Читать книгу The Unseen - Nanni Balestrini - Страница 10

Part One

1

The cellars are a maze of passageways lit every twenty or thirty yards by dusty fluorescent strip-lights swinging from long ragged electric wires that hang from the ceiling its rough cement fissured by long deep cracks it seems to go on for ever and here and there bulges downwards as if pushed by some enormous weight up there crushing buckling breaking through and every four or five yards props made from great beams hold it up the wood rotten mouldy the ground covered in a film of putrid water the cloying sickening stench of putrefaction mingling with the stench of mould every so often at a turn-off or the junction of two passageways are little piles of sand of cement sodden collapsed trampled shovels and other rusty tools left lying there the air is damp and from our mouths come little puffs of vapour as we breathe that nauseating air

the irregular shuffling of the small silent procession merges with the continuous jangling of the chains the sound echoes whenever the gangways of rotting wood are crossed the shadows lengthen behind each step whenever it gets close to the sections lit by strip-lights they disappear and all of a sudden reappear ahead and the steps lengthen they move forward slowly paying attention to where they tread and to the chains so that they don’t drag too much in front or behind trying always to leave the same distance between the one in front and the one behind taking care not to brush the right shoulder against the slimy wet wall and on the left keeping clear of the sub-machine-gun barrels levelled straight as the small procession turns repeatedly to the right and the left to the left and the right until all sense of direction is lost

then we climb a narrow stairway semi-darkness suffocating with long flights high steps aching tugs at the chains hurting the wrists and at the end of the last flight the light of a small door and we come out high up at the top of a stairway tiers spreading into an enormous room brightly lit full of people moving down there beneath us all of a sudden against my leg I feel an animal muzzle that growls threateningly the black pupils dilated the large eyes protruding two long very white teeth bared by the tight red mouth a huge massive dog the smooth black fur on end on its back arching its ears pointing up quivering all the time the carabiniere holding its leash is impassive in his bullet-proof overalls the latest in anti-terrorist style

from where we are the tiers fall away steeply to the floor of the room and from there rising all around up to the ceiling thick cylindrical iron bars varnished in gun-metal grey the enormous cage is full of officers in bullet-proof overalls in gun-metal grey everywhere we turn with more big black dogs growling and nervous one after the other the carabinieri remove our chains take the handcuffs off the sore red wrists the photographers’ blinding flashlights flare on our faces they too are dogs no jackals and they writhe they bend they stretch up on tiptoe an anxious ballet arms raised straining higher and higher with the sleeves of their jackets slipping back to the elbows higher and higher

we rub our red wrists we light cigarettes we walk up and down the steps a bit we wave to relatives we sit down together in twos and threes talking quietly the photographers below us get on their knees they jerk their torsos to right and left like contortionists in the circus they lean towards the animals inside the cage they try to get their heads sideways through the bars sliding their long lenses between the legs the arms of the carabinieri who form a motionless barrier their fingers twitch in a frenzy they jiggle the cameras up and down they shoot pictures and let off dazzling flashlights at the faces inside the cage then in a faraway corner an even more dazzling light goes on and the whirr of the television cameras starts up

I sit down on the highest step of all and far beneath me I can see the lawyers with their black gowns thrown carelessly back on their shoulders chatting calmly among themselves in small groups behind the tables of peeling wood on the right parallel to the cage the court is assembled with the investigating judge dour lost in thought sitting in the middle on a high-backed chair so high it rises well above his head then the assisting judge perched sideways on another great high chair and to the right and left the jurors men and women nearly all with their faces hidden behind wide dark glasses the broad tricolour sashes across the pale pullovers the puffed blouses with their starched collars the double breasted jackets in various shades of grey the ties greenish blueish yellowish and at the far end on the right there’s the public prosecutor’s solitary little stand

above the heads of the court millions of small fragments make up a vast mosaic dusty and faded reaching the ceiling and depicting a scene of confusion a furious battle on the left are the forces of evil represented by strange beings contorted monstrous entangled in dominant colours of green and mauve and on the right the forces of good angelic transparent harmonious blue and feather-light clashing in the centre in a furious battle but the forces of evil are already clearly defeated they are beating a retreat pursued by the implacable forces of good below in a gilded oval stands the imposing figure of justice blindfold holding in one hand the sword in the other the scales a little lower the legend in relief says the law is equal for all

on the left behind the barricade of carabinieri are the wooden screens behind the screens is the public gallery it’s almost totally empty but for some relatives mother father sister brother cousin uncle sister-in-law no friend no comrade because they’re all afraid because seen from outside the law-court looks like a stage-set for war metal screens and barbed wire cordons of police and carabinieri a succession of barriers and armoured cars in strategic spots while other armoured vehicles circle the building continually then dogs and metal detectors at the door and searches questioning files threats warnings hints and all the rest

the small door behind us opens once again and in the midst of another swarm of carabinieri emerging at the top of the steps are the women they too in chains and all of them handcuffed we all get up and go towards them the cage is filled with shouts with greetings with smiles with different perfumes all of them have dressed in the brightest of colours long skirts bright shirts bright scarves rings on their fingers necklaces chains brooches bracelets pendants on their wrists big fantastic earrings clasps in their hair in the chaos the carabinieri get edgy they shout orders the dogs growl menacingly the photographers’ flash guns burst into light again the journalists make frenzied notes in their notebooks the handful of relatives wave and shout hello behind the screens and other shouts and greetings answer them

one after another the carabinieri slip off the chains and remove the handcuffs the girls run to us we run to them on the steps we mingle we entwine we entangle in a mosaic of embraces of hugs of kisses of voices all that interests us now is to talk talk about so many things talk about everything at last to talk to talk as long as we can to touch and hear one another as men and women together everything vanishes around us the courtroom the carabinieri the photographers the dogs the judges everything that’s on the other side of the bars is alien to us it doesn’t exist presents get passed across good luck tokens small objects everything that could be brought there right into the cage we exchange clothes too shirts sweaters kerchiefs scarves

a bell rings out from the court bench and the investigating judge dourly begins reading the long list of individual charges this one that one charged with etcetera etcetera with having etcetera etcetera this one that one charged with etcetera etcetera with having etcetera etcetera in accordance with the law in an unvarying monotone hurried offhand this one that one charged with etcetera etcetera with having and so on and so on he rushes through it he slurs his words in his haste this that armed band association and so on and so on you can follow none of it he hurries to the end and then come the preliminaries and the lawyers with no conviction and as pure formality bring the usual futile objections therefore recess and the court’s withdrawal to decide on the defence’s objections and a few minutes and they’re back already and the bell’s rung again to say that of course all the defence’s objections are overruled and the bell’s rung again and the court declared in session and the investigating judge declares debate open

2

The agreed day arrives and early in the morning before they open the gates we’d put up a big poster to announce the mass meeting and inviting everybody to come along we are taking the meeting not asking for it it says in big letters and underneath Gelso had added as well as everything else we need the headmaster Mastino gets in first as usual and he starts reading the poster then his face turns ugly and he scowls at us stares at each of us as if to say I’m marking you down and I’ll see to you later then the teachers get there and they read it without saying a word just look at us as though we’re crazy a few minutes later out come a bunch of janitors that Mastino has told to pull down the posters

the bravest janitor who was also the stupidest one reaches up to remove the poster but Cocco gets in front of him in a rage with his arms raised with his long black overcoat with the scarlet lining and he lets out a scream at him the janitor stops in his tracks taken aback and then the rest of us get in front of the janitors they don’t know what to do they look up at Mastino who looks down at them from the window of the headmaster’s room but in the end they decide to go back inside because they realize if they push it it’ll come to blows the first students to arrive have seen what happened they start talking it over with us and they don’t go in and gradually the group gets bigger then Mastino decides to make a move himself and he comes out under the arcade so we can see he’s there and he starts pacing up and down

I feel as if I’m watching the boss pacing in front of the factory in those stories I’ve read about the first workers’ struggles the first strikes the same kind of intimidation and in fact the students get scared somebody starts saying he wants to go inside they come up with no end of excuses even though we keep explaining that if we all stay outside Mastino can do nothing he can’t suspend us all but there’s too much wavering and too much fear and a first little group heads shamefacedly inside it’s like a general signal and the others all rush in too within a few minutes nearly everyone’s gone in only twenty or so are left outside along with the six of us and Mastino goes back in too with a smug grin on his face

we’re left in the lurch Malva’s upset but Cocco’s determined we’ll go in and do it just the same those of us there are he says we have to do it just the same anyway we’ve got nothing to lose now he shouts and that way we’ll persuade the others to hold the meeting just the same we all go in together and we install ourselves in an empty classroom on the ground floor and we’ve only been there a minute and we haven’t even started speaking when Mastino arrives yelling what are you doing here you you and you you’re all suspended come to my room one at a time and he walks out leaving the door open Scilla kicks the door and then he barricades it we shove two benches in front of it we’re silent for a moment we must do something we eye one another but we don’t know what to do we feel trapped

then in a flash I can see as if it was in front of me the page of a pamphlet I’ve read this summer about forms of struggle in the factories and all that stuff I can see that page in front of me with the heading in bold print indoor demo and I say indoor demo we must have an indoor demo what say the others yes an indoor demo we’ll go into all the classrooms and we’ll get all the others to come out at least we can try we’ll start with the top class and we’ll go through them all everyone agrees we go out and form a small procession in the corridor and we reach the first classroom the lesson has already started we burst in we all go into the classroom together in silence the teacher notorious as Mastino’s toady takes fright and doesn’t say a word all the students are facing the door

