Oriana Fallaci

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Image:Oriana.jpg Oriana Fallaci (born June 29 1929) is an Italian journalist, author and political interviewer. A former partisan during World War II, she had a long and successful journalistic career.

She has been called Italy's most celebrated female writer by Ferruccio De Bortoli.[1],[2]. The Los Angeles Times described her as "the journalist to whom virtually no world figure would say no."

She has interviewed many internationally known leaders and celebrities such as Henry Kissinger, the Shah of Iran, Ayatollah Khomeini, Willy Brandt, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, Walter Cronkite, Omar Khadafi, Federico Fellini, Sammy Davis Jr, Nguyen Cao Ky, Yasir Arafat, Indira Gandhi, Alexandros Panagoulis, Archbishop Makarios III, Golda Meir, Nguyen Van Thieu, Haile Selassie and Sean Connery.

After retirement, she returned to the spotlight after writing a series of articles and books highly critical of Islam and Arabs that aroused substantial support, controversy and accusations of Islamophobia and racism.

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Career

Fallaci was born in Florence.

During World War II she joined the resistance despite her youth, in the democratic armed group "Giustizia e Libertà".

Her father Edoardo Fallaci, a cabinet maker in Florence, was a political activist struggling to put an end to the dictatorship of Italian Fascist leader Benito Mussolini. It was during this period that Fallaci was first exposed to the atrocities of war.

Fallaci began her journalistic career in her teens, becoming a special correspondent for the Italian paper Il mattino dell'Italia centrale in 1950.

Since 1967 she worked as a war correspondent, in Vietnam, for the Indo-Pakistani War, in the Middle East and in South America. For many years, Fallaci was a special correspondent for the political magazine L'Europeo and wrote for a number of leading newspapers and Epoca magazine.

In the late 1970s, she had an affair with the subject of one of her interviews, Alexandros Panagoulis, who had been a solitary figure in the Greek resistance against the 1967 dictatorship, having been captured, heavily tortured and imprisoned for his (unsuccessful) assassination attempt against dictator and ex-Colonel Georgios Papadopoulos. Panagoulis died in 1976, under controversial circumstances, in a road accident. Fallaci maintained that Panagoulis was assassinated by remnants of the Greek military junta and her book Un Uomo (A Man) (ISBN 0671252410) was inspired by the life of Panagoulis.

Fallaci has twice received the St. Vincent Prize for journalism, as well as the Bancarella Prize, 1971 for Nothing, and So Be It; Viareggio Prize, 1979, for Un uomo: Romanzo; and Prix Antibes, 1993, for Inshallah. She received a D.Litt. from Columbia College (Chicago).

She has lectured at the University of Chicago, Yale University, Harvard University, and Columbia University.

Fallaci’s writings have been translated into 21 languages including English, Spanish, French, Dutch, German, Greek, Swedish, Polish, Croatian and Slovenian.

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Controversy

A journalist from Florence, Tiziano Terzani, expressed disagreements with her approach in an open letter to her in Corriere della Sera while David Holcberg at the Ayn Rand Institute supported her cause with a letter to the Washington Times. [3]

Fallaci has received support from rightist political parties and movements such as the Lega Nord in Italy, where her books have sold over 1 million copies alone, but also from individuals and organisations in the rest of the world. [4][5][6]

At the first European Social Forum, which was held in Florence in November 2002, Fallaci invited the people of Florence to shut up every shop and stay in the houses and compared the ESF to the Nazi occupation of Florence, but despite her worries nothing happened and all the demonstrations were peaceful. Sabina Guzzanti, a popular leftist comic, mocked at her during the Forum.Template:Fact

Italian pacifist singer Jovanotti mentioned Fallaci in a song, Salvami, where she is described as "the journalist and writer who loves war/because it reminds her of when she was young and beautiful". [7]

