Lo specchio di Galadriel. La guerra di Libia e l'ambigua costruzione dell'identità italiana

[Autom. eng. transl.] The experience of the war and occupation of Libya plays an important role in the real and discursive construction of the Italian national identity and in the elaboration of its problematic Mediterranean dimension. The ideological and narrative device that produces and supports the war effort gathers and elaborates some central (though contradictory) elements of the Italian geopolitical identity. The country's relationship with its "fourth shore" appears from the beginning as a charge of expectations. The conviction is that conquest - beyond its material benefits - performs an intrinsically positive function, somewhere between purification and consecration. What is expected is the birth of a new Italy and a new type of Italian. Also for this reason, the results of the military action and of the occupation end up fueling the sense of dissatisfaction that had made possible the outbreak of hostilities, structuring, the ambiguous relationship that, over the years, would have been consolidated between Italy and the his "possession". As in Galadriel's mirror, the Libyan war reflects not only many of the features that will characterize Italy's relations with the North African colony but the various aporias underlying the national formation process. Over the years, it will also end up absorbing and catalyzing different perceptions which - albeit eccentric with respect to the event in question - will flow into the same interpretative canon. The 'Libyan caesura' definitely frames Italy in its role as a Mediterranean reality; at the same time, it defines in unambiguous terms the parameters of its relationship with this world, within the framework of a historical and geopolitical location that still structures the country's international action.