Valeriana is firm when she talks she is nervous of course but clear her voice carries well and her words are distinct the headmaster says he has suspended us all because we wanted to hold a mass meeting without his consent everyone knew it you all knew it too that this meeting was planned we’ve been talking about it for a fortnight now today you came inside out of fear but if you’re scared today you’ll be scared tomorrow as well and always and we’ll never be able to settle our problems ourselves so you’ve got to make a start now right away we must all hold the meeting right away to show that in this school we aren’t slaves we have to do it so we can do what they’re doing in all the other schools to show that we’re the ones to decide because the school is ours it’s not Mastino’s

Cocco and Scilla give the teacher threatening looks as if to say don’t you dare open your mouth and he doesn’t he keeps quiet all right some people at the desks stand up and the first comments start coming that’s right let’s get out there let’s all get out there yes we’ll go round all the classrooms Mastino arrives from the other end of the corridor and runs up against the procession he starts screaming but now nobody’s scared any more Cocco stops right in front of him and shouts in his face mass meeting mass meeting Mastino goes on shouting purple with rage and threatens them all with suspension and screams to go back into class but the procession bursts into another classroom the method is to enter en masse without warning

by the time Valeriana’s halfway through the speech they’re all up and ready to walk out there’s no need any more even to talk they’ve got the idea already the noise is bringing everyone out from the rest of the classrooms the procession swells and the whole ground floor is swept in we take the stairs in procession up to the first floor and go into the first classroom we come to by now there are so many people that they can’t all get in and there too all the students come out right away the ones pushing in collide with those pushing out we don’t even go into the other rooms the students come out by themselves all over the place on the second floor too we see some leaning over the banisters screams of everyone out and we climb up the stairs to the second floor and when we reach the corridor they’re already all out of the classrooms and they join the procession

the procession has come to a halt up on the stairs they’re all crowding up the whole length of the stairs you can hear Mastino below screaming something but it’s unclear it’s hard to make out what he’s saying there’s an incredible din then we lean out and see Mastino down on the ground floor in the centre of the stairwell tearing his hair desperation on his face all you can hear is him screaming the stairs the stairs paper pellets are raining from above and landing on Mastino’s head then from the first and second floors come a hail of biros erasers pencils then exercise books and textbooks too they’re all throwing things down at Mastino who is down there alone in the centre of the stairwell he’s not even trying to shield himself his hands are thrust in his hair but not as a shield and he keeps on screaming the stairs the stairs

the teachers are nowhere in sight the janitors have vanished some teachers have run into the empty classrooms and locked themselves in in one classroom after another the glass door panels cave in and the teachers can be seen standing scared stiff with their backs to the wall down below Mastino delivers one last desperate shout that succeeds in being audible the stair’s giving way the shouts quieten down less because of Mastino’s words than because people have now let rip enough Gelso looks at me from behind his little round glasses he asks me what the fuck’s the shit shouting and Cocco says he’s bluffing he’s got nothing else left beneath us Mastino lifts his outstretched arms imploring boys and girls boys and girls stop the stair can’t hold all that weight calm down and walk down the stairs at an orderly pace no running no noise

but these are orders don’t you hear him he’s still giving orders shouts Cocco now you can take back all your threats take it all back in front of everybody no more suspensions and mass meetings whenever we want them there’s a great rumbling roar mass meeting mass meeting everyone’s shouting below Mastino holds out his arms and then lets them drop and when he manages to speak he pants out yes yes all you want but come down here at once I entreat you I’m saying it for your own good come down here come down quietly don’t run I beg you there won’t be suspensions you can have your own meetings but come down I beg you everyone’s shouting victory victory but no one’s going down nobody believes all that about the stairs collapsing nobody takes the least bit of notice

Gelso is cleaning his glasses contentedly Malva and I hug in delight and you can still hear Cocco’s great hoarse voice yelling so that’s the end of your big-talk now eh and then he adds Mastino you’re suspended permanently go to the headmaster’s room when we send for you Valeriana’s voice can be heard saying we ought to go down to the yard now to hold the meeting because it’s the only place where there’s room for us all together and everyone shouts in agreement everyone shouts mass meeting mass meeting yard yard and they start coming down the stairs and instead of coming down at an orderly rate as Mastino wanted they all run down and what’s more thudding along with leaps and bounds to spite him and all shoving Mastino is still there motionless with his arms raised and his head down shouting no no quietly quietly and then everyone knows how it ended

3

In town the youth groups have organized a festival in the cathedral square China and I take the train on our own we get there earlier than we’ve arranged with the rest of our comrades and there’s already loads of people the police are turned out in force all around there’s graffiti being done on the walls and the ground free space is a right or make society a festival or let’s reclaim life the police begin to hassle us to move on there are a few scuffles a couple of CS rockets go off that don’t frighten anyone but they get hold of one comrade and beat him up a bit we leave the square but in the side streets we start to smash up cobblestones and fill our bags with them meanwhile large groups mainly from the outlying ghetto districts make their way to the meeting place

we try to link arms and manage to form into a long snake that’s not bad at all we can see the others from our collective they’ve all come they’re in small groups mixed up with the rest the front of the march is heading straight for the cathedral square holding up a banner that says the time for rebellion has come it’s a carnival you can see from the confetti and the paper streamers on the ground families have brought children for the outing dressed up as Zorro and Sandokan or the black pirate we go right round the cathedral square and that’s when all hell breaks loose because the carabinieri attack the back of the march they let off teargas at once the air is impossible to breathe everyone has weeping eyes the families are seized with panic they’re chasing after their Zorros and Sandokans and black pirates scattering in the stampede

China and I stay with a group that’s throwing broken cobblestones and next to us we find Cotogno Valeriana and Nocciola we see the carabinieri starting out at a run to charge then some comrades move a few cars into the middle of the road a couple of petrol bombs on the cars and the carabinieri are lost behind the flames and the clouds of black smoke a hundred yards ahead there’s a group that’s got it in for a Rolls Royce the bodywork battered with sticks and crowbars stones hailed on the windows and a petrol bomb there too and the boss’s car makes a nice bonfire we play hide and seek a little while longer with the carabinieri through the streets of the centre finally we scatter and we all meet again at the station

all our eyes are stinging and we keep rubbing them even though it makes it worse and there’s also the stinking smell of teargas in our nostrils we wash our eyes at the water fountain Malva turns up she’s had a fall she’d come in high heels she hit her nose and it’s all grazed Gelso’s glasses fell off as usual and in the melee someone smashed them and and he can hardly see now Verbena breathed in a lot of gas she feels sick and she’s going to throw up Ortica arrives lifting the skirt of his raincoat to show us a big black truncheon we very nearly brought back something else didn’t we Cocco Cocco found a rifle on the ground they’d even lost one of their rifles you should have seen Cocco running along like an ostrich with the rifle in his hand everyone was laughing and clapping but then we threw it away what were we going to do with a rifle

another time one evening in mid-April on television there’s the news of a comrade’s murder a fascist shot him he was seventeen and there’s an immediate spontaneous reaction in the morning we all meet on the train for the city the same faces the same tennis shoes the jackets the shoulder bags the scarves the kerchiefs the gloves the berets the carriages are packed people are standing in the corridors nobody’s talking and at each station more get on on the walls of the villages we pass through you can see the fresh graffiti the same words that can be read on the silent faces of the comrades at the last stations in the suburbs a tide of people gets on pressing on the platforms they’ve got plastic bags with helmets in them and under their jackets spanners bars iron rods in their pockets slings ball-bearings bolts

when we arrive there’s a long procession filling the platform and it’s moving up the stairs of the metro no one’s bothering with tickets and in the carriages there are flags and the long poles for the banners someone has a go at singing but the mood is grim threatening we reach the university in the square in front of the university there’s a tide of people but not just students not just young people all ages are there old people too there are workers in overalls with red kerchiefs round their necks the demonstration is already there drawn up ready to go the stewards in front kerchiefs masking half their faces and the heavy sticks with small red flags tied on there’s a dull rumbling sound then a shout and a slogan launched murdered comrade you’ll be avenged everyone together a roar and the demonstration sets off

