by Jordi Valentini
Seeking to counteract left-wing youth movements in the shared terrain of alternative publishing, right-wing youth in the 1970s discovered and appropriated Tolkien’s work, partly due to the general disdain or indifference towards him from the Italian left-leaning public and intellectuals. Tolkien’s anti-modern and traditionalist world became a refuge for a disillusioned generation critical of the Italian Social Movement (Movimento Sociale Italiano), the main conservative party, for its outdated structure and its unwillingness to give younger people a voice. The magazine Eowyn is one of the many outlets from which the Youth Front (Fronte della Gioventù) emulated alternative media typically associated with far-left movements, and it is comprised entirely of women. These women are critical of abortion, women’s work outside the household, and what they perceive as a moral decay in society. They aim to fight this decay, just as the character that lends her name to the magazine fought the forces of Darkness, siding with their male “camerata.” They critique key intellectual figures of feminist thought and highlight other women as role models, such as German filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl. She is chosen as an ideal woman—strong-willed, fully aware of her merit, and characterized by a lack of solidarity towards other women and a sense of class privilege. These traits are also attributed to Éowyn in Tolkien’s work, as well as to another character with whom Meloni has associated herself, Danaerys Targaryen from George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire, popularized by the HBO show Game of Thrones. While there are substantial differences between these female characters, as well as the works from which they originate, their political and symbolic use by right-wing politicians and personalities is similar. This use also continues the propaganda efforts of Eowyn, with which Giorgia Meloni shares an unresolved relationship with the heritage of fascism. It is a historical and political void, in which Meloni, appealing to her electoral base with pop culture references, enacts an ambiguous revival of traditional and post-fascist ideals while promoting a personalized political agenda.