entries from Kemp’s diary for clarity):

‘In Kemp’s words, the historic experiments started early:

6 May 1897
‘Left at 8.30 a.m. for Paddington with apparatus for experiments at Cardiff. Arrived at 2.17 p.m. and stowed apparatus in store. Proceeded to Lavernock to see mast and found that a long cable had been fixed, stretching out beyond low-water mark, for the earth connection. Fixed a wire atop the 107 ft pole, 16 strands of aluminium wire. Then returned to Cardiff to make arrangements for transporting apparatus to Flat Holme Island.’

7 May 1897
‘I packed Mr Marconi’s transmitter into a small tug at 6.30 a.m. together with the transmitting and receiving apparatus belonging to Mr Preece’s Parallel- Wire system and transported all to Flat Holme Island. Fixed a wire of 18 strands to top of 110 ft pole and prepared Mr Marconi’s transmitter in a small hut close to mast. Slept at a small house owned by the person in charge of the Cremation House.’

For the next few days, Kemp was busy on the little island, fitting up and testing Marconi’s transmitter and Preece’s parallel-wire system. He had trouble with the insulation of the zinc drum at the top of the mast and with the insulation of the stays. Sparks on the parallel-wire system also caused difficulties whenever he used the Marconi transmitter, but these were only ‘teething troubles’ and by the Wednesday of the following week he was able to record that, ‘The signals transmitted across to Lavernock by Mr Marconi’s transmitter and the Parallel-Wire system were good.’ Insulation, however, was still proving troublesome and his next comment was, ‘As I did not like the insulation of the drum, I sent some of these signals on the aerial which was connected to insulated stays’ - a reminder of the very high voltages encountered in the aerial circuits of the early spark transmitters.

Mention was made above of the two versions of Kemp’s diary: the original contemporary pocket diary (parts of which the owner, Kemp’s son, Leslie, kindly permitted me to photograph some years ago) and the expanded version which Kemp had typed and edited for the Marconi Company in about 1930. The latter version contains an amount of detail to which no reference is made in the original, and while no actual contradictions have been noted, it is difficult to avoid wondering how an old man (he was over seventy at the time) writing more than thirty years after the events could have remembered many of the trivial details he mentions. In the original diary, the events of the time from Monday 10 to Friday 14 May are bracketed together with the single comment, ‘Signalling with Marconi and Parallel-Wire systems to Lavernock Point’, but in the 1930 version the daily events are recorded with considerable detail, for example:

13 May 1897
‘The great day for Flat Holme signals. 1 started at 7 a.m. and fitted a new copper earth wire in lieu of the iron earth. I sent and received good signals on both systems between 12 and 1.45 p.m. The first half hour of V’s were on a paper strip on the inker, the second, ‘so be it, let it be so’, and the third, ‘it is cold here and the wind is up’. This message was posted to the Kaiser by Professor Slaby.

In the afternoon Mr Marconi came over and tried some adjustments; Mr Taylor came with him and did a little transmitting but, as T sent the best sentences between 12 and 2 p.m. I returned to those adjustments and sent them the following:
How are you?   repeated
It is hot   repeated
Marconi   repeated
Go to bed   repeated
Go to Hull   repeated
So be it   repeated
Tea here is good   repeated

Nine similar sentences follow. The tests were resumed the following morning. A motor-driven commutator and a Vrill break were tried, but with no marked improvement on the previous day’s results.’

15 May 1897
‘I dismantled the Marconi transmitting apparatus on Flat Holme, leaving it at Penarth, and then arranged for a steamer to Brean Down on Monday.’

Here is the first mention in any of the records of an attempt to transmit right across the Bristol Channel from Lavernock to Brean Down on the Somerset coast. It leaves the impression that it was a sudden, ‘on the spot’ decision, inspired in all probability by the success of the Lavernock-Flat Holme experiments. Preparations continued over the weekend, with Kemp assembling the Marconi transmitter on the top of the cliff at Lavernock. Monday, however, brought bad weather, and Kemp noted that it was too rough for the receiver party to land at Brean Down. Kemp himself remained at Lavernock to operate the transmitter. Just how the receiver party eventually reached Brean Down is not evident from the surviving records. There is no record either of the names of those in the receiver party, or of exactly what they received, but in his contemporary diary Kemp noted on Tuesday, 18 May: ‘Good signals to Brean Down using kite and 300 ft (91.4m) of 4-strand wire’.

In the language of the day, the phrase ‘good signals’ was far from being synonymous with ‘good messages’. In the 1930 version of his diary, Kemp seems to qualify his original comment by saying ‘The engineers reported that they had received signals at Brean Down’. Whether or not the signals were exactly ‘Q5’ (fully readable), it is evident from Gavey’s report that the Post Office officials were impressed with the inherent possibilities of the system. Signals, of sorts, had got across, although it was clear that, in Gavey’s words, ‘There was . . . still much to be desired in order to convert crude appliances into good working devices’. [. . .]

This historic series of experiments across the Bristol Channel came to a close, as Kemp noted the following in his diary:

29 May 1897
‘Packed up and returned to Paddington by the 10.37 p.m. train from Cardiff, arriving at Paddington at 3.30 a.m. on Sunday morning. We stowed all the apparatus in the cloak room.’ ’

An orgy in the Vatican

Cesare Borgia, one of the most infamous of the Borgia family, indeed labelled by some as ‘the most handsome, dashing, and despicable Borgia of all’, was killed in battle 510 years ago today. He is considered the inspiration for Niccolò Machiavelli’s political treatise The Prince, but he also figures often in a diary kept by the papal court’s Master of Ceremonies at the time, Johannes Burchardus. One particularly notable passage from the diary concerns an orgy in the Vatican - as arranged by Cesare.

