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People from Here
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Welcome back to People from Here.
What we want to tell you today
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is the story of two young people,
of two young people with high hopes.
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There is Adelina,
a brilliant lawyer who works
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at a prestigious legal firm in Milan.
Then there is Ettore,
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an industrial chemist.
The future can only smile
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upon Adelina and Ettore.
Actually,
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their future will be more turbulent
thank they could have ever imagined.
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In fact,
in 1938 Ettore and Adelina are Jewish.
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On September 18th,
from the balcony of Trieste's town hall,
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Benito Mussolini announced
for the first time the Racial Laws
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for the defense of the race.
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The world of those two young people
suddenly collapses under their feet.
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We will tell this story
about Ettore and Adelina
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on the eve of the day.
We will tell it with the son
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of Ettore and Adelina,
Daniele Finzi, who in 2011,
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decided to donate
his parents letters and documents
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to The Archives of Pieve Santo Stefano.
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Shortly we will also discuss why
this choice was made.
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Now I would like to start
with September 1938.
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with Mussolini's announcement
of the laws for the defense of the race.
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Ettore and Adelina immediately started
to understand that there wasn't
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a future for them in that country.
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Deciding to leave their country was
a difficult decision,
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a difficult decision,
but one that will save their lives.
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Yes, my father Ettore Finzi was
very knowledgable about history.
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Also because he knew German very well.
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He had two aunts, aunt Genie
and aunt Lazigudita Gentiluomo,
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who both lived in Vienna.
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He had followed all
the Nazi antisemitism up to March 1938.
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So when the Race Manifesto was published
in July 1938, he didn't expect it.
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He knew what the contents were about
and he also hoped that Italy would be
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a little different from Germany.
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And my father, more than my mother,
made quick and immediate decisions.
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He was also very intuitive.
He had known my mom only a few months,
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and he returns
to these months in April 1938.
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It was love at first sight
and because of the Race Manifesto
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and the Racial Laws,
they decided to get married.
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They were married in Milan
on December 1, 1938.
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In 1938. We arrive in 1939.
- Yes.
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An ominous date for many.
- Yes.
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Very unjust, but there is a turning point.
- There is a...
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Ettore and Adelina decide to leave.
Or rather, how do they depart?
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Because, in a sense,
they leave informed.
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Yes and no.
The problem is immediate
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and that of money.
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Because the White Paper of the British,
a policy from maybe February
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or March of 1939,
allowed a total of 75,000 Jews
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to enter Palestine for five years.
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However, to qualify to enter,
every person needed to have 1,000 stars.
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Because, like we said, they had chosen.
- To go to...
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The goal was Palestine.
- Yes.
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The choice was not a coincidence,
because my father had also thought
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about Latin America.
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But the idea of going
to Palestine was because it was nearby.
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He was from Trieste so it was close.
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He also hoped his parents could join him.
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In any case,
the issue of money was really
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a huge problem
because they didn't have any.
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So, thanks to the lawyer Gianni Morandi,
who was the owner of the firm
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where my mom worked,
they went to Zurich for their honeymoon.
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Then they went to Lugano
to gather clients for the lawyer.
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It was to put towards this large sum.
And I still remember two leather bags
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with thousands of little stars inside.
They were gold little stars.
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At this point, they reach Palestine.
A tangent here about Palestine.
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The State of Israel still didn't exist.
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There wasn't any money to protect them.
Therefore, they had to start from scratch.
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Yes, and so, they started all over again
from January to April 1, 1939.
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They arrived in Haifa on April 6th.
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Yes, because as of 1922,
the British controlled Palestine.
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There were Palestinian Arabs.
The Jewish Palestinians were organized
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by the Yishuv, who were more concerned
with the kibbutz and wanted
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to dedicate themselves
to agriculture, etc.
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But the foundation, the political one,
was led by the Arab agency.
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The Arab agency was, well,
I'll give you an example.
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They arrived in Tel Aviv on April 7th
and twenty days after,
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they were in school learning modern Hebrew
because there were various Jews
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in Tel Aviv from every part of Europe.
It was necessary
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to learn this common language.
So, there was some organization,
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but there were a lot of problems.
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In any case, where I mentally find...
- Ah yes.
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this small amount of protection.
However, they had to start...
