La poetica del linciaggio : i discorsi interventisti di D'Annunzio tra performance e ricezione (1915)

In May 1915, while his country was on the verge of a civil war, the poet Gabriele D'Annunzio gave a series of fiery speeches against Austria-Hungary, hoping Italy would soon join the Entente. This article uses a variety of sources (newspapers, journals, letters, caricatures, etc.) in order to shed light on those speeches, focusing on two issues: on the one hand, their hateful content (notably, the call for physical violence against both the Austrian diplomats and the Italian MPs who opposed the war, depicted as disgusting animals); on the other hand, the different reactions to the poet's words not only in Italy but also abroad. [Publisher's text]