Coup d’Etat (trade hardcover)

Description

Described by Leon Trotsky as a “fascist theoretician”, Curzio Malaparte had an admirable talent to antagonize any political movement he fell in. A freethinker, a lover of political intrigue and enemy of all bigoted orthodoxies, Malaparte remains one of the most unappreciated writers of the last century.

Framing each chapter as a dramatic dialogue between different actors, Coup d’Etat: The Technique of Revolution is a study of means by which a coup can be won or lost, by comparing eight different examples. Here Trotsky and Lenin debate the necessity of historical materialism in carrying out a succesful coup d’etat, there Gustav Bauer muses over the necessity of historical materialism in preventing one. One memorable chapter has Malaparte himself driving around the Italian countryside with Israel Zangwill discussing Machiavelli as the March on Rome is happening around them.

This edition was translated by Sylvia Saunders in 1932.