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Yes, they had to restart.
- from scratch.
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On the other hand, however,
there was a lot of bitterness
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that was left behind by the fact
of having to abandon...
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Yes.
- Italy.
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Having to leave Italy was stressful.
- Yes.
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In regard to this,
I will also read an excerpt
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from the letters
that have been donated to the archive,
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diaries in which Ettore specifically tells
about what he was feeling shortly after
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the time in which he abandoned Italy.
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We will read this excerpt:
"When I left Italy four months ago,
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"feeling more disgusted by the burden
of having to leave the country
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"than for the imminent danger,
many of my colleagues
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"and friends were quick
to express to me their discontent
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"about what was happening.
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"Through their conversations,
I felt they knew about condolences
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"and they ended up
only making me withdraw.
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"They were whispered conversations solely
because they knew me
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"and thought highly of me.
For many, being an example against
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"the persecution of Jews not being born
in Italy, could also be considered fair,
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"because it is understood that they came
to the country to make a fortune
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"by going behind other's backs.
They had some expert political views.
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"The Fascist government's right
to persecute people that it had let into
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"the country was generally recognized."
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Okay, so Ettore felt betrayed by Italy?
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Without a doubt.
As I was saying prior,
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also because my father was from Trieste.
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From his father, my grandfather,
he had also received an irredentist
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and nationalist upbringing.
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Trieste has always been divided
between people from Trieste, Austria...
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Let's say Austrians.
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and irredentists,
those who love Italy, Italian culture,
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Italian language,
like my grandfather and the Slovenians.
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He had received this upbringing,
and so he was an irredentist nationalist.
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Additionally, he was a genius official,
and he felt like an Italian.
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He loved Italy
and he felt betrayed by this terrible law.
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In addition, in Ettore's letters,
in this text, it also highlights
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a responsibility
by the Italian people themselves
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for what was happening.
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He writes:
"The political maturity
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"of the Italian people
is apparently that of government rule
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"that it has and that it deserves."
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There is a precise responsibility
by the people.
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Well, the Italian people's problem...
(Laughter)
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Living yes...
like saying living today like yesterday.
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In other words,
the lack of personal responsibility
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and accepting anything,
like a leader or a guide,
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that which has
an uglier appearance, if you will.
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And that Trieste...
Not coincidentally Mussolini
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and September 18, 1938,
where they were
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at the Unity of Italy Square
to present the Racial Laws.
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Not only because of
the nationalism that was there,
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but because Trieste was
a very multiethnic, multicultural city.
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There were more than two centuries
in which ethnic groups were diverse.
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They coexisted.
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But at the very moment
in which Mussolini showed his cruelty
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towards Jews, who, I repeat,
were real Italians, and felt as such,
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and had also fought
for Italy during the First World War,
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At the point, everyone was inclined
to accept Fascist rule.
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We return to Ettore and Adelina,
who, because of their decisions,
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leave the Second World War behind,
in which the persecution of Jews
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and the holocaust is about to start.
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They leave behind the errors of the war,
however, like you said, they face a life
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that is not easy.
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Like we said,
Adelina was a lawyer with a great career.
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She finds herself having
to start her work up again.
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Yes, because the main difficulty was
a work shortage.
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There was an excess of workers
(Laughter)
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from Tel Aviv.
And then, there were few jobs
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or they were completely insecure.
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Another big problem was
a housing shortage.
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So much so that my parents were forced
to live with a family,
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with a Polish family in an apartment.
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Above all,
the main difficulty was the work shortage.
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Also because the two bags
of the two thousand stars were not
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to be touched at all.
My father was not flexible.
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My mom then, as long as my father remained
in Tel Aviv until August 23, 1944,
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when he went to work
at the British oil refinery...
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(Interviewer Talking)
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No, he was also with my mom
because they then had my sister first,
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and then I was born in 1942.
So when my father left,
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he felt the obligation to work
to support the family.
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He also liked the idea
of having money to freely spend.
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As mentioned, your mother was free...
- Yes, free.
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in Palestine.
- Yes.
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Your father, on the other hand,
had to move abroad to Persia
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because, meanwhile, he found work
with an oil company.
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So two lovers who find themselves
far apart in a foreign land,
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and the only point of contact
between these two people becomes
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the writing, the letters
that will then become so important
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for documentation, for their memories.
