By David Broder
출처: Alberto Lingria/Reuters/뉴욕타임스
“If this is to end in fire, then we should all burn together.”
These ominous words aren’t from an apocalyptic poem: They’re from a politician’s memoir. Giorgia Meloni, the leader of the far-right Brothers of Italy party, opened her 2021 book with this strange call to arms, eschewing the more prosaic style favored by most politicians. But then Ms. Meloni, whose party carries the symbol adopted by defeated lieutenants of the Mussolini regime and describes itself as “post-fascist,” is hardly a mainstream political figure.
At least, she didn’t use to be. Yet just two months after Ms. Meloni published her best-selling memoir, her party topped national opinion polls for the first time. Since then, it has continued to boast over 20 percent support and has provided the only major opposition to Mario Draghi’s technocratic coalition. On Wednesday, in a sudden turn of events, the government collapsed. Early elections, due in the fall, could open the way for the Brothers of Italy to become the first far-right party to lead a major eurozone economy. For Europe and the country, it would be a truly seismic event.
It would also mark a remarkable rise for a party that in 2018 secured just 4 percent of the vote. At its heart is Ms. Meloni, who skillfully blends fears of civilizational decline with folksy anecdotes about her relationships with her family, God and Italy itself. Conversant with pop culture and fond of referring to J.R.R. Tolkien — the line in her memoir, from an Ed Sheeran song on the soundtrack of a film in the Hobbit series, combines the two — Ms. Meloni presents herself as an unusually down-to-earth politician.
