Cristiano Parafioriti - Invictus

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Invictus: краткое содержание, описание и аннотация

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The epic story of Ture Di Nardo, known as “Pileri”, a young Sicilian peasant torn away from his family and his woman by the call to arms during the Second World War. 
Enlisted in the Alpini and part of the Julia Division, he followed the bitter fate of the Italian Army in Russia in what was to be the biggest Italian military defeat of the 20th century. 
Like a new Ulysses, the young Ture Pileri will have to face terrible trials on the long journey home. 
With this engaging historical novel, Cristiano Parafioriti brings to light a real story that has been kept in the heart of its protagonist for seventy years. The strength of a man, driven by love, able to resist and react to the defeat of an entire army.
Sicily, April 1941. In San Giorgio, a small village in the Nebrodi mountains, live the Di Nardo family, known as the “Pileri”, a humble family that supports itself through agriculture and sheep farming. The head of the family is Zi Peppe, married to Za Nunzia, with whom he has seven children. Ture, the eldest, is twenty years old and has only managed to escape being called up to arms thanks to his father’s connections and can therefore continue to provide for the family. One evening, on his way to fetch water from the trough with his sister Concetta, the latter reveals to him the love interest of his cousin Lina. Ture does not reciprocate the young woman’s feelings, but on that occasion, he is struck by the beauty of Lina’s younger sister, Rosa. A few days later, Ture declares his love for her, and Rosa confesses that she, too, has secretly loved him for more than a year. Their passion immediately blows up, but the joy is short-lived: the war outcome takes a turn for the worse, and a new, irrevocable call to arms arrives. Zi Peppe can do nothing this time. His son must leave for the front. The family loses his strong arms while Rosa the newborn bud of love. Here begins the epic of Ture. Ripped from his family and his woman, enlisted in the Alpini and part of the Julia Division, he followed the bitter fate of the Italian Army in Russia in what was to be the biggest Italian military defeat of the 20th century. 
Like a new Ulysses, the young Ture Pileri will have to face terrible trials on the long journey home that will end on 23 September 1943. On that night, Ture arrives exhausted on the Nebrodi under Rosa’s house, who runs into his arms. The two lovers, after many adventures, meet again to never leave each other again. A festive procession then escorts the young survivor to San Giorgio, to his family. Unconquered by the war. Unconquered by the Russian winter. Unconquered by the Nazi fascists. Unconquered by the Americans. Ture Pileri can finally embrace the rest of his family and get on with his life. Invictus. Ture Pileri will die in 2018, at the age of 97, surrounded by the love of Rosa and the affection of his large family. A real story, kept in the heart of its protagonist for eighty years. The strength of a man, driven by love, capable to resist and react to the defeat of an entire army.

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After that event, he spent a month and a half among the corpses, and the memory of those few survivors being pulled out alive from the ruins of the massacre still made him flinch. At the time, the Command had taken care to send a dispatch only to the families of the dead soldiers; there was no news of the living. Moreover, Zi Peppe hadn’t heard anything about his family, whether the earthquake had affected the villages in the Nebrodi mountains.

Only in March 1909, when he had finished his military service, he returned to San Giorgio.

He had not even had time to rejoice at the safe return of his loved ones when hunger and the crisis forced his father to embark him for America in May of that year.

After 29 days spent between Messina, Naples, and the Atlantic Ocean, he arrived in New York on 26 June 1909.

He was 20 years old and, arrived in the New Continent, had been admitted to the quarantine area of the Ellis Island Immigrant Reception Centre for a month because of suspected bronchopneumonia.

During those long days as a prisoner-sick man, he had met some shady Sicilian emigrants, who had hired him for some ‘special commissions’.

A few revolver shots he had dodged, a few others he had fired, and he had thus created a ‘respectable reputation’ for himself, thanks to his charisma and cleverness in smuggling whisky.

After six years, he was called up as a soldier in Italy because of the Great War. If he had stayed in America, he would have been considered a deserter and couldn’t have returned to Sicily any more.

Therefore, he had decided to return home, and, soon, young Peppe, from the charming and dangerous New York, found himself in the Cavalry Regiment Savoia on the Isonzo front.

He saw more dead people killed in one day on the Karst than in six years in New York!

When he returned, he carried the signs of war with him, and, suddenly, the American dream had vanished completely. The mere thought of returning to the Wild West that was America in the early 1900s made him shudder.

The Messina earthquake, the American mafia, the war, too much blood, and the too many deaths in so few years had worn him out.