- Yes.
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In fact, if my father accepts
this two year contract
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with this Iranian company,
he would be in Abadan in Persia.
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And it was indeed a military zone.
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He would do his work there
as an industrial chemist.
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Of course, he had to detach
and leave his wife,
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his children in Tel Aviv.
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Then, although very tired,
every evening my mom wrote
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and reported what had happened
during her workday,
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because she had found work
with a company that was part
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of the Tel Aviv pharmaceutical industry.
After then being fired,
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she went to work at a house to iron.
So, she could do anything.
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She reported with great ability,
descriptive, careful about everything
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that went on during the day.
Rather, my father sometimes wrote letters
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with extensive description.
He explained to her a bit about his duty,
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weather problems because it was very hot,
relationships with the British,
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and with the local population
that was in truly devastating conditions.
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They were letters that,
among other things...
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If you permit me a tangent.
They were things one absolutely knew
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but I didn't even know
the letters existed.
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Then perhaps we can also elaborate
on how they were found.
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Then also about how the decision
to publish them came about.
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Let's go back.
We had said that while Ettore
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and Adelina were in Palestine,
their children were born.
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Yes, my sister...
- You were born
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and your sister Ana was born.
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It is fitting that the future
of these two children was often focused on
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in these letters that Ettore
and Adelina exchange.
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I would like to read another
particularly significant passage
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that is again written by Ettore
from Abadan in February 23, 1945:
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"If on one hand, the war tends
to be nearing its end, on the other,
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"for us, the situation in Palestine
is taking a favorable turn.
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"These days, I am overthinking
and continuously thinking
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"about the problem and worried,
not so much about our personal future,
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"but the future of our children.
I feel irresistibly taken towards
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"a solution that,
although never once explored,
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"today seems inevitable to me.
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"Perhaps in a year's time we will find
the need to have to return to Italy.
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"Then they will become
one hundred percent Italians."
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Probably if your father could have chosen,
he would have never wanted
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to return to Italy.
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Yes, I would not have wanted to also.
Quite the opposite because my father,
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due to having been betrayed by Italy,
deeply desired to return to Italy.
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Apart from the experience in Abadan,
also because life
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in Palestine was truly very hard,
very difficult because
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of the work problem,
and the problem of the lack of apartments.
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However, we can't forget
that the attention
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from the Palestinian Arabs
and the British made life difficult.
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If we could return back in time...
- Yes.
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In September 1940, Tel Aviv was bombed
by Italian planes, right?
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Yes.
- They bombed Tel Aviv
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and it seems like there were one hundred
and fifty two deaths.
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So life was very hard.
Another tangent.
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I mean,
one of the big problems was also food.
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For example, my sister and I went
to the gan, which was like kindergarten.
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To help you understand, at lunch they used
to give us half an egg to eat.
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On the other hand,
while facing this situation,
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the hope of returning
to Italy continuously remained.
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And how did Adelina live
with the hope of returning?
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I will read another significant passage:
"I will never ask those taking that step.
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"Here I feel undoubtedly hesitant
by instinct and by force of tradition.
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"And I won't ever ask myself,
not only out of obedience,
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"but because more than anything else,
I am concerned
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"about doing everything possible
for the future of our children."
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It's like saying,
she was also willing to do her part.
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There was a sense of pride
of returning to Italy,
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that country that had dismissed them,
in order to guarantee
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a future for you children.
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Here there is a...
(Laughter)
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There are many letters.
In any case, when my father says
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that they will become
one hundred percent Italians,
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he also proposes to my mom
the idea of converting to Catholicism,
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because we were Jews.
- (Interviewer) Of course.
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Meanwhile, the Finzi from Trieste were
almost completely assimilated.
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That is to say,
they went to the temple twice a year.
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Instead, my mom was
from a much more orthodox family,
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They came from the Parrdo,
a very important Iberian family.
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Parrdo which used to be Prado.
They came from Spain after the expulsion.
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So my father proposes this idea
of converting to Catholicism
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in order for his children...
- To become...
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Yes, to become entirely Italian,
even as a religion.
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However my mom... Here it says
that she was reluctant.
