From the eBook "My Tuscany"

Every day, after the alerts sounded, you could watch a breathtaking spectacle. You actually saw dozens of planes, arrayed in square formations way up in the sky, neatly following one another in long waves. We were told that they were all directed toward Germany and the industrial centers of Northern Italy. I liked the planes’ rumbling as they broke through the bright clouds into the blue. The grey formations seemed alive with the silver flashes of the planes’ fuselage. People were not too alarmed. Florence was too beautiful and dear to the British to be bombed—the Florentines said. But around us the city lay shrouded in sandbags and protective walls. I had no idea of what was beneath those concrete blocks and steel palings. I was told that there were marble statues and painted church walls under them. They were hidden from sight for safety, but the most precious treasures that could be removed had been sent away, just like my mother and younger sister, to the hill towns that the war would not reach. I did not particularly care about such things in those days because I could not even imagine them.

I walked toward the square facing Santa Maria del Fiore. The cathedral and the Baptistery were hidden by walls of cement blocks. Not much of them was visible. Church people were pulling open the massive bronze doors in the façade. A dark maw gaped slowly sending out a breath smelling of incense, and let in a stream of people who rushed inside seeking shelter.

“The British will not bomb the Brunelleschi dome”—people said.

But they were crying and there was terror on their faces. The noise of the crowd was like a storm at sea.

I walked on. I did not go in. I walked alone in the deserted streets. I liked this solitude in the quieted city. The sun’s rays fell softly on the stones of the pavement and on the buildings’ walls.

In the spring of 1943, as the war got closer and closer, my family had left the seaside city of Livorno and had moved to the countryside, where we had a big empty house we used for summer vacations. My parents knew that we would all miss the mild Mediterranean air, the familiar avenues and squares and stores, and our friends, and the comforts of a peaceful life. But people talked of an inevitable Armageddon, bombings, and warships shelling the city. If you could, you left.

I turned twelve later that summer. Ever since I had turned nine I had lived in the war’s atmosphere with greater and greater enthusiasm. All Fascist youths were called to the country’s help. We listened to the Duce’s speeches in awe of his shouting voice. His face was present everywhere with its square jaw and dark, burning eyes. His words hovered in gigantic black lettering on building’s walls everywhere. He was ever-present in our lives. We wished we could fight and die as He asked us to do.