in front of the law courts in front of the steps there are ranks of riot police poised for battle with teargas canisters stuck onto the muzzles of their guns and helmet visors down the demonstration comes to a sudden halt and slogans are launched against the police the tension mounts seriously the demonstration moves on again and then stops once more in a square hoisted up on the base of the obelisk that’s in the middle of the square I see an old man with a red kerchief at his neck lifting a bugle to his lips and sounding the call for silence and at once there’s a fearful silence you can only hear the bugle’s high notes when the bugle stops there’s a roar a great roar all around thousands of fists are raised all armed with bars and spanners

in the streets we cross all the shops are closed the shutters are all rolled down and then suddenly all the helmets go on I can see row after row an expanse of coloured helmets like a sea of billiard balls coloured red white blue green black the demonstration stops in the avenue at a crossroads there ahead just a few yards past the crossroads is a roadblock cars jeeps super-jeeps lock up vans of the police and carabinieri protecting the fascists’ headquarters that’s a few yards behind the roadblock the front of the march with the stewards is at a halt a few yards away from the roadblock the spanners and the bars are raised threateningly police and carabinieri close ranks and take cover behind the shields stones are thrown in a hail that seems never-ending you can hear the thud of the stones as they hit the shields and the policemen’s helmets

dozens of petrol bombs fly through the air then come the blasts loud as can be yellow red blue they make a high wall of flames ahead of us some jeeps have caught fire the police break ranks they all turn and run tripping and stumbling in their flight one more volley of petrol bombs and other cars are catching fire a cloud of black smoke you can’t see a thing any more then you hear the dull thumps of the teargas canisters that hail down on us by the dozen a downpour of teargas that rains on us from all sides in a single moment the air becomes impossible to breathe the stewards’ lines move back and get to the road junction they stop at the junction behind in the avenue the march has crumbled and suddenly from the end of the avenue we hear the piercing sirens of a column of super-jeeps

the sirens get closer louder and louder I hear shouting all around then suddenly everyone’s running towards the sides of the avenue towards the pavement and all at once as the crowd parts there appears a huge grey-green super-jeep driven at top speed brushing right past us I’m running on the pavement as well more super-jeeps arrive from the column the sirens really close ear splitting stones and a few petrol bombs are thrown at the super-jeeps whose windows are guarded by iron grilles flames rise up from the side of one so many of them that they seem never-ending from the pavements the comrades are still throwing stones and petrol bombs they’re shooting ball-bearings and screw bolts with slings I see a super-jeep zigzagging in the middle of the avenue and then aiming straight for the pavement

people fling themselves against the walls of the houses they scramble up the grilles the shutters of the shops onto the first-floor windowsills the super-jeeps mount the pavement they graze the walls they brush against us I scramble up the grille of a shutter everyone is trying to scramble up but there isn’t room for everyone people hang on to one another the super-jeeps come on to the pavement scraping against the walls of the houses brushing against us one two three I hold my breath and close my eyes someone near me is screaming in terror I keep holding on to the grille even when the column has gone by and I can see the last super-jeep that has brushed against us and then kind of jolts and suddenly turns towards the middle of the road I can hear a lot of screaming all coming from the place where the super-jeep turned round

very loud screaming shouting I see a lot of comrades running in that direction I can’t see a thing there’s smoke and confusion they all have red eyes crying with the teargas I get down from the shutter and head over there running with others we collide with others coming from the opposite direction anguished faces staring eyes some lower their kerchiefs one’s running his hands through his hair I can’t see what’s happened there’s a group of comrades standing in a semi-circle some are weeping it’s not with the teargas some are sobbing one girl shouts something I don’t understand then further on I see the bloody body on the ground I see the long trail of dark blood and further on I see the reddish mass of brains the wheels of the super-jeep have spattered out of it out of the head spattered out

4

Then suddenly a puzzling still image that I couldn’t quite make sense of it wasn’t a photograph because inside the frame were hints of movement there was the intense glare of a floodlight it must have been filmed at night something shot very close up so close that you could make out nothing in any detail there was no commentary there was only that mute puzzling image I could hear only the rustle of China’s fingers rolling the joint then the camera lens zoomed back to focus on a head a man’s head the head lay on a stain a broad red stain and there was a red stripe coming out of one ear and running down along the cheek as far as the white collar of the shirt

the camera zoomed back again to show the body of the carabiniere shot down beside the yellow column of a petrol pump beside the body you could see a pistol I don’t know whether it belonged to him or the person who’d killed him I turned up the volume on the television which was down low the newsreader was saying someone had waited for the carabiniere outside his house and killed him with two shots in the head from a nine calibre no one had claimed responsibility yet then there was a review of casualties in the security forces since the beginning of the year pictures of carabinieri and policemen killed in the street or through the windows of cars a long list of names and dates

the images of the casualties were intercut with other images there was commentary on mug-shots of fugitives scenes of terrorists being arrested of gun battles with terrorists of killings of terrorists scenes of terrorists on trial lined up in the cages with fists in the air and threatening faces the tone of the commentary was like a war dispatch China who had by now lit the joint passed it to me and took the remote control and cut out the sound now you can see two carabinieri in full dress uniform stiff young men carrying a vast wreath of flowers with a big purple ribbon across it with The Government in big gold lettering on it then China changed channels she started changing backwards and forwards from one channel to another

at that time I had just stopped working in the dye factory and China and I didn’t have a permanent place to live any more we were moving around here and there for a bit with comrades who could let us stay with them we weren’t the only ones for sure to live like that not at all at that time we were all more or less compelled to be nomads because of the oppressive atmosphere at the time there were strings of arrests and house searches nearly every day and carried out quite at random on just anybody in the movement on anyone who in some sense was a comrade or had dealings with comrades so it was usual not to stay too long in one place

we tried to spend the nights at the houses of comrades who considered themselves less known less exposed or better still staying with friends who weren’t involved at all or staying with friends of friends the demonstrations and festivals in the square were a thing of the past the movement was like a great ghost absent withdrawn sheltering in its ghettoes the stage was now held by the trickle of clandestine armed actions where responsibility was claimed by dozens of signatures of combat organizations in competition the life of the movement was over but for the comrades it wasn’t over it wasn’t as if they could stand on the sidelines saying let’s wait and see because the repression involved everyone there weren’t too many distinctions made

and so we were there that evening me and China on that unfamiliar bed strewn with newspapers magazines clothes smoking a joint and watching television which we usually never watched and outside you could hear the police sirens going by nobody went about any more at night even at our centre we would see one another only by day and when we were out we were careful meeting comrades and then there was the business of Scilla and his friends that worried us we were worried about them and worried about how it might reflect on us I remember that we talked about it that evening too while China switched backwards and forwards from channel to channel with the remote control

before that Scilla was the typical steward who in fights with the fascists stood out as a very firm character very violent very aggressive Scilla had always been at the centre of all the fights he’d even fought the fascists alone and this is how he’d gradually turned himself into a myth because there in that small town the fascist presence had been sizeable and there too like anywhere else they didn’t let people go about the town centre dressed in a way that marked them out as left-wing carrying a left-wing newspaper so the fascists provoked and attacked people who could be recognized as left-wing or just suspected of being left-wing

later the movement managed to win the upper hand thanks to guys like Scilla but at that time it was the fascists who ruled the roost and the police and judiciary shielded the fascists and through this Scilla and his kind let’s say the military branch of the movement built their status by virtue of a necessity acknowledged by all of the left the physical challenge to fascism was recognized as a legitimate necessary function and on this role of antifascist militant Scilla was able to build the status that in days to come placed him above suspicion when he began to play the role of police informer

Scilla always displayed an attitude of physical competitiveness towards everything and everyone even with comrades also because he probably felt unable to compete in other areas so that he was always aggressive sometimes pretending it was just in fun but it wasn’t much fun unpleasant yes that’s it unpleasant and with those he couldn’t draw into this physical competition his demeanour was a rather slimy and forced kind of awe in short he reproduced within the movement the same levels of violence expressed towards the enemy he always felt at war with everything and everybody and in everyone he saw an enemy on whom to take out his violence and he’d hit a comrade in the very same way he’d hit a fascist

and so inside the movement even Scilla’s kind had their uses he was an internal policeman he carried out a function that was maybe unpleasant but considered useful Scilla and his kind never took part in the internal debates of the movement in the meetings and mass meetings they were largely silent interested only in where the violence came in they experienced the stage of intensified conflict in merely mechanical and purely military terms of escalating the conflict and using violence against the State as earlier it had been used against the fascists they were always outside the struggles in the local factories and little by little began to mimic clandestine ideals and behaviour the habit of hiding a gun in the cellar and so on

later when things got as far as that meeting that conclusively split up our group and which I’ll talk about later after that meeting we heard nothing more about him and those who took the same road we never saw them again we heard nothing more about him Valeriana Cotogno and Gelso except in the leaflets claiming the armed actions that they carried out they carried out a series of armed actions before this carabiniere but I only discovered this once I was inside they didn’t do killings they did robberies a few woundings until this carabiniere but then when I saw it on television that evening with China we didn’t think for a second that it could have been them

