Nunzio Pernicone: "Non Mollare!"

A very fine scholar of the history of anarchism has died. I knew him as a real gentleman who was not stingy with his knowledge.

Nunzio Pernicone (1940-2013)was the son of an anarchist, about whom I know only that he organized Italian anarchist theater productions in New York. He taught near me at Drexel University, and 19 years ago I invited him to speak at the tiny local venue created by me and my friends. I had just read his first book Italian Anarchism, 1864-1892. We went out to eat before the lecture and talked shop. He was very well received by the attendees.

In the years since, we'd share little bits and pieces where our research overlapped, and we'd occasionally cross paths at events or socially. What put Nunzio in the top tier among historians was his sheer command of his subject, but also that he got it, rather than viewing anarchism as just an interesting set of ideas and people to write about. His second book Carlo Tresca: Portrait of A Rebel (2005) is very important because for the first time it properly examines the greatest of all Italian anarchists in America, and one of Benito Mussolini's very worst enemies anywhere. Tresca was, before Nuzio's book, one of my heroes who I'd go on about, but when I did I'd seem to rant because the story of his life is intense and there was no serious volume to bring it all together. My fellow blipsters will easily guess which of my cats is named after that lion.

It's a shame to lose this scholar of what I love, and this fine man. I had not seen him in over a year and the news of his death is only a day old, but cancer was probably the cause.

By the way, Nunzio Pernicone was a serious cat lover.