Asiatica Association

New book: Enrica Garzilli, Il Duce's Explorer. The Adventures of Giuseppe Tucci and Italian Policy in the Orient from Mussolini to Andreotti. With the Correspondence of Giulio Andreotti (Milan: Asiatica Association, Nov. 2015).

The book deals with the life and work of Giuseppe Tucci, the world famous Italian explorer, scholar, book collector, archaelogist, spy, and Mussolini's spokesperson in Asia. This book also reconstructs the Italian policy in Asia from Mussolini to Andreotti (1924-1984). 

Tucci was the central protagonist of Fascist cultural policy in Asia: from his first expeditions to the valleys of the Himalayas and the plains of the Ganges, to his diplomatic activity in Japan as Il Duce’s spokesman; from his encounters with scholars and leaders such as Gandhi, Tagore, the Dalai Lama, Subhas Chandra Bose, Mircea Eliade, Julius Evola and Giovanni Gentile – his great protector, along with Giulio Andreotti – to the archaeological excavations in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iran in his later years, his is a human and intellectual adventure tied inextricably to the history of modern Italy, which Tucci himself helped to forge.

We tried to retrace his adventure in the pages of this book, where the pace of a thrilling narrative combines with the scientifc rigor of reconstructing the history of Fascist policy in Asia. A history based on eyewitness accounts and historical documents, including the original and unedited correspondence of Tucci and Andreotti, and the unpublished notes of Mussolini.

This volume is the first in a series of nine, which together represent an enlarged translation of the two-volume Italian book, L’esploratore del Duce: le avventure di Giuseppe Tucci e la politica italiana in Oriente da Mussolini a Andreotti. Con la corrispondenza di Giulio Andreotti (1st ed. not for distribution, Milano: Asiatica Association, Roma: Memori, January 29, 2012; 2nd rev. ed., Milano: Asiatica Association, Roma: Memori, August 13, 2012; 3rd rev. ed. Milano: Asiatica Association, April 14, 2014).

The decision to publish the book in a series of nine, shorter volumes was made for two principal reasons. The first, to get the book in readers’ hands in a timely fashion, by releasing volumes of reduced pages at regular intervals. Between translation and editing, to have produced the entire book at once – which stands at 1,493 pages – would have required four years of work. The second reason, and the most important, is to meet the reader half way in regard to price: the cost of the entire volume in English would be substantial, while acquiring briefer volumes over time is far more feasible. In the table of contents, found in the previous pages, readers may survey the various topics treated in the nine volumes.