China presses the remote switch again this time the screen shows a boundless plain the lens zooms in it must be filmed from a helicopter and you can see an ostrich running very fast on a flat barren plain it’s running fast in a straight line its head still the body rhythmically trembling the legs are so fast you can’t see them sometimes it turns its head and runs even faster a long low shadow comes fast behind it it’s catching up the ostrich turns its head the shadow is a few yards away the ostrich is running in zigzags now it gains a few yards but in seconds the shadow’s again very close the ostrich runs towards the void with all its strength the shadow rises into the air and in one bound the cheetah’s upon it they form a single still shadow the helicopter turns there’s just the grey sky and the noise of the blades

5

It happened right after Christmas on Christmas Eve I’d had a telegram from China to tell me she was coming to see me on Monday for a visit this telegram had arrived in the middle of a discussion I was in the dormitory cell with four other comrades discussing how to share the tasks of cooking the Christmas dinner I was making the risotto I was making yellow risotto and I was making the stock with a stock cube on the camping-gas stove a guard called me I turned and saw the little yellow square against the bars I thought it was the lawyer about the trial which was getting close now but then when I saw it was from China I thought I didn’t think anything I think I was very pleased because it had been a surprise and I thought that China had given me this surprise of a Christmas visit and I was very pleased

it’s funny I thought because all the Christmasses we’d spent together I don’t think we ever once celebrated one but now there I was preparing Christmas dinner I thought about China’s hair her long hair that when she laughs she throws forward covering her whole face with her long long black hair that when we talked with the glass between us I couldn’t even touch but luckily here there was no glass separating visitors now but then I remember how awful it was that we couldn’t even hold hands for a moment and this depressed us a lot even though we were happy to see each other but not in that inhuman humiliating depressing way and sometimes I’d get into a furious rage before the visit knowing I’d see her there behind the glass and that we’d have to talk through the glass without being able to touch not even a finger

again I was overcome by that feeling of hatred I’d had other times before the blood rose to my head a violent desire to kill the guards any of them right there and then with my bare hands if I dwell on it it’s as if I can still feel it now even after all this time well I wasn’t expecting that visit because China had come just the week before it had been a lovely visit we’d talked about so many things made plans because I believed I’d get out soon right after the trial and so I was touched now thinking about that unbelievable journey that she had to make for me every time a thousand kilometres to come and see me and every time another thousand kilometres it was unbelievable but after all that visit wasn’t to take place in the end because of all the havoc that was to come

Monday came no it was Sunday it was afternoon exercise time in the morning there’d been a search but oddly unlike the other routine searches this search had been a bit tougher than the rest and the guards had also done a strange thing they’d left because there the symbolic runs right through these things through the searches and such things it’s a matter of giving reciprocal signs and so the sign they’d left this time strange to interpret strange for me that is without any inkling of what was going on while the guards probably did have and no mistake because they had a nose for the mood of the moment there was this sign we found it there on the table when we got back up to the cells after the morning exercise

they’d left on all the tables in all the cells in all the dormitories they’d left all the objects everything in the form of a box a receptacle a tin a bottle in other words all the containers they’d put them there on the tables from boxes containing detergent to ones containing coffee or sugar to bottles of oil and shampoo all the boxes all the containers the bottles they’d left them there on the tables as if they were hinting at something or other I realized what it was only later to begin with I didn’t pay much attention the fact of finding all these things lined up there on the table surprised me and then later when I went for the afternoon exercise it also surprised me to find out that the same thing had been done in all the other cells too

so I remember that the atmosphere of that afternoon exercise was particularly tense there was an atmosphere you could cut with a knife and what I thought in the light of earlier situations I’d been in and experiences I’d had I thought somebody was going to get done in because there was a lot of tension and you could see it in the air you could feel it in so many things in a strange silence that was different from usual and especially from the looks quick rapid looks that passed suddenly between some people as they were walking up and down and then the thing that I surmised and that must have been on their minds a stabbing or at any rate the settling of some score or other and I was expecting it to happen any minute something like what I’d seen other times before like once shortly after they arrested me and it really upset me at the time

that time it happened as we were exercising outside as usual when three or four non-politicals because we exercised along with the non-political prisoners these non-politicals went up close behind another non-political they went up close to somebody exercising there like them and from behind they put a noose round his neck a knotted steel wire they put this noose around his neck from behind and two of them took his arms they held his arms tight to keep him from moving and they pulled the noose it’s this system that’s used to immobilize someone during a stabbing for it isn’t as easy as it seems to stab someone so that the blade can get deep enough into a vital organ but it can happen that the person survives even after twenty or thirty stab wounds

it’s not easy to stab somebody it’s not as easy as it might seem I mean it’s easy to stab him but it isn’t easy to kill him because besides he isn’t just going to take the stabbing without putting up a struggle he struggles he wriggles he goes wild he thrashes all over the place it’s very difficult to hold him still I mean and one of the techniques is precisely to put a noose around his neck first to pull it until he half loses consciousness because he’s nearly choking and in the meantime you stab him with the knife pushed up from below because wounds angled down are less effective you have to push the knife up from lower down and most important you have to try to aim for a vital organ maybe just under the sternum here

and so they put this noose around his neck and the others held his arms and the one behind him started pulling the steel wire noose but the steel wire noose broke or it’s more likely that the knot was badly tied anyway it snapped or it worked loose or I don’t know anyway they didn’t succeed in pulling it tight round his neck of course he was terrified because he knew at once what they had in mind trying to get a steel wire round his neck but as for them after a moment’s awkwardness they treated it all like a joke all the more because they hadn’t brought out the knives yet the knives hadn’t appeared yet

so they were making a joke of it they were slapping him on the back saying so we gave you a fright as if it was all a joke but he didn’t believe it was any joke he didn’t fall for it at all because besides you don’t play jokes like this in a prison if someone plays a joke like that on you then you’re the one that murders him because these are no jokes then the guy went over to the exercise yard gates and he started to yell to call the guards to let him out and that was when the ones who were after him realized that either they went for him right then or the guards would arrive and it would all become trickier and if he managed to get out in time they’d never get him because then he’d obviously be transferred or shoved into the isolation cells anyway he wouldn’t be showing his face there again that’s for sure

then just as the guards were running to see what he was yelling about four or five of them jumped on him with knives with blades skewers and they started stabbing him all in a muddle and obviously he put up a fight he didn’t just stand there and let himself be stabbed he was kicking trying to shield himself to wriggle free and he took quite a few stab wounds before he fell to the ground and all the while screaming and the guards were rushing about the exercise corridor they could see what was happening but they didn’t come into the yard there was a sergeant yelling from behind the gates cut it out cut it out the whole scene lasted a few seconds the others were at the far end of the wall we were all there all at the far end watching without a move the whole scene lasted a few seconds

he was screaming and screaming like a lunatic then he was thrown down on the ground not just thrown he fell on his knees and just then he was stabbed two or three times with a skewer down on his head just like that with the skewer down on his head and just as he turned his head a skewer another stab with the skewer caught him right in the eye a skewer caught him right in the eye a skewer stabbing right into his eye and he was really screaming in an unbelievable way then he fell down on the ground then when he fell down on the ground they kept on stabbing him trying to get him in the heart because they kept on stabbing him in the chest but they were stabbing him in the neck too they were trying to tear his neck open

the blood he was on the ground with the blood gushing out of him from every one of the holes from all the wounds from all the cuts he had from his head from this eye with blood coming out of him all over the place it was a lake of blood it was a pool of blood that must have been ten feet wide really and he wasn’t moving any more with that eye that was a red stain with one eye half out and the other gaping and he seemed dead and he wasn’t moving any more he seemed dead he wasn’t moving even a finger then they stopped and went back to where everyone else was at the far end of the wall of the yard and the guards opened the gate a little because the guy also happened to be only a few feet away from the gate they took him by the feet and they dragged him out

6

But meanwhile time was going by out there and nothing was happening and when the time came to go up because we were exercising in the volleyball court but no one was playing volleyball they were all walking up and down exchanging those rapid glances and now and then a few muttered words and time was going by and nothing was happening I was expecting somebody to be stabbed but nothing happened and even when the time came for the guards to take people back to the cells people started going back up with no fuss just as usual and so everybody went back up and I went back up lagging behind talking to another comrade and I didn’t have the faintest idea that at that very moment a fuck-up like that was happening

