Global InformationJulius Evola information
Julius Evola | |
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 Evola in the early 1940s | |
| Born | Giulio Cesare Andrea Evola 19 May 1898 Rome, Kingdom of Italy |
| Died | 11 June 1974 (aged 76) Rome, Republic of Italy |
| Era | 20th-century philosophy |
| Region |
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| School | Perennialism Traditionalism Conservative Revolution |
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Giulio Cesare Andrea "Julius" Evola (Italian: [ˈɛːvola];[1] 19 May 1898 – 11 June 1974) was an Italian far-right philosopher. Evola regarded his values as aristocratic, monarchist, masculine, traditionalist, heroic, and defiantly reactionary. An eccentric thinker in Fascist Italy,[2] he also had ties to Nazi Germany;[3] in the post-war era, he was an ideological mentor of the Italian neo-fascist and militant Right.[4]
Evola was born in Rome. He served as an artillery officer in the First World War.[5] He became a Dada artist but gave up painting in his twenties. He said he considered suicide until he had a revelation while reading a Buddhist text.[6] In the 1920s he delved into the occult; he wrote on Western esotericism and of Eastern mysticism, developing his doctrine of "magical idealism".
His writings blend various ideas of German idealism, Eastern doctrines, traditionalism and the interwar Conservative Revolution,[7] with themes such as Hermeticism, the metaphysics of war and sex, Tantra, Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, mountaineering, the Holy Grail, civilisations, and decadence. Evola believed that mankind is living in the Kali Yuga, a Dark Age of unleashed materialistic appetites. To counter this and call in a primordial rebirth, Evola presented a "world of Tradition". Tradition for Evola was not Christian—he did not believe in God—but rather an eternal supernatural knowledge with values of authority, hierarchy, order, discipline and obedience.[8][9] According to scholar Franco Ferraresi, Evola's thought is one of the most consistently "antiegalitarian, antiliberal, antidemocratic, and antipopular systems in the twentieth century".[10] Writings by Evola contain misogyny,[11] racism,[12] antisemitism,[13] and attacks on Christianity and the Catholic Church.[14]
Evola advocated for Fascist Italy's racial laws,[13] and eventually became Italy's leading "racial philosopher".[15] Autobiographical remarks by Evola allude to his having worked for the Sicherheitsdienst, or SD, the intelligence agency of the SS and the Nazi Party.[16][17] He fled to Nazi Germany in 1943 when the Italian Fascist regime fell, but returned to Rome under the puppet Salò government to organize a radical-right group.[18][19][20][21] In 1945 in Vienna, a Soviet shell fragment paralysed him from the waist down.[22]
On trial in 1951, Evola denied being a fascist and instead referred to himself as "superfascista" (lit. 'superfascist'). Concerning this statement, historian Elisabetta Cassina Wolff wrote that "It is unclear whether this meant that Evola was placing himself above or beyond Fascism".[23] Evola has been called the "chief ideologue" of Italy's radical right after World War II.[24] He continues to influence contemporary traditionalist and neo-fascist movements.[25][26][27][28]
- ^ "Evola cogn.". Dizionario d'ortografia e di pronunzia. Dizionario d'Ortografia e di Pronunzia (DOP) (in Italian). Rai Libri. Archived from the original on 14 July 2014. Retrieved 23 October 2018.
- ^ Ferraresi 1987, p. 84; Payne 1996, p. 113; Goodrick-Clarke 2001, p. 53.
- ^ Drake 2004, p. 223–224.
- ^ Ferraresi 2012, p. 44.
- ^ Sedgwick 2023, p. 15.
- ^ Waterfield 1990, p. 13.
- ^ Ferraresi 2012, pp. 44–45.
- ^ Rose 2021, p. 44-51.
- ^ Furlong 2011, pp. 8–9.
- ^ Atkins 2004, p. 89.
- ^ Coogan 1999, p. 359.
- ^ Gillette 2002.
- ^ a b Staudenmaier 2022.
- ^ Furlong 2011, pp. 5, 42; Drake 1988, p. 406.
- ^ Payne 1996, p. 113.
- ^ Coogan 1999, p. 315f.
- ^ H. T. Hansen, 'Preface to the American Edition', in Julius Evola, Men Among the Ruins: Post-War Reflections of a Radical Traditionalist, Simon and Schuster, ISBN 978-1-620-55858-4 2018 pp-1-104, p.5. This is deduced by remarks by Evola suggesting he was an active agent for the Sicherheitsdienst, remarks that Philippe Baillet, his French translator, believes refer to the fact that the Sicherheitsdienst had been set up within the SS and had a remit to cover cultural matters, before it actually assumed a later role in Nazi counterespionage.
- ^ Coogan 1999.
- ^ Wolff 2016, pp. 478–494.
- ^ Drake 1986, p. 67.
- ^ Gillette 2002, pp. 177–178.
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
Guidowas invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Wolff 2016, p. 491.
- ^ Payne 1996.
- ^ Coogan 1999, p. 330.
- ^ Goodrick-Clarke, Nicholas (2003). Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism, and the Politics of Identity. New York University Press. pp. 52–71. ISBN 978-0-8147-3155-0.
- ^ Romm, Jake. "Meet the Philosopher Who's a Favorite of Steve Bannon and Mussolini". The Forward. Retrieved 23 August 2017.
- ^ Horowitz, Jason (11 February 2017). "Thinker loved by fascists like Mussolini is on Stephen Bannon's reading list". BostonGlobe.com. New York Times. Retrieved 23 August 2017.