Indro Montanelli - The 1920s and 1930s

The 1920s and 1930s

Montanelli's career began with a Law degree from the University of Florence in the early 1920s, where he wrote a thesis on the electoral reform of Benito Mussolini's fascism. Allegedly, in this thesis, he maintained that rather than a reform it amounted to the abolition of elections, which goes some way to illustrate the ambiguous nature of the Italian fascist censorship. According to him, it was a short experience of the French cultural atmosphere in Grenoble, while he was taking language lessons, that he realised that his true vocation was that of the journalist.

Montanelli began his journalistic career by writing for the fascist newspaper Il Selvaggio ("The Savage"), then directed by Mino Maccari, and in 1932 for the Universale, a magazine published only once fortnightly and which offered no pay. Montanelli admitted that in those days he saw in fascism the hope of a movement that could potentially create an Italian national conscience that would have resolved the economic and socioeconomic differences between the north and the south. This enthisiasm for the fascist movement began to wane when in 1935 Mussolini forced the abolition of the Universale along with other magazines and newspapers that expressed opinions on the nature of fascism.

But it was in 1934, in Paris that Montanelli began to write for the crime pages of the daily newspaper Paris Soir, then as foreign correspondent in Norway (where he fished for cod for a bit), and later in Canada (where he ended up working in a farm in Alberta!).

From there he began a collaboration with Webb Miller of the United Press in New York. While working for the United Press he learned to write for the lay public in an uncomplicated style that would distinguish him within the realm of Italian journalism. One lesson he took to heart from Miller was to "always write as if writing to a milkman from Ohio". This open and approachable style was something he never forgot and he'd often recall that very quote during his long life. Another indelible American moment occurred while teaching a course. Someone had asked him to explain the composition that Montanelli had just read. Montanelli told him he'd repeat it since he clearly didn't understand... Hitting the table, the red-faced student cut him off and angrily told him, as a matter of fact, that if he hadn't understood Montanelli's composition, then it was Montanelli who was the imbecil! . It was then that he realized that he, who had come from the authoritarian regime of fascist Italy, had just had a confrontation with democracy. During this time Montanelli conducted his first interview with a celebrity: Henry Ford - who surprised him by admitting he did not have a driver's license. During the interview, surrounded by American art depicting pastoral and frontier subjects, Ford began to reverentially talk about the Founding Fathers. Looking at the decor, Montanelli astutely asked him how he felt about having destroyed their world. Puzzled, Ford asked what he meant. Undaunted, Montanelli pressed on that the automobile and Ford's revolutionary assembly line system had forever transformed the country. Ford looked shocked, and Montanelli realized that, like all geniuses, Ford hadn't had the slightest idea of what he'd really done.