I got back to my cell and it was just a few minutes after I got back to my cell when I heard shouts coming from the direction of the rotunda I should explain what the rotunda is the special section of the prison we were in was a small three-storey block ground floor first floor and second floor and each floor was split into two wings at the centre of these wings on every floor there were two gates and in between the two gates there was a space that was the rotunda the same rotunda where the stairs were and from there people dispersed into one wing or the other the right wing one side and the left wing the other side I was in the left wing of the top floor the second floor that is

on the first floor there were all the non-politicals and on the ground floor there were the so-called working prisoners the ones that carry out food distribution duties in the corridors and do the cleaning in the corridors and so on the top floor on the other hand held all the politicals there were sixty of us politicals and incidentally it’s worth mentioning that shortly before this there had arrived the overwhelming majority of prisoners both politicals and non-politicals who’d staged a very tough revolt in another special prison and who’d then been transferred it had been a very tough revolt there had been two dead two prisoners with a reputation as bastards had been killed and just about the whole prison had been wrecked and so now in ours the politicals’ floor was full there was no room at all to spare there were sixty of us and it was full up

I was at that time in a cell with four other comrades and I heard shouting coming from the rotunda very agitated shouting and I saw the guards who patrolled the corridor of our wing at first I saw them running towards the rotunda at the far end of the wing and everybody in the cells came to look through the bars separating them from the corridors and a moment later the guards came back at a run shouting and they started closing the armoured doors because the cells have a barred gate and in front of it they also have an armoured door and precisely because of the protests there’d been in that prison we’d won the right to keep the armoured doors open all day and have them closed only between eleven at night and seven in the morning

so this was in the afternoon the armoured doors were open and so the guards reacted that way as soon as they realized what was happening was that the guards in the rotunda were being seized by two comrades because at that time we came up the stairs in pairs which was later stopped so when those two comrades got up to the rotunda they brought out the knives they had on them and they seized the guards they seized them and threatened to kill them they got them to open no since the guards had the keys of the gates on them they removed them and themselves opened the two gates that led to the two wings the left wing on one side and the right wing on the other

and so the guards who happened to be in the two wings found the way closed off they found themselves closed in a trap because at one end of the corridor there was the gate to the rotunda with the comrades who had captured the guards and at the other end of the corridor were the big windows at the far end of the corridor and so there the guards were left with no way out they were scared stiff too because they had no idea how things would go so the thing they did instinctively because it’s probably what’s laid down in their rule-book is that in these cases they have to close the armoured doors and so all that occurred to them to do and all they did was to try and close the doors

and so they managed to get some doors closed no just one door they didn’t get any others closed because in their confusion in their fear they didn’t manage in time to get any others closed they didn’t manage to close them because the comrades who were in the cells immediately stuck brooms broom handles through the bars past the door between the bars and the door stopping the doors from closing you have to picture all this happening in a split second so they really only managed to close just one door there were others they tried to close or forgot about or didn’t make it in time to close the fact is that all the guards surrendered at once they all surrendered in wholesale terror

but in the meantime while those two comrades were taking the guards in the rotunda they were taking three or four guards I don’t know how many in the meantime it turned out that in the right wing I was in the left in a dormitory cell in the right wing the comrades had sawed through the bars there were eight comrades in that dormitory because then you could leave your cell for the midday meal to cook and eat together this was another thing we’d won with the protests there’d been in the months before in that prison and you could get together in a dormitory cell to eat along with other comrades and so at that time up to eight of us could be together in a dormitory

they’d sawed through the bars of the gate and by the time those two comrades seized the two guards in the rotunda they’d already sawed through them and were waiting for that moment they removed the bars of the dormitory cell and the eight of them went out then there were really ten prisoners who were out the eight from the dormitory and the two in the rotunda and that’s how they also got all the guards who were in the second floor corridor obviously I found all this out later because I was locked in my cell I was in the left wing and I saw nothing we just heard loud shouting we heard shouting and we just heard all this uproar the guards trying to close the armoured doors running up and down the shouting but it was all no more than a moment

what happened and what then became known later or at least in part because these stories can’t always be told in full was that very quickly the comrades who’d taken the guards came down with the keys they’d taken from the guards they opened the gate leading to the stairs and they went down to the first floor and they seized all the guards down there and in that way they opened the two wings of the first floor and then they began unlocking the cells of the non-politicals and so all the non-politicals came pouring out of the cells and then they too came up to the second floor and started unlocking all our cells as well

they didn’t go down to the ground floor because it couldn’t be defended like the upper floors and the working prisoners stayed there for the whole duration of the revolt cooped up in their wing between the two floors in revolt and the guards that were outside at this point I saw people wearing masks arriving in my wing they got to my cell and they unlocked every cell in the left wing they unlocked my cell too and then there was enormous confusion and some people told us there’s a revolt we’ve taken the guards we must keep calm put mattresses over the windows because they’re likely to fire teargas rockets into the cells and then everyone put mattresses over the windows and then we all poured out into the corridor

just at the same time as I went out of my cell into the corridor I heard a tremendous rumble an incredible bang what had happened was that a comrade who’d stayed on the first floor to keep watch had seen guards reaching the ground floor and trying to come up guards already turned out in full force so he’d thrown a few grams of plastic explosive but loose I mean not packed in a canister but just with the detonator and the fuse he threw this plastic purely to frighten them away in fact I don’t even think anyone was injured I’m not certain only in that enclosed space it made a terrific bang then the guards all ran away and from that moment the revolt was under way

7

I remember that when I was transferred to that special prison I was a bit scared just that name special prison scared me and the evening before I left I was up all night talking with my cell mates they realized I was frightened and they stayed awake all night with me to keep me company then there was the whole transfer trip which was very long the whole length of Italy chained up in that armoured van but I’d no sooner arrived at the special when that fear more or less went when I got there I was pretty astounded by the way that prison worked I hadn’t had any idea it was like that now that I’m describing it I realize that in fact the atmosphere there was tense to say the least there was enormous tension but on my arrival it looked to me like a big fair

that name special prison I thought when I first got there they could label it as that but it was really a fair and the cells were bazaars you could more or less have anything in your cell all the cells were overflowing with things of every kind you could play musical instruments there were guitars and tamborines bongo drums accordions there was even somebody who had a violin and he played it whenever he wanted you could have every kind and colour of paint you wanted you could have canvases oils tempera pastel crayons charcoal typewriters you could have the books you wanted all the magazines and newspapers you wanted you could have tape-recorders and cassettes football boots and tennis shoes there was no limit to the amount of clothes you could keep in your cell all the shoes all the sweaters all the hats you could keep everything you wanted there in the cells

the association time there as they called it was quite unbelievable considering it was a special there were four hours two in the morning and two in the afternoon there were four exercise hours a day and on top there were two hours twice a week when we could all meet in a big room together and what’s more at the time for the midday meal there was the opportunity for the comrades who were in the single cells to go and eat with the comrades who were in the dormitories which meant association time was this you got up at nine you went for exercise at eleven you went back up and it meant an incredible lot of work for the guards at eleven you went back up from exercise and then they had to organize all the shifting around to escort all the people who were moving to go and eat in other cells

all you had to do was apply to go to another cell you did it on the spot on a slip of paper and that was enough they really should have carried out searches but you can’t start moving sixty people in less than half an hour and search them as well and so everybody moved around with no fuss from one cell to another to go and eat it wasn’t a case of applying a day ahead you did it there on the spot it was a formality for sure they couldn’t keep track of the applications they could maybe do it later on and it helped them most of all to figure out how things fitted to work out from the people who spent time together what the political links were between the comrades the groupings the different political tendencies

the guards were really duty-bound to search you when you left your cell in the morning for exercise and they were duty-bound to search you again when you went back up to your cell and to search you again once more when you left your cell to go and eat in another cell but all this had become impossible they’d stopped doing it and so they’d stopped checking altogether there was this constant movement there was this constant cell locking and unlocking there was this huge mass of objects piled up in the cells and when this is the situation when there are all these areas that you take for yourself that you win for yourself then the situation becomes ungovernable what struck me there was the enormous scope there was inside the prison it was a special prison but you could move around there just as you wanted

nor were the cell searches properly seen to the more stuff there is in a cell the harder it is to search it all well the difference from the normal prison that I’d just come from was that here they did one search a week where there they did one a month but here the way things were with the guards meant that if a ballpoint pen went missing during a search there was an outbreak of hammering on the bars in every cell so that right away this guy would come back with the pen and apologize and here the way things were with the guards meant that they put up with the worst insults and the worst threats and if you called a guard at midnight to get him to take cigarettes or a newspaper or wine or a plate of pasta to someone in another cell even if it wasn’t his job he’d do it right away all the same and in double-quick time this was the way things were with the guards

if one day during a search you told him no don’t you lay a hand on me he’d even stop searching you and if while they were searching the cells they found knives they didn’t even say a word they didn’t even give you a hard time about it any more they’d got used to finding knives in the cells they confiscated them and that was all that was the atmosphere there was there before the revolt there were visits without glass screens the rules said they were to be an hour but they were always two hours to the minute and sometimes even longer if you pushed it and you could have four visits a month plus a special visit that you could have on top and if you didn’t have a visit you could make a ten-minute phone call instead

the non-politicals in the specials aren’t the non-politicals of the normal prisons they’re people who in prison have tried at least once to escape they’re all people from the world of big-time crime or important gangs and there you could associate with the non-politicals too you could exercise with them and go and eat with them too all you had to do was apply to go and see them so this amounted to a situation of progressive extension of areas inside the prison there was a state of permanent protest that had its effects on the regulatory structure because the prison is this it’s a structure that elaborates the regulation of the body to the maximum and so the fact that this regulation is rearranged corresponds to a shift in the balance of power between prisoners and custody