Cesare Borgia was born in Rome in the mid-1470s, the illegitimate son of Rodrigo Borgia who would later become Pope Alexander VI, and the grandnephew of Pope Callixtus III. Cesare was trained for a career in the Church, attending schools in Perugia and Pisa, and then studying law at the Studium Urbis. Aged around 15, he was made Bishop of Pamplona, and at 17, after his father had been elevated to Pope, he was made archbishop of Valencia, and then a cardinal.

Cesare was clearly precocious, and biographers say he was also brave, handsome and ambitious. However, he was also ruthless: some historians believe he was responsible for the murder of his older brother Giovanni - his father’s favourite. In 1498, Cesare resigned his office, being the first cardinal in history to do so, becoming an ambassador for the pope to France. For helping King Louis XII receive a papal annulment of his marriage, Cesare was rewarded with the title of Duke of Valentinois. When King Louis invaded Italy in 1499, Cesare was by his side on entering Milan. Subsequently, Cesare was sent by his father, the pope, to subdue rebellious cities in northern Italy. With the full force of the papal armies, he established a new state of Romagna for himself. In 1501, the pope named him a Papal Gonfalonier and Duke of Romagna.

In 1503, however, both Cesare and Alexander VI fell ill with fever; the son recovered but the father died. The new pope, Pius III, supported Cesare, reconfirming him as Gonfalonier, but he died within weeks, leading to the election of Giuliano Della Rovere as Pope Julius II - a deadly enemy of the Borgias. Pope Julius soon sought to recover the northern Italian cities for the Papacy, and Cesare himself was arrested in Naples, then a Spanish possession, and imprisoned. In 1506, he escaped, and fled to Navarre, then ruled by his brother-in-law John III, for whom he served briefly as a military commander, before being killed at the siege of Viana on 12 March 1507. Further information is available from Wikipedia, The Borgia Bull, New World Encyclopedia, or Encyclopedia.com.

‘Cesare is best known,’ Encyclopedia.com summarises, ‘as a model leader, the ideal of the Renaissance prince, in the eyes of Niccolo Machiavelli, the Florentine historian who believed Cesare’s combination of ambition and cunning were best suited to rule in his times. The historian, serving as an ambassador for Florence, spent some time at Borgia’s court in 1502-1503 and described his actions and tactics in his work The Prince. Borgia’s conquest of Romagna and the murder of his rivals at Senigallia on New Year’s Eve 1502 in particular earned Machiavelli’s praise.’

Apart from Machiavelli, historians turn to the diary of Johannes Burchardus (or Johann Burchard) for biographical information on Cesare. Burchardus was born in Alsace, and rose to high rank in the church, being appointed Master of Ceremonies under Pope Sixtus IV, and retaining the position through several popes until his death in 1506. But his main claim to be remembered is as a chronicler, for his Liber Notarum, a record of life in the papal court. Though editions of the work had been published earlier, it was not until the early 20th century that a first full and critical version was published, in Latin. An English version, edited by Dr F. L. Glaser followed in 1910: Pope Alexander VI and his court: extracts from the Latin diary of Johannes Burchardus. This is freely available at Internet Archive.

One of the most infamous passages from the diary records an orgy in the Vatican as organised by Cesare: ‘On the evening of the last day of October, 1501, Cesare Borgia arranged a banquet in his chambers in the Vatican with fifty honest prostitutes, called courtesans, who danced after the dinner with the attendants and the others who were present, at first in their garments, then naked. After the dinner the candelabra with the burning candles were taken from the tables and placed on the floor, and chestnuts were strewn around, which the naked courtesans picked up, creeping on hands and knees between the chandeliers, while the Pope, Cesare, and his sister Lucretia looked on. Finally prizes were announced for those who could perform the act most often with the courtesans, such as tunics of silk, shoes, barrets, and other things.’ The so-called Banquet of Chestnuts - disputed by some - has its own Wikipedia page.

Here are several other extracts from the diary of Burchadus relating to Cesare.

20 April 1499
‘On Saturday, the 20th of April, 1499, the Pope received a letter from France advising him that the marriage contract had been concluded by the former Cardinal Cesare Borgia and the Lord d’Albret in the name of his daughter, by which, as was reported, and as it was in fact set down in the contract, the Pope was to give a dowry of 200,000 ducats, and the marriage was not to be performed until his Holiness had nominated the brother of the bride a cardinal.’

23 May 1499
‘On the 23rd of May, 1499, a courier arrived from France with the report for the Pope that his son Cesare, the former cardinal, had contracted the marriage with the Lady d’Albret, on Sunday, the 12th of May, and had performed it and did take her eight times, one after the other.’

18 November 1499
‘On Monday, the 18th of November, 1499, Cesare Borgia returned secretly through the Porta Cavallegieri to Rome with a chamberlain and the brother of the deceased John Marades and stayed with the Pope in the palace until Thursday, the 21st. On the morning of this day he departed and rode away secretly with an escort of papal soldiers to the city of Imola, which he took over soon afterward by force together with the castle. The Lords of the city, the sons of the deceased Count Girolamo Riario, nephew of Cardinal Riario, were robbed with violence.’

23 January 1503
‘On Wednesday, the 23rd of January, 1503, the report was circulated in Rome that Cesare had brought under his rule recently Chiusi and Pienza as well as the places of Sarteano, Castle della Pieve and Santo Quirico, where only two old men and nine old women were found. The men of the Duke hung them up by the arms and lighted fires beneath their soles, in order to force them through this torture to confess where property had been hidden. But they could or would not confess and perished under the torture. The villainous band tore the roofs from the houses, the beams, windows, doors, chests and barrels, from which they had let the wine run out, and set fire to everything. They took with them whatever they could plunder in the places they passed through, as well as in Aquapendente, Monte- fiascone, Viterbo, and everywhere else.’