At 10:47 PM on July 25, 1943, Italians were suddenly compelled to confront Fascism as the past. An extraordinary radio broadcast announced to the nation that Benito Mussolini had been removed from office. Moments later, millions took to the streets in celebration, smashing statues, burning Fascist Party cards, chanting and singing, and beating anyone in a black shirt. Mussolini's regime of two decades seemed to have melted away in a matter of hours. For the next forty-five days, Italians experienced an intermezzo marked by extreme emotions, unstable values and relationships, and potent debates over their society's past, present, and future.

Forty-Five Days explores the immediate aftermath of the Italian Fascist regime, from the fall of Mussolini on July 25th to the Armistice of September 8th. This fine-grained narrative tells the story of this fascinating, tumultuous moment as it unfolded through the voices of ordinary people: factory workers, peasants, soldiers, and schoolchildren; staunch Fascists and fervent anti-Fascists; Northerners and Southerners; Catholics and Jews. Crowds celebrated the restoration of freedom and anticipated a new era of peace and stability, but they also faced the challenge of how to reestablish its political, social, and moral foundations. Who had been a true Fascist and who remained uncompromised? How should communities cleanse themselves and rebuild after two decades of authoritarian rule? What should come next for the nation's leadership? Italians of all stripes confronted these fundamental questions.

Drawing on diaries, letters, legal records, police reports, and oral histories, Joshua Arthurs reconstructs the collapse of the first modern state to declare itself totalitarian and the social wreckage left in its wake.