_-_by_Benito_Mussolini_(cover).jpg) Cover of the first Scribner edition | |
| Author | Benito Mussolini |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Subject | Fascism |
| Publisher | Charles Scribner's Sons |
Publication date | 1928 |
| Publication place | United States |
| Media type | Print (hardcover) |
| Pages | 318 |
| OCLC | 917663 |
| LC Class | DG575.M8 A2 1928 |
My Autobiography is a book byBenito Mussolini. It is a dictated, narrativeautobiography recounting the author's youth, his years as an agitator and journalist, his experiences inWorld War I, the formation and revolutionary struggles of theFascist Party, theMarch on Rome, and his early years in power. It was first published in 1928;Richard Washburn Child, together withLuigi Barzini, Jr., served as the book'sghostwriter.
Mussolini dictated parts of the text to his brother Arnaldo Mussolini who handed the manuscripts, together with other material supplied by Mussolini's loverMargherita Sarfatti, toRichard Washburn Child (the former Americanambassador to Italy). Child served together withLuigi Barzini, Jr. as a ghostwriter for the autobiography, which was mainly aimed at readers in the U.S. It was a paid work of propaganda and remained unpublished in Italy until 1971. It was first serialized inThe Saturday Evening Post (May to Oct. 1928) and then published as a book, with a foreword, by Child. In this preface, he wrote:
In our time it may be shrewdly forecast that no man will exhibit dimensions of permanent greatness equal to those of Mussolini.
— Richard Washburn Child[1]
The autobiography was first published as a book ingilt-lettered green cloth byCharles Scribner's Sons in 1928. The text's typescript is held in theHoughton Library at Harvard University.Hurst & Blackett reprinted aPaternoster Library cheap edition in 1936 (the title page says11th thousand). AJapanese translation was published in 1937. In 1939,Hutchinson & Co. published an edition with "specially authorized additions by arrangement and approval ofIl Duce, bringing it up to the year 1939".
Greenwood Press reprinted the 1928 edition in 1970 (ISBN 0-8371-4294-6). In 1998,Da Capo Press publishedMy Rise and Fall (ISBN 0-306-80864-1) combiningMy Autobiography withThe Fall of Mussolini: His Own Story (1948).
