Why write about the Fosse Ardeatine now?
Portelli: The fosse ardeatine is still a very vivid and controversial memory. It’s been the focus of the anti-partisan discourse ever since the end of the war, because of the blame put on the partisans, who supposedly should have turned themselves in, according to these black legends or urban myths. If you want to tackle the historical revisionism, the anti-anti-fascism discourse, this is really the pivot on which everything stands. On the other hand, because of the composition of the victims, they’re a cross-section of the population of Rome, it became a standpoint from which to really write an oral-history of Rome, going back to the origins of these people, their families, and then to what happened afterwards. The way it’s been remembered, the way it’s been celebrated or desecrated, and what has happened to the survivors. One day in the Fosse Ardeatine is the hinge for 130 years of the history of the city. I was sort of drawn to it, on the one hand the 90s were very much like today,