He chose the quiet life of a farmer and decided to stay in San Giorgio.

There he began his second life.

A year after the end of the Great War, he met Nunzia and got married. Slowly, they began to cultivate the land, raise animals, and have children.

In November 1921, his first son, Ture, was born.

Ture was now 20 years old.

He was a bright and solid young man. As the eldest of the large family, he was, by right and by duty, the right-hand man of Zi Peppe Pileri, who had brought him up on hoe and bread from an early age.

Young Ture was meek, but not a few times he came home red with rage and fisticuffs. He never offended anyone, he was respectful towards his elders, and he didn’t let anyone push him around.

His brothers were still little and only helped out on some occasions, such as during the harvest, the grape harvest, or the olive and hazelnut picking.

Ture, on the other hand, was already of an age to serve the family full-time. When he didn’t go with his father, because there wasn’t much work, he was hired by someone and walked home in the evening because there was only one mule in the family, used by Zi Peppe. If he had any luck, on the way back, there was a cart that would take him to San Basilio, and from there, he would continue along the mule track that connected the two villages. Sometimes, however, he had no luck and arrived in San Giorgio wet to the bone because, on the way, he had been caught in a gale and, in order to not remain in the dark, had walked without shelter under the pouring rain.

Since the beginning of the war, things had got worse for the family because the local farmers no longer hired Ture on a day-to-day basis. They seemed resentful because he had managed to be exempted from the military service, thanks to a recommendation his father had provided him with.

It was as if those men were complaining that Zi Peppe had not also recommended their sons. Strong arms were needed. The war was causing hunger and mourning for almost a year over those desolate lands of the Nebrodi mountains.

Zi Peppe knew well that some things were better done by himself and for himself, so he had pulled some strings only for his son Ture. Besides, he knew from experience that, if the situation were reversed, they would have provided only for their children so as not to lower the chance of saving them from the war.

He had succeeded, and he did not even feel guilty about it. He saw Ture working hard for his brothers and sisters and knew he had done the right thing.

Honest as he was, however, he did carry a little guilt inside: he had had to bow down to lord Marchiolo, a hardened fascist, who had rank and power at the Military District of Tortorici.

He had swallowed many bitter pills just for his son, to keep him with him in the fields and, above all, to save him from the horrors he had experienced on the Karst, and from almost certain death.

For this reason, when ‘Gnura Mena had cast the evil eye on him, he had felt it all over him! It was not just the words of a charlatan, but a common feeling that had crept into the souls and minds of the other villagers: why were their sons at war, while Ture, young and strong, was still serving his father?

The war had taken many strong arms from their families, and this was the major gripe.

People were starving, and hunger claimed more victims than war. And it took no prisoners.

III

At first, Ture wanted nothing to do with going to war, hearing his father’s gruesome tales. As soon as he was exempted from military duties, he went back to his village, and the next day he set off to work in the fields.

Summer arrived.

With time, however, this privilege began to take its toll on him, as he felt the eyes of everyone, especially the families who had soldiers at the front.

His behaviour began to be affected: he withdrew into himself. He became more and more quarrelsome and grumpy. Sometimes, when people asked him why he wasn’t at war, he would tell them stories he made up at the moment. He said he was waiting for being called to the front to some of them. Or that he was about to leave the following month. To others, that he was about to embark from Messina or that any more soldiers were needed. Time passed, and, at the end of July 1941, Ture was still in the fields harvesting with his father.

After a time, most people began to disbelieve these excuses, and many others, who learned the truth, accused him of being a coward, of bringing dishonour to their village. And even if they did not spit such contempt in his face for fear of getting a few punches in the jaw, they talked behind his back everywhere: at the mill, the haberdashery, the grain stores.

Ture would hear this chatter, and it would eat away at his pride, but when he got home in the evening, he would look his brothers and sisters in the eye, and the thought of these evil tongues soon disappeared. For this reason, he worked even harder. He felt that he owed to fate, then he busied himself with many more tasks than his father gave him daily.

August also arrived.

One evening, when he came back from the countryside a little earlier, he saw Concetta loaded down with some pitcher, intent on going to the trough near the river, and offered to help her.

“Why are you in a rush to help me?” His sister asked.

“Usually you nod your head and say thank you in these cases,” Ture replied.

“Are you coming to help your poor sister or to see your cousin Lia?”

Concetta’s question caught her brother off guard. Cousin Lia was nineteen years old. She was already shapely but not yet engaged. Ture had honestly never thought she could be anything more than a cousin.

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