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Not because she was personally orthodox,
but because, in that moment when
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it was known what was happening
in Europe, the extermination camps
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or another difficult situation,
they absolutely didn't know
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where my paternal
and maternal grandparents were.
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Then, however, the news arrived,
even betraying the origin and...
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It was quite heavy.
- Yes, very heavy.
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By the way, how did the news
about the war arrive meanwhile
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it continued in Europe?
Was there just an awareness
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of what was happening?
Was there an awareness
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of the existence
of the extermination camps?
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Above all, how did they also live
with these dual feelings?
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Because, on the one hand,
there was this hope
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of being able to return one day
to a normal life in Italy.
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On the other hand, however,
there was a lot of fear
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also for the fate of loved ones.
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They knew everything.
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Both about the Jewish agency
and the British.
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The news arrived quite detailed.
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I don't want to forget a noteworthy group
of young Jews that were part
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of the Jewish brigade.
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They fought alongside the British
and they also fought in Italy.
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Then in all of Europe.
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They were the ones who said
that they gave very detailed news
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of what was happening.
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So, they knew about everything
that was coming to Italy and Europe.
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The concerns were
about my paternal grandparents,
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those who later died in Auschwitz,
that they didn't...
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The last official news was transmitted
by a type of telegram of the Red Cross
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in July of 1943.
My father knew absolutely nothing.
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My mom didn't know.
She knew that her parents were hidden.
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Her brother was in Switzerland.
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But they had absolutely no news.
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They couldn't say or write anything
because the mail was altered.
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Outgoing and incoming mail was altered.
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I found that at least some details
in the letters had been deleted precisely
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in the letters had been deleted precisely
by the person that did the alterations.
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So, my father needed to be careful
because they were altered by the British.
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They were altered by the Persians.
Then they were altered on arrival
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in Palestine.
So, they were...
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In this situation,
they also found themselves in a state
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of uncertainty being far from Europe,
far from what was happening in Europe,
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far from the war.
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For a moment, Adelina perhaps had hoped
that her family would have an advantage
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over the immense tragedy
that afflicted the Jews of Europe,
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that they would all find themselves
reunited upon their return.
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There was almost this illusion, this hope.
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Hope is often the last idea.
There was hope.
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They didn't have detailed news.
My father's brother was a doctor
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who lived in Bologna
in the mountains of Monghidoro.
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He knew
that his parents had been arrested,
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that they had been deported.
However, he had not communicated anything.
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Even though, hypothetically they went
to Auschwitz, there could have always been
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the hope of returning.
Therefore, they hoped.
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Unfortunately, however,
the terrible news was that they arrived.
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They arrived in Palestine while
the war by now...
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It was over.
- By now it was over.
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And like you said,
the terrible news arrived by mail.
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News so terrible
that Adelina cannot even transcribe them
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in a letter to Ettore.
She writes:
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"My dear, unfortunately,
the dreary news has arrived.
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"I am sending you the letter
because I don't have the courage
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"to write to you
about it with my own pen."
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It's terrible.
Unfortunately, they were reactions
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to what had just happened
in the war in Europe.
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In a communication letter separate
from the international cross.
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Maybe in that exact moment Ettore
and Adelina understood
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what they had escaped from?
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Yes without a doubt.
I will also tell you
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that when my father had
the idea of going to Palestine,
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everyone criticized him;
friends, parents, brothers, the sister,
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because they said
that he was always pessimistic.
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He would rather have wanted them all
to also come with him.
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However, he expected it, also because
the war in Europe ended on May 8, 1945.
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The news gets to him in August.
Given that months go by
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where he doesn't receive positive news,
he feared for the lives of his parents.
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Excuse me but if you permit me.
- (Interviewer) Of course.
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But before the communication
about the deaths of his parents,
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he received communication from Sweden
that said his sister was saved.
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Then my aunt Yolanda Clara was part
of that group of prisoners
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that were moved
from Auschwitz in December 1944.
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They were moved west
so as not to leave a mass
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of prisoners in Auschwitz,
because the Red Army was coming.
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She was then liberated
in the north of Ravensbrück in April 1945.
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She was then transferred
to Sweden to recover.
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We have said that at this point,
the war had ended and Ettore and Adelina
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along with their children decide
to return to Italy.
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How difficult was it once again to start
from scratch because they actually had
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to start from scratch.
