History
First housed in Rome, it moved to Milan in 1911. While it advocated neutrality on the wake of World War I (which it viewed as an imperialist conflict), the paper was becoming infused with the militarist and irredentist attitudes of its editor at the time, future Fascist leader Benito Mussolini (who had risen to prominence as an opponent of Filippo Turati during the Italo-Turkish War). Mussolini's dissent caused his ousting from the party, Avanti!'s direction being taken over by Giacinto Menotti Serrati, Mussolini then started his own paper Il Popolo d'Italia with Syndicalist and Republican dissidents from the Socialist Party.
The paper quarters were set on fire by Mussolini's Blackshirts on April 15, 1919, and it was banned by the government in 1926. From that point on, Avanti! was issued as a weekly, and was edited in exile – first in Paris and then in Zürich, at the Ristorante Cooperativo.
With Mussolini's first fall in 1943, the paper returned to Italy. However, its circulation was drastically curtailed due to changes in political options after World War II. After losing its popularity, Avanti! ceased to be a respectful newspaper merely becoming a party-newspaper of the Italian Socialist Party (PSI).
Read more about this topic: Avanti! (Italian Newspaper)
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