I soon became aware of the strained and tense atmosphere arising from this situation and underlying the fairground appearance that had been my first impression there’d been a whole series of protests there were protests to stop the guards doing searches every time cells were left for exercise or demands about going to eat in another cell or demands about visits or meetings with lawyers and so on when you mount a protest and for instance when you refuse to be searched there are two outcomes either the administration gives way and as a result you wind up in a much stronger position and that’s that or else the administration reacts and then the struggle goes on and the tension rises until there’s a confrontation

so there were constant disruptions at exercise people would refuse to go back to the cells and there’d be concerted hammering on the bars of the cell gates and things like that there’s always a ceiling when a protest begins if the administration doesn’t give in right away you trigger the mechanism of mounting conflict but then there’s a ceiling and this ceiling measures the balance of power for example if the prisoners are in the position of power to threaten to take guards hostage then of course the administration yields first because it knows that the prisoners can go as far as taking hostages and the administration usually always yielded there because it was afraid of this that the prisoners would take guards hostage of course you couldn’t ask the impossible you couldn’t ask them to unlock the cells for you and let you go home but you could push all the time to extend social spaces

and the protests succeeded because they were solid everybody joined in right away without even thinking about it by now the guards no longer took any responsibility the guards reacted on every occasion by passing on decisions to their superior who in turn dumped them on his superior and so on up to the prison governor and he’d take it to the minister which meant whatever you did inside the prison you were never confronting the guards but the strength of your position was such that you ended up dealing directly with the minister with every protest you made and since by now what was at stake was by now always the trigger for a sequence of events leading to taking guards hostage perhaps proceeding merely from the fact that you wanted a blue felt tip pen it was their policy to give way over everything

also because the minister’s strategy centred as always on the distinction making that special prison a cooling-down prison let’s say at the positive end of the special spectrum while at the other end was a maximum security prison the prison regime is entirely based on this strategy of differentiation with its potential to blackmail you with the threat of a worsening of your conditions with its potential to warn you if you protest watch out or I’ll send you to a prison worse than the one you’re in now and so the comrades’ argument was just because we’re well off here it doesn’t mean we don’t have to make demands but we have to make demands just the same here as well so as to break this blackmail situation that threatens us all with ending up in a prison where we’re worse off

8

The first time I met China was during the Cantinone occupation that’s where I first saw her China had come round there I’m not sure when and she was helping Gelso with the mural that Gelso had decided to do on the biggest wall she had a big brush and she was dipping it in a bucket of white paint but she was dipping it in too much and the paint was spattering all over the place and it was running down on to the floor I saw what a mess it was and I went over to show her how it should be done but also because I thought she was very pretty and I remember that there’s where she gave me that scarf it was that time when I first met her because when I went up to her of course I got a good splash here on my front and she made up for it then by putting her red scarf round my neck it was a really long scarf ankle-length and she told me keep it I’m giving it to you it’ll hide the stain

to see how little need there was you only had to look at how I dressed in those days the battle-dress shirt with baggy sweater threadbare at the elbows riddled with holes and with loose unravelled ends the jeans frayed at the hem with a safety pin in place of the zip broken months ago one shoe split at the seams that let the water in when it rained the other had no lace but it held with a permanent knot odd socks one black and one grey and most of all the off-white raincoat that’s my second skin all scruffy and dirty so many buttons missing that I always leave it open a tear under the armpit holes in the pockets but stuff always ending up in the lining newspapers leaflets felt-tip pens always the same old rags until they fall apart because it’s part of the gamble because we’re staking everything and how do you think about clothes when you’re betting everything you’ve got

the morning we occupied the Cantinone we’d got there very early we’d got there very early in the morning it was Saturday morning and the night before while Valeriana and Nocciola were keeping an eye on both ends of the street Cotogno Ortica and I used a hand drill to drill through the big padlock from underneath where the lock is we sprang the chambers and the padlock fell open so that by the following morning it would be all ready and we’d only need to undo the chain then all along the ditch on the other side of the road we placed plastic bags hidden in the brushwood with stones ballbearings and catapults in them not too much because inside the Cantinone there was all kinds of stuff we could use to defend ourselves in case of immediate attack

in the morning at seven prompt as can be we five met at the station and with Ortica’s car we drove round the streets where the groups of comrades who were to do the break-in were to be ready and waiting they were all there as planned all armed to the teeth like for demonstrations where you know trouble might flare up scarves gloves berets and everything we undid the chain and we went inside and right behind us came groups of comrades we made a quick inspection inside it was still nearly pitch dark there was no electricity shining a torch inside we saw piles of timber of every size piles of planks and beams it was so big an area the torchlight couldn’t reach the far wall but we thought it was lovely

the Cantinone was one wing of an old castle belonging to the Curia the other bits of the castle were occupied by a nursery school run by nuns and an old people’s home also run by nuns the wing we were interested in was used at the time by a construction firm to store materials it was a big rectangular building on the ground floor was a single vast hall that was now full of beams and timber on the upper floor there were rooms on the ground floor two rows of columns ran its whole length supporting two high crossed vaults in the centre there was a big main door between two rows of big windows running right along the facade protected by grilles but with no glass and no frames

since everything had gone according to plan one comrade went out to go and give the signal to another group waiting outside that went off to put up posters and hand out the leaflets we’d done to announce the occupation while we inside started forming a chain to clear the Cantinone of the building lumber we carried out everything through the door leading to the yard and we heaped it up there outside the nuns and the old people from the home started looking out of the windows more and more of them they were looking at us in amazement and disbelief perhaps at first they thought we were building workers but they must have doubted it for they saw that there were girls at work there too

nearly an hour goes by then those on guard outside sound the alarm that they’re on their way and we all rush out into the street the carabinieri are driving up in their two minibuses in no hurry at all and once they pull up opposite the door they stop and get out there would have been ten or so in no hurry and empty-handed the maresciallo comes towards us he looks puzzled and Valeriana takes a few steps towards him and tells him it’s an occupation and she gives him the leaflet and tells him it’s all explained here the maresciallo glances at it quickly but then he says he wants to come in and see and he points to the door and makes a move in that direction but at once all the comrades who’d gone outside spontaneously form a tight human barrier we form a wall between him and the main door of the Cantinone

the maresciallo looks at us in astonishment more than anything else then he says but you know what you’re doing is illegal Cotogno answers yes but there’s a lot of us doing it and we’re not the only ones occupying round here the maresciallo shakes his head and asks and who’s in charge here and we answer all of us all of us are in charge here rather abashed the maresciallo waves his men away but we don’t budge we stay there waiting for them to leave in earnest they all get back on their minibuses they go into reverse and pull away slowly but when they get to the junction one of the two minibuses stays there while the other vanishes then we go back inside and Scilla gets busy setting up a defence team it’s sickening what we need is petrol bombs because those guys can come back any moment now and there’d be a slaughter

all this time new people were starting to turn up they came in groups the students who knew all about it already and then the first ones to come out of curiosity workers and unemployed people came who’d seen our posters and the leaflets word had got round and people turned up came in and hung about the place taking a good look round we were explaining why we’d occupied what we wanted to do now and people were talking asking questions more and more people were turning up people I’d never seen before there were children running about the hall and going into the rooms upstairs it was total chaos everywhere then standing to one side we notice three well-dressed guys we hadn’t seen coming in grim-faced looking around anxiously and keeping their voices down the word gets round at once the mayor’s here

