The author's first novel and a fundamental novel for the renewal of Italian literature in the second half of the twentieth century.

First published by Feltrinelli in 1963 and subsequently published, in revised editions, by Einaudi in 1976 and by Adelphi in 1993, «Fratelli d'Italia» was the book with which Arbasino - following in the footsteps of his beloved Gadda, later celebrated in the essay «L'Ingegnere in blu» in 2008 - overwhelmed the banks of a now worn-out neorealism to indicate new linguistic possibilities and new poetic horizons. A poetics made of apparent superficiality but which in truth strikes and exposes the sudden Italian social and economic changes that arose on a terrain still too compromised with the past and its cultural and political backwardness. But it is above all the language that communicates the novelty represented by this novel: Arbasino uses it to give life to long digressions or to give vent to his taste for quotations or, again, to make it live as pure sound no longer obsessed by meaning, thus creating rooms within the novel-room or parallel lines rather than solid plots. An electric and dissipative book like the nights of its young protagonists, full of conversations that deliberately refer only to themselves, cultured, playful and finally tragic with a post-modern, non-cathartic and non-pedagogical tragicity, perfectly enclosed in the word that closes the novel: “nothing”.

While both at the Centro Manoscritti dell'Università di Pavia and at the Gabinetto Vieusseux we have the preparatory typescripts for the editions of May 1963 for Feltrinelli, of 1967 again for Feltrinelli (pocket edition with changes to the last chapter), of 1976 for Einaudi, we do not have, in either institution consulted, the original of Fratelli d'Italia re-edited until 1993 (and reprinted until 2020) with numerous variants, as highlighted by the essay by Martignoni-Cammarata-Lucchelli. The present witness, therefore, stands as an archetype of the Adelphi edition of 1993 but also as a workshop for subsequent editions that never reached the press . In fact, from the comparison with the printed edition and these photocopies, substantial and substantial certified variants emerge that can be traced both by comparing the various chapters and by observing that, above all, for the second volume containing the Festival section we find both autograph corrections/integrations in blue pen and more substantial texts typewritten on strips of paper that were accepted or left out of the printed edition (we also see corrections to the same variants, such as c. 703). We are therefore faced with a witness that denotes the fact, since it was kept until the end in Arbasino's Roman apartment, that it was a copy on which the author continued to work. Obviously it would be appropriate to be able to know if there are witnesses at the Gabinetto Vieusseux who are relatives or similar to this copy of ours but, as per Fabio Desideri's email of 29 October 2024, the cataloguing of the manuscript material relating to the series "Manoscritti di Alberto Arbasino" has not yet begun. The fact remains, however, that the presence of autographed corrections in our witness determines the unique status of the typescript. We give here a series of evidences of these variants (first the text that appeared in the 1993 edition and then the variants of the photocopy) for pp. 15-16-17.

Section: Spring – Summer Chapter 1. Fiumicino my stuff ] my stuff and stuff I had stopped along the Aurelia] I had stopped along the road Bushes, junipers, myrtles, very sporty games ] MISSING Bushes, junipers, myrtles so narcissistic … ] so narcissistic, with big hands before noon ] before noon still on the street to come] throw ourselves back on the street to come unforgettable, his] unforgettable, with him away from these Olympics ] away from the Olympics in deserted Olympia! ] in Olympia! «golden!» («and the myrtles?», «divine!»), and ] golden!, and yet arriving for decadence and flaneries ] for flaneries and decadence there will be twenty, thirty] there will be ten, twenty, thirty wild weeks ] wild weeks all an elaborate ] after all an elaborate But then he left ] he left they still beat each other] beating each other seriously among those balls] “those balls” more and more willingly ] And what a willingness and the remaining money, putting into practice «le droit des peuples à disposer d’eux-memes» ] MISSING red and yellow and purple snapdragons and anemones very tropical ] red and yellow and purple snapdragons towards the dunes and the naked. And shortly after among the heathers and the wind ] between the heathers and the wind. And shortly after among the dunes and the naked The chapter titles also differ: in the Festival section of the 1993 edition we have: In villa which is Breakfast in the villa, Vigilia di festa which is Vigilia, Grande party which is Grande festa. In the Rome section we have Cafè Society which is Condition of color. The North section has distinguished the chapters Zurich and Bavaria which are reunited in the photocopy, From Spain was Spanish holidays, Finale was Ultime carte.