In 2002 in Switzerland the Islamic Center and the Somal Association of Geneva, SOS Racisme of Lausanne and a private citizen sued her for the supposedly racist content of The Rage and The Pride. In November 2002 a Swiss judge issued an arrest warrant for violations of article 261 and 261 bis of the Swiss criminal code and requested the Italian government to either try or extradite her. Roberto Castelli, Italian minister of Justice mentioned this fact in an interview broadcasted by Radio Padania affirming that the Italian Constitution protects the Freedom of Speech and thus the extradition request had to be rejected, the episode is mentioned in her book The Force of Reason [8][9][10]

In 2003 the MRAP (Movement against racism and for the friendship among peoples) sued to have The Rage and The Pride banned in France. A French court rejected the request, as well as the group's request for a disclaimer to be placed in each book.Template:Fact

In May, 2005, Adel Smith, president of the Union of Italian Muslims, launched a lawsuit against Fallaci charging that "some of the things she said in her book The Force of Reason are offensive to Islam." Smith's attorney, Matteo Nicoli, cited a phrase from the book that refers to Islam as "a pool that never purifies." Consequently an Italian judge ordered her to stand trial set for June 2006 in Bergamo on charges of "defaming Islam." A previous prosecutor had sought dismissal of the charges.Template:Fact

On August 27, 2005, Fallaci had a private audience with Pope Benedict XVI at Castel Gandolfo. Although an atheist, Fallaci has mentioned her great respect for Pope Benedict XVI and her admiration for his 2004 essay titled "If Europe Hates Itself". [11]

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Awards

On November 30, 2005, Oriana Fallaci received the Center for the Study of Popular Culture’s Annie Taylor Award in New York. The writer was honored for her "heroism and valor" that made of her "a symbol of struggle against oppression and fascism". Since 9/11, Fallaci has dedicated herself in the fight against "the greatest threat to Western civilization since the Cold War, Islamofascism".

On December 8, 2005, the writer received the Ambrogino d'oro, the most prestigious award of Milan.

On December 14, 2005, she was awarded by the President of the Italian Republic, Carlo Azeglio Ciampi, with a gold medal for her efforts (benemerita della cultura). Because of the writer's serious health condition, she couldn't travel to Italy. She sent a message stating (translated from Italian):

The gold medal moves me because it gratifies my hard work of writer and journalist, my engagement to the defense of our culture, my love for my Country and for Freedom. My well-known health condition prevents me to travel and to withdraw personally an award that, for me, a woman not accustomed to medals and to trophies, has an intense ethical and moral meaning.

On February 22, 2006, the president of Tuscany, Riccardo Nencini awarded Oriana Fallaci of a gold medal. Nencini explained that the writer is a symbol of Tuscany's culture in the world.

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Books by Oriana Fallaci

  • A Man, a novel about a hero who fights alone for freedom and for truth, never giving up, and so he dies, killed by all. (1979) ISBN 8427938543
  • The Seven Sins of Hollywood preface by Orson Welles, Longanesi (Milan), 1958.
  • The Useless Sex: Voyage around the Woman Horizon Press (New York City), 1961.
  • Penelope at War (1962).
  • Limelighters (1963)
  • The Egotists: Sixteen Surprising Interviews (1963)
  • Quel giorno sulla Luna (1970)
  • Inshallah, a fictional account of Italian troops stationed in Lebanon in 1983.
  • If the Sun Dies, about the US space program.
  • Interview With History (1976, a collection of interviews with various political figures Liveright)
  • Letter to a child never born, a dialogue between a mother and her unborn child.
  • Nothing, and so be it, report on the Vietnam war based on personal experiences.
  • Oriana Fallaci intervista Oriana Fallaci, Fallaci interviews herself on the subject of "Eurabia" and "Islamofacism". (Milan: Corriere della Sera, August 2004).
  • The Rage and The Pride (La Rabbia e l'Orgoglio, 2001) ISBN 0847825043.
  • The Force of Reason (La Forza della Ragione, 2004) ISBN 0847827534
  • Oriana Fallaci intervista sé stessa - L'Apocalisse (in Italian). An update of the interview with herself. A new, long epilogue is added. Publisher: Rizzoli, November 2004.

Fallaci has also written essays and novels revolving around news events.

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See also

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External links

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Online articles and translations

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