the three come towards us the mayor in the lead a big tall heavy man with a long camel coat nearly down to his ankles and when the mayor opens his mouth the deafening racket stops only the children go on running about the room he comes straight out and asks abruptly who’s in charge here you know what you’re doing is illegal immediately we all burst out laughing they look around at a loss to understand then the vice-mayor a thin old man with a red face who’s also the party secretary lays into us you’re provocateurs you’ve done this tomfoolery to undermine the new left administration this is a provocation there’s a whole crowd of people who’re not from round here who’ve come from outside it’s a deliberate provocation I’ve been in politics for forty years and I know provocateurs when I see them

but the mayor takes over again listen kids we’ve come here to tell you that charges have already been filed against you and legal proceedings are already under way to have you forcibly evicted we promise you we’ll withdraw the charge but you must clear out right now and put everything back just as it was and we guarantee that there won’t be any legal consequences everybody’s jeering and Nocciola steps forward turning to the three of them look there’s no question of us leaving here not for a minute the only thing we want here is to go on with this occupation and to achieve what we set out to do which is something you aren’t even bothering to find out I don’t know if you’ve got the point the mayor makes a gesture of annoyance he turns round and leaves followed by his retinue

then I don’t remember what else happened in the afternoon we also had a visit from the extra-parliamentarians who’d just founded their own party and so had stopped wearing their jeans and anoraks they turned up with the party newspaper sticking out of the pockets of their grey lodens they came up to Cotogno and me their leader got straight to the point what you need to do right away is call a mass meeting to discuss what’s to be done this spontaneous movement has to have political leadership first of all we’ll have a closed meeting between us and the occupation leaders to decide on the programme we’ll get the mass meeting to approve and so on finally they left none too happy but their leader threatened us all mass struggles are doomed if there’s no vanguard to lead them you’ve got no political line and you’re dragging the masses to defeat and blablabla and blablabla

9

Well right at the start of the revolt there was pandemonium in the sense that the first word going round was that there are nineteen guards taken hostage and this provoked outright amazement there was incredulity fear and amazement but then at once the general mood rapidly became a mood of great excitement probably because what everyone felt most of all at that moment was the fact of being in control of this space the fact of freedom of movement all over this space and just the simple fact of free movement in a space bigger than the cell you were confined to released this whole general excitement

then what happened was that those prisoners who’d planned the whole thing who’d organized it immediately set in motion all the organizational functions of the revolt these comrades assigned themselves roles precise tasks which involved guarding and surveying the most likely points where a break-in could be made from outside because the guards could always try a break-in even if the hostages we were holding meant it wasn’t so simple and then somebody had to attend to guarding the hostages and all this took place in great haste the whole organizational machine was quickly set in motion despite the great amount of confusion because obviously it had all been decided in advance and these roles had all been assigned well ahead

there were comrades with a weapon made from those coffee-makers they were moka coffee-makers later on in fact they were banned from being used in cells the fuse came out of the coffee-maker there was the detonator and inside was the explosive and these coffee-makers functioned as grenades the explosive had been hidden in the cells and it was this the guards were looking for when they’d carried out that peculiar search they’d searched in all the boxes and bottles because that’s where people hide explosives they hadn’t found any but they’d left them all on the tables to make it clear that they knew there were explosives in the prison that they’d got wind that something was going to happen

the guards were all put in a dormitory cell and there began the whole ritual of the search and so on the guards weren’t molested nobody harmed them only some comrades began to mimic though without any malice very ironically it looked like the kind of thing the indians* did in ’77 they started mimicking the whole ritual of the guard towards the prisoner and then they were all searched like that exactly the way they searched the prisoners every day they were made to stand there with their legs slightly apart their arms raised and then they were searched in the routine way as they did to us day in day out whenever we went out and whenever we returned to our cells

first the head was searched fingers through the hair under the hair then down the back of the head on the neck down on to the shoulders and under the armpits and then going right down the back under the bum the legs the backs of the legs and down the legs to the feet and then back up again up the legs the thighs the inner thighs the stomach and then all the way up the trunk back to the neck and then making them undo their trousers pull down the zip feeling the waistband feeling the balls and then making them take off their shoes hand them over and turn them upside down to look inside them all this with the guards there waiting one after the other like our routine with arms raised legs slightly apart

but what we all confirmed after these searches carried out on all the guards was that among the nineteen guards taken hostage there wasn’t even one non-commissioned officer just some poor wretch of a lance-corporal who obviously just happened to be there and this fact that there wasn’t even one non-commissioned officer there made us all think that the non-commissioned officers had got wind of something going on they had a good idea what was going to happen because it had never ever come about that there wasn’t at least one non-commissioned officer on the floor there wasn’t a single non-commissioned officer not even a sergeant and just by a complete coincidence on the whole floor no on both floors the first and second floor in every wing there wasn’t a single sergeant

then later they made them take off their uniforms too they stripped them and they brought them clothes the prisoners wore and they made them put on these clothes because they were hostages and so if they were wearing their uniforms if there was a break-in they would immediately be identifiable by whoever was breaking in police carabinieri or guards themselves to free them so that they could carry out on-the-spot reprisals against the prisoners without running the risk of endangering the lives of their guards if instead they were dressed like the prisoners it would all be more difficult

but there was no violence directed at the guards everyone I remember was concerned about this and they kept on saying that in any case nothing should be done to the guards because that was our insurance that things would turn out all right the hostage guards were all put in a big cell and watched from outside they were always well treated they even ate the same as us what we ate during the revolt was spaghetti which there was plenty of in the cells there were comrades who cooked spaghetti for all the rest of us and they came to take orders three alla matriciana four alla carbonara five with tomato sauce everywhere spaghetti was being cooked on the camping-gas rings and the hostage guards got their spaghetti too

and the rest of the prisoners the ones that weren’t involved in starting the revolt right away they got themselves organized too to deal with taking on the guards in the likely event of an attack so a whole machinery was set in motion with everyone very involved basically people started arming themselves they started pulling down the window frames to make blades bars and things like that out of them they started making skewers by sharpening the points of the metal fittings of the camping-gas rings they started breaking off table-legs to make clubs and things like that then the armoured doors were pulled off their hinges and placed against the big windows at the end of the corridors because from outside they could fire in at us and so on

in the process of taking over the entire prison people had also got hold of some tools and machinery too for instance they’d taken an electric grindstone and used it to cut through the iron slats of the beds and so with those slats blades could be made they could be made in quantity and there was also an electric welding machine that was used to weld the gates of the rotunda and so block the possibility of a break-in from below and also a break-in from above because from the second floor there was a spiral stair leading up to the roof and then we were also able to make use of the guard-post telephone on the second floor and on this telephone we communicated with the prison administration and this was the medium of communication for negotiations

and then there was the television because another peculiar thing was that when there’s a revolt they usually cut off all the electricity and this time instead they hadn’t cut off the electricity and they’d left the television working as if to let us stay in touch with the news from outside they could easily have pulled the plug on the lot but instead they left the electricity on they left the telephone working they left the television working and on the television we got news about the negotiations all the televisions in the cells were on all the time with the sound turned right up especially when the news was on and the news of the revolt was always the lead item

inside the cells weren’t damaged in any way everything was turned into a huge bivouac in the sense that all people did was go up and down the whole length of the corridors which would be about fifty or sixty yards everyone was walking up and down the whole time some disguised with just a scarf or a handkerchief around their faces while others were unrecognizable hooded in a pillow-case with two holes for their eyes a blanket like a poncho over their shoulders and these were obviously non-politicals because the non-politicals had their own way of doing things in a revolt so that they wouldn’t be recognized as you always see in photographs of a rooftop revolt they always have their faces hidden so they won’t be recognized so as to avoid any bad consequences

and everywhere people did nothing but move about they all did nothing but walk up and down the corridors inside and outside the cells they truly seemed to be measuring a larger physical space a bigger space for manoeuvre that they’d won and they kept on walking they went on up and down the corridors in and out of the cells all of them open that lined the corridors and everyone was shifting around all the time from one cell to another to such an extent that the cells looked quite different there was a continual movement of people and things shifted around carried from one cell to another a continual movement of objects of clothes of things it had all become a great bivouac a party

the atmosphere there was euphoric there was a festive atmosphere I can remember this great euphoria this excitement this festivity and what everyone was saying over and over again and what they were convinced of was that there could never ever be a military intervention by the guards by the carabinieri by the police by the forces of repression and this all because of there being nineteen guards held hostage and this made a break-in nearly impossible because it would have been very dangerous for the guards held hostage I can remember that there were no worries I can remember there was no anxiety whatsoever I can remember there was euphoria and excitement there was this mechanism triggered in everybody’s head to see this situation as holding no danger and making everybody feel they were at a party