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Ah yes.
It was difficult.
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My father's brother,
who had worked in Sansepolcro,
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helped him get a job at his work.
He spoke with Mr. Marco Vittoni
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and he said he was quite willing
to hire his brother
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because he was a chemist.
Mr. Vittoni wanted a change of pace
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for his company.
But when we arrived in Italy in May 1946,
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with a short stop in Bologna
and then to Parma at the home
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of my maternal grandparents,
and then to Sansepolcro precisely
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in November of 1946,
we had absolutely nothing.
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And there was nothing...
(Laughter)
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Without a doubt, a country in devastation.
- Yes, a country in devastation.
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I remember the path with holes.
I remember the Tower of Berta Square
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in a pile of ruins.
- The Tower of Berta Square was destroyed.
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I repeat, it was also a problem to eat.
I remember my father rented
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a furnished apartment
in Saint Claire Square
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in which the conditions were...
- Insecure.
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Very, very insecure.
However, they were young
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and they wanted to start over.
There was my sister and myself.
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So, they wanted to put a painful time
of their lives behind them and start over.
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You have previously already answered
that there was resentment towards
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that country that made them escape
and also towards those friends
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that...
- No.
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had put down the idea of the...
- No, absolutely not.
-
Other than it being something
that is part of our DNA,
-
resentment is useless.
It's best to move forward,
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to have the will to start again
and to overcome difficulties.
-
Not resentment.
I never heard my father
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nor my mother speak ill of Italians.
Yes, it was upsetting to have lost.
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To having lost parents.
To having lost years of work.
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My mom could not return to work
in Milan because there was no way
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to find a home.
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In 2011, Ettore Finzi's
and Adelina's epistolary was donated
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to the Pieve diary archives.
It's awarded the Premio Pieve.
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First and foremost, how were you able
to find these letters again,
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because they were made public
by the decision of donating them.
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My father died on June 18, 2002.
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He lived in an apartment in Parma.
In August I was ready to let go of it.
-
By chance, I found a bag in his office,
a leather one that held documents.
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There were letters inside
this document holder.
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And there were two notebooks,
black ones with a red border
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that were used in the past,
and inside were his diaries.
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I understood right away
because I have done historical research
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for many years, so I understood
it was something interesting.
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I found it strange
that my father never told me anything,
-
because he didn't say to me
that there were letters and diaries.
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And so I took them all to my house,
to my office and I left them there
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for a year, a year and a half.
Then I slowly began to read them
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with a bit of fear.
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Because with diaries and letters...
- One will find...
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always find something intimate.
Then I think in my family,
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nothing would ever be talked about.
No one had ever commented,
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or made references.
Then I gradually began
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to transcribe these letters.
I can't tell you how I did so,
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because they were truly written...
- Strictly handwritten.
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Yes, handwritten with a fountain pen,
on tissue paper, because back then
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it was airmail paper.
It was a type of job
-
that strained the eyes.
In any case, I did this transcription job
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of the diary, of the letters, etc.
I had the idea of publishing it.
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The full version of this diary,
of these letters...
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I had already collaborated
with the diary archives
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for some time for my research.
In any case, just to be certain,
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I went to Pieve Santo Stefano
and I had this volume in hand.
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It was Cristina Cangi, who you will meet.
She asked me:
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"What is it professor?"
- "It's this work that I did."
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"Why don't you submit if for the award."
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I say I really had not thought
about wanting to publish it.
-
I start reading some interesting things
and then I submit it.
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They asked me for the archive
and also for the letters,
-
but I wasn't going to do that.
-
I remember that it's possible
to read this publication
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that is titled "Transparent",
in which the documentation
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is presented
and published by Il Mulino.
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Our arrangement time has ended,
although we would like to talk for hours
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about this story that is a bit,
by certain passages and elements,
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similar to the story
of many other families,
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also of the province of Arezzo.
Perhaps there will be a way
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to talk more about it in the future.
Thank you Daniele Finzi.
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Thanks to all of you
who have followed our episode,
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a special episode
that has been made possible
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in collaboration
with The Archives of Pieve Santo Stefano.
-
I naturally thank you as well.
In particular,
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the archives
for this episode were made available
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by Nadia Frulli.
Thank you to all of you
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for watching the program.