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The Pike: Gabriele d'Annunzio, Poet, Seducer and Preacher of War Paperback – 3 Sep 2013

by Lucy Hughes-Hallett (Author)

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WINNER OF THE 2013 SAMUEL JOHNSON PRIZE FOR NON-FICTION WINNER OF THE 2013 DUFF COOPER PRIZE WINNER OF THE POLITICAL BOOK AWARDS POLITICAL BIOGRAPHY OF THE YEAR 2014 WINNER OF THE 2013 COSTA BOOK AWARDS BIOGRAPHY OF THE YEAR The story of Gabriele D'Annunzio, poet, daredevil - and Fascist.

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Product details

Paperback: 704 pages
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers (29 August 2013)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0007213964
ISBN-13: 978-0007213962
Product Dimensions: 12.9 x 4.5 x 19.8 cm
Boxed-product Weight: 481 g
Average Customer Review: Be the first to review this item
Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 304,795 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #38 in Books > History > Europe > Croatia
- #229 in Books > Biographies & Memoirs > Historical > Europe > Italy
- #1017 in Books > History > Europe > Italy

Product description

Review

‘Hard to beat … a biographical tour de force … a rich, voluptuous treat … a triumph, the biography of the year’ Robert McCrum, Observer, ‘Books of the Year’

‘[The Pike] dramatically extends biography’s formal range to encompass a daunting theme’ TLS, ‘Books of the Year’

‘This is a magnificent portrait of a preposterous character … deplorable, brilliant, ludicrous, tragic but above all irresistible, as hundreds of women could testify. His biographer has done him full justice’ Francis Wheen, Daily Mail

‘A cracker of a biography, an extraordinary story of literary accomplishment, passionate war-mongering and sexual incorrigibility… In less skilled hands this could have been a disaster; in fact it works wonderfully well’ Spectator, ‘Books of the Year’

‘Beautiful, strange and original … an extraordinarily intimate portrait’ New Statesman

‘Hugely enjoyable … Hughes-Hallett has a great talent for encapsulating an era or an attitude …That almost 700 pages flew by bears testimony to how pleasurable and readable those pages were’ Sunday Times

‘A splendid subject for a biography … Hughes-Hallett dances her way through this extraordinary life in a style that is playful, punchy and generally pleasing … In death, as in life, the amazing story of D’Annunzio is painted in primary colours, but with the darkest shadows’ Observer

‘A riveting biography … It must have been so tempting to be judgmental, but Hughes-Hallett allows us to judge for ourselves’ Antonia Fraser, Daily Mail, ‘Books of the Year’

‘Not only an inspired telling of a life that becomes more repellent with each page, it illuminates early 20th-century Europe in brilliant, unexpected ways’ Observer

‘Electrifying … a fascinating portrait … Hughes-Hallett relates his journey from romantic idealist to Right-wing warmonger with flair and insight’ Daily Express

About the Author

Lucy Hughes-Hallett is the author of Cleopatra: Histories, Dreams and Distortions which was published in 1990 to wide acclaim, Heroes: Saviours, Traitors and Supermen, published in 2004, which garnered similar praise, and The Pike, publishing in 2013. Cleopatra won the Fawcett Prize and the Emily Toth Award. Lucy Hughes-Hallett reviews for the Sunday Times. She lives in London.

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Amazon.com: 36 reviews

J. LAWSON

This is what happens when a writer of erotic literature becomes a major political player

15 June 2014 - Published on Amazon.com

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Not since the erudite, witty, and generally brilliant John Ryle Lawson III wrote his magisterial volume on Tom Landry and Bill Walsh has an author handled a subject with the skill that Lucy Hughes-Hallett displays in her riveting account of this forgotten but significant figure. D'Annunzio, a necessary ingredient for Mussolini's rise, is an intriguing figure. An amusing figure. An irritating figure. An offensive figure. An outrageous figure. And a morally reprehensible figure. You have to read this book to believe that such a person ever could have existed. By the end of the book, you'll be sorry he did.

As an aside to the Football Community, it's quite an oddity when D'Annunzio takes over Fiume and you learn that he referred to his troops as the Legion of Fiume. If Erin Andrews doesn't like interviewing members of the Legion of Boom, I can't imagine how much she'd dislike interviewing members of the Legion of Fiume.

Perhaps the pinnacle of D'Annunzio's strangeness occurred when this artistic, lewd, callous, war-mongering man was trying to refashion the government he headed for a year or so in Fiume. The constitution he crafted was quite a lulu. As Hughes-Hallett puts it, he outlined a position "so veiled by mumbo-jumbo that it can only be described in the constitution's original words." Hughes-Hallett then quotes from D'Annunzio's constitution, showing the madness that came over him when he contemplated himself or government. He wanted a special position in government...

"It is reserved for the mysterious forces of the people. It is a figure of offering to the unknown genius, to the appearance of the new man, to the ideal transfiguration of the works and of the days, to the fulfilled liberation of the spirit."

That loon was a major figure in European politics less than 100 years ago. Turn that over in your brain.

4 people found this helpful.

Scott in PT

... of a true rotter who happened to be a great poet and brilliant intellectual

2 August 2016 - Published on Amazon.com

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Very well-written biography of a true rotter who happened to be a great poet and brilliant intellectual. Sex, drugs, spending other people's money lavishly, more sex, more drugs, a classical music lover, and last but not least, a fascist dictator who beat Mussolini to the punch, and by all accounts, an orator to rival Hitler. What more could you want? A thoroughly entertaining read!

3 people found this helpful.

Marius Gabriel

Scandalous and delicious account of a life scripted by Fellini

26 February 2014 - Published on Amazon.com

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Gabriele d'Annunzio's life was shaped by his many and lurid addictions -- to women, oral sex, Fascism, poetry, war and high drama.

Lucy Hughes-Hallett does a wonderful job of bringing this extraordinary character back to life.

The rich and heady concoction that was d'Annunzio's daily existence makes for a brilliant but sometimes overwhelming read, in parts like the script of a Fellini film, and in others like the more lurid passages from Gibbon's Decline & Fall of The Roman Empire.

Highly recommended to anyone interested in the man or the period.

2 people found this helpful.

M DiFalco

A good read

11 June 2016 - Published on Amazon.com

Verified Purchase

Knowing very little about Gabriele D'Annunzio, I found the book very interesting. It is also a history of the Italy of D'Annunzio times as well as the rise of fascism. Also enjoyed reading of all the artists, writers, lovers who weaved in and out of D'Annunzio's life.

One person found this helpful.

Seneca

Excellent

29 November 2013 - Published on Amazon.com

Verified Purchase

Some of those whose biographies we would like to read did not leave enough material behind them. With Gabriele d'Annunzio, poet, seducer and preacher (and debtor who rarely paid his creditors, and aviator, and would-be dictator of Fiume, and builder, and house decorator, and friend/enemy of Benito Mussolini) the problem is just the opposite. He filled notebook after notebook describing his every thought and emotion, starting with the look of a flower that reminded him of this or that and ending with the peculiar shape and smell of a specific woman's genitals.

In selecting the material, combining it with other sources, and providing a portrait of the man--in some ways an appalling man, but a great poet nevertheless--the author has done a superb job. My only complaint is that, since the book was witten for non-Italians, it has very few direct quotes from d'Annunzio's work. As a result the reader is left a bit puzzled as to just what in that work moved the tens, indeed hundreds, of thousands who paid him homage.

A shame, but it could not be helped.

6 people found this helpful.

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