10

Things were hectically busy at the Cantinone there was somebody doing electrical work and they’d run in an electric cable attached to the outside wiring of the old people’s home there was somebody doing plumbing and they’d fixed the pipes and so we had water too there were some doing building work they’d gone and got their tools and they’d started filling up the holes in the floor and fixing the tiles there were some doing carpentry and building wooden frames for the windows and then covering them with plastic sheets and at the far end of the big room with the planks and beams we’d found there we were building a big stage for the concerts and performances we wanted to put on the opening concert had already been announced with a poster and leaflets the comrades were giving out wherever they went

three or four old men from the home next door had also turned up and were recalling the days when the Cantinone had been an osterìa and had had huge casks tables and benches running the whole length of it because that was where the peasants met to drink wine and play cards and we promised them that we’d put back the casks and the benches and the wine like there used to be then a bunch of comrades who’d gone out to advertise the concert arrive back with the cars full of stuff to eat we think they’ve stolen it and we get mad but instead it had been some shopkeepers who’d given us packs of drinks and pasta and then some Neapolitan guys turn up who worked in a pizzerìa they arrived with a pile of pizzas so there was food for everybody

at the same time the first working groups had been formed and had moved into the rooms on the first floor Valeriana and a group of women were meeting to set up a collectively run clinic others were planning a counterinformation service on soft and hard drugs others were discussing food and the counterculture others music film theatre there’s a decision to get in touch with the youth circles in other towns that we’ve heard from to exchange news and experiences and to set up a resource centre with their newspapers and their documents and in another room on the first floor a press office was already in full-time operation with typewriters and duplicators parcels of leaflets of press releases announcements documents were piling up on the tables of the press office waiting to go out

the evening of the concert arrives and the bands arrive from the different surrounding villages the sound system is set up the lights are ready the lights cast bright-coloured stains on the whitewashed walls of the big hall and the bands begin turning up they play all at the same time and the intermingled sounds pour out into the street and fill the air people are arriving loads of people young people are arriving from all over and not so young too the street outside is transformed into a car park with all the cars jammed into it there’s a sea of heads everyone sitting on the benches and on the ground tapping their feet and all this echoing out as the bright-coloured lights turn faster and faster I look about to see where China is and I see her against the wall with Gelso whose head’s shaking with laughter his hair hanging right over his face when he lifts it he sees me and waves for me to go over there too

the party was at its height there was such euphoria such great excitement people coming in and out in and out indescribable confusion they all really liked the place we should stay there they said we should stay there whatever it took we’d do terrific things in the Cantinone the music was blaring out loud as can be in the thick of the crowd I meet Scilla carrying a 15-inch spanner saying there are too many phoneys here I spot one he gets his stuffing knocked out Scilla was the only glum face in the entire place they were all looking at the stage where somebody was singing I love to play pound out my music all day but I don’t earn my wages that way for I play like a mule I’m a wild boy I wanna win I’m kinda rough but believe me I’m cool and I went to be with China right under the stage and I stayed right there holding her close while the music blared out loud as can be

suddenly the music stops Scilla has gone up on to the stage and over the microphone he says the cultural assessore* is here outside with a message from the mayor and the council people roared with laughter saying bring him in here to us and we’ll eat him up the cultural assessore is young small and nervous with a little moustache and a white raincoat and he’d been a 68’er he waits patiently until the voices quieten down to let him speak and then he says I must tell you that the situation is urgent we’ve just had a telephone call from the chief constable telling us that you’ll be cleared out of here within twenty-four hours by order in the name of the council and the mayor I’m appealing once again to reasonableness and good sense evacuate the Cantinone and we promise you room in the new multi-purpose centre as soon as the work on it is finished

uproar and shouting come from every part of the hall then Nocciola begins speaking you’re conning us first you go and say that we’re provocateurs and fascists then that you want to find somewhere just for us the truth is that you’re shit-scared about your council majority because if it was up to you you’d be the first to call the police but we know very well that this story of the multi-purpose centre is a fairytale you only have to look at how little you’ve cared about our problems in the past no no the assessore bravely interrupts him I want to point out that this is a slander the problems of young people are problems of great concern to us in the next budget we’ve allowed for considerable expenditure on youth and culture but there are timetables that have to be respected however I assure you that a satisfactory solution will be found for your problems too

you should have talked to us about it first he says in a conciliatory tone you should have trusted us and together we’d have found a satisfactory solution I think the needs underlying what you’ve done here are valid what isn’t valid however is the way you imagine you’re going to satisfy them together we must find another way but meanwhile the Cantinone needs to be cleared before any irreparable damage is done people have had enough out out everyone’s shouting I’m waiting for an answer I’ll only leave here when I’ve got your answer whether it’s negative or affirmative he manages to add then from the stage Valeriana gets some silence and she says the decision is up to the floor and we must all discuss it but not while he’s here and if he wants he can wait outside and we’ll give him our decision later

Scilla escorts him outside and before leaving the stage he raises his arm holding up the spanner thunderous applause breaks out everyone’s shouting we in the collective don’t really know what to do we confer briefly then Cotogno takes the microphone comrades we can’t leave here under the threat of police intervention if we clear out of here voluntarily now letting ourselves be blackmailed by the mayor and the parties then we’ve lost we must decide what’s the best thing to do whether to stay here and defend the occupation which means confrontation or not I think that for the time being confrontation isn’t in our interest I think it would split the movement whether we win or lose in military terms because whatever happens we’ll lose politically and even if we win in military terms we’ll be up against an unmanageable situation

we must decide what’s in our best interest for the growth and strengthening of this movement and so the most pressing problem for us is not to preserve the Cantinone at any price the problem is that we must preserve this strength that we’ve built and that’s why we must say no to the voluntary evacuation they’re suggesting but we must also say no to confrontation maybe just at the last moment but we must decide for ourselves autonomously when and how to evacuate if we evacuate as the result of our own autonomous decision we keep our political strength intact and tomorrow we’ll be able to carry on the renewed struggles of this movement for the conquest of a social space we’ll be able to carry on with other occupations and other struggles if instead we go for confrontation here today we risk everything I believe we lose everything

there were a lot of disgruntled faces even if the majority were in agreement with Cotogno but in that general euphoria it was like throwing cold water on a fire our position is agreed in the discussion and so we send word to the mayor that the mass meeting has decided to go on with the occupation to the bitter end but then we decide that we can’t just all hang on waiting for the break-in there must be 400 people there for us all to stay there and then all leave together at the last moment is impossible it’s better for just a few to do it because then it’s easier to leave it takes time to persuade everybody nobody wanted to leave nobody wanted to admit the party was all over but at last they went they dismantled and took away everything that didn’t have to be left behind and in the end only those of us in the collective were left about sixty in all

in the big hall candles are lit and the main lights are switched off the atmosphere of earlier evenings returns with sleeping bags being unrolled and people lying down only this time no one wants to talk or sing to tell stories and make plans to roll joints and make love this evening everyone has a stick or a bar besides their sleeping bag I see Valeriana sitting against a pillar smoking her eyes fixed on the angled shadows on the cross vaults I go up to her with China and I see her eyes are glistening what’s wrong Valeriana shit all this work for fuck all I liked this place we’ll never find a place as nice as this maybe if we occupy some broken-down hut right out in the wilds maybe then they could let us have it but a place like this that they don’t even know what to do with no way are those bastards going to let us have it

from time to time someone who’s on guard comes back inside for the changeover it’s bitterly cold outside it’s not too warm inside either any more we put the sleeping bag down and I slip inside just as I am the floor is hard but I’m tired and it feels comfortable enough all the same China takes off her man’s tweed jacket she rolls it up and puts it under my head we’ll be more comfortable like that she says and she slips in too China isn’t sleepy and she sings to herself I’m a wild boy hear what I say ain’t nobody better groovin’ tonight don’t you ever stand in my way or you’ll be in trouble alright eyes closed I say they’re already standing in our way we’ll be lucky now if we don’t get into trouble but China goes on sometimes it’s rough on me if I misbehave like you see but even in jail I could fight and I liked to go out on the town every night

11

After that first retaliatory sally was driven off with that charge of plastic explosive on the ground floor the guards outside the prison didn’t make another move also because there was a moment when a comrade at a high window displayed a lovely bright orange ball something like two kilos of plastic and that bright orange ball up there was enough to bring down the entire prison and so they understood that that first explosion was just a warning that a lot worse could happen if they persisted and then from time to time one of the captured guards was also displayed at the big corridor windows with a knife at his throat as proof that they were alive and to tell those down below not to try anything

the captured guards had been split into small groups and every half hour they were moved into different new cells there were precise shifts a whole system of half-hourly moves had been worked out in advance so that from outside no one could ever tell which cell there were guards in so that there was no chance of trying anything to free them the ones in charge of the negotiations kept us up to date minute by minute about how things were going they said that taking part in the negotiations on the other end of the ’phone as well as the prison administration and the guards’ commanding officers there were also politicians representing the ministry of justice and the government and that they seemed to be stymied by the seriousness of the situation they were taking time but they also seemed willing to negotiate