MANUSCRIPT: Olives from San Remo.
Women Under Fascism: An Unpublished Manuscript
Earland, Ada. Manuscript: Olives from San Remo. N.D. [ca. early 1920s.]
388 typescript leaves, rectos only; green cardstock flat file, labelled by hand. In a specially made cloth slipcase.
Unpublished manuscript of this travel memoir entitled Olives from San Remo, Gathered by Ada Earland. With chapters on Fascism, cookery, and folklore, and an appendix of “Ligurian Proverbs and Sayings.” With an album of original photographs of San Remo. Undated, but composed during the early 1920s – the latest reference is 1925 – and covering the period from 1911 through 1921.
Earland, the author of Ruskin and his Circle (1910) and John Opie and his Circle (1911), both published in London by Hutchinson & Co., writes entertainingly and energetically, and after nine decades this readable account of a lost world merits publication. The body of the manuscript runs 355 numbered leaves, with an additional five pages of preliminaries (including a manuscript dedication), a thirteen-page chapter entitled “Under Fascimo,” and a ten-page appendix of “Ligurian Proverbs and Sayings” in Italian with English translation. With five additional manuscript pages inserted (171a to 171e).
It is addressed by Earland (of Alton, Hampshire, and formerly of 16 Park Close Road) to the publisher Selwyn Blount, with the note, “Length including final chapter (to follow) 100,000 words.” The first chapter is entitled “My new home – a servant of the old school – Loly”; others include “A Ligurian Household – Zabaglione – Quaint Remedies,” “Life on the Cornice Roads – the Human Boy – the Dazio – Gambling.” Other subjects dealt with are “Games,” “Cradle Songs,” “Position of Women,” “Ligurian Philoprogenitiveness,” “Defaced Shrines,” “Witchcraft,” “Omens,” “Contumaceous Citizens,” and “Travelling sans Luxe.”
A whole chapter is devoted to “Ligurian Cookery – Meals and Manners.” The following description of the local children gives a good indication of Earland's spirited style:
Children passed under my window on their way to the elementary schools, carrying curious raw-hide-covered knapsacks, and square baize or carpet bags to hold their slates. I could pick out all the characters in De Amicis’ minute study of Italian school life, “Cuore,” from the chattering boys going leaden-footed, schoolwards. Very human boys, these young Ligurians, as the metal plates affixed to posts supporting electric cables testify: – “Chi tocca la file muroe:” who touches the wires dies: – point being given to the warning by the addition of a death’s head and cross bones: [...] Some such warning to adventurous youth is absolutely necessary, for the boys climb with the agility of monkeys, and have to be deterred from the daredevilry of swarming up these poles to carry out pseudo-scientific investigations on the subject of live wires.”
“When Fascismo first came under my conscious notice,” Earland writes in the final chapter, “the fighting stage was over, the Arditi had conquered, and the ranks had been reinforced by thousands who took no part in the fighting but were now ready to sing ‘Giovinezza’ and shout with the crowd.” She describes a “peaceful demonstration [...] at San Remo during the winter of 1922-23,” where “[t]he crowd roared itself hoarse as the battle-scarred veterans marched past.” “Consensus,” she concludes, “must prevail over a madness that declares it is progressing while hurrying along the backward road towards barbarism, and would destroy all existing institutions without being able to prove that it has anything better to offer.”
The accompanying album (crude and without covers) contains thirty-five photographs, 9 x 6.5 cm and smaller. The photographs, which are certainly original and not the work of a professional studio, are loosely inserted and not mounted, and in good condition. Each is captioned. Representative examples include a peasant woman “Washing Clothes in a Water Channel feeding whee
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