Cos’è una patria? Appunti del patriota Meneghello

Presented here are some unpublished notes by Luigi Meneghello written for a conference held in Bologna in 2002 dedicated to the theme of the Patria (the homeland). The experience of fascism, with its violent, nationalist deformation of the concept of fatherland and patriotism had deep roots in Meneghello’s generation. His moral crisis and experience of intellectual liberation, his commitment to the partisan cause, and finally his emigration to England were stages of a biographical itinerary of extraordinary intensity, reflected and clarified in his writing, both literary and non-literary. The ideal of Patria and the consequent concept of patriotism, variously discussed in Meneghello’s biographical and professional experience, has always represented, after the repudiation of fascism, a reference point for an ethic of engagement.