This book testifies to life in the work detachments which made up Italian prisoner of war camp no. PG 146, based at Mortara in the Lomellina - an area of Lombardy to the south west of Milan. In September 1943, when news of the Italian Armistice reached the detachments, the prisoners escaped into the countryside and depended on the local people for food, clothing and shelter in the difficult months which followed, during which the occupying German forces hunted them down and sent those unfortunate enough to be recaptured to the Stalags. But there were some who managed to cross the Italian Alps into Switzerland, others who stayed in hiding with local families and one who travelled travelled hundreds of kilometres to reach the Allied Lines. The author's mother and her family hid three South Africans, and with the help of an underground movement set up for the purpose, all of them made it over the mountains to freedom.

The only study to date on Italian POWs in the United States, this book records the history of the 50,000 Italian prisoners of war who were captured in North Africa during fighting in the desert and shipped to the United States as POWs. After Italy surrendered to the Allies and declared war on Germany, 35,000 POWs worked with the U.S. Army as cooperators in Italian Service Units serving on Army posts throughout the United States. The 15,000 non-cooperators remained in stockades until their release in 1945 and 1946. The text itself is more than 50 percent oral history and is based largely on interviews with nearly 50 former POWs, their friends and families, and the U.S. civilian and military personnel who worked with them. Many of the POWs returned to the United States after the war (some as male war brides). Every individual interviewed has a colorful, vivid, emotional story to tell of his experience with bullets and bombs, with the dead and the dying, and about the trauma of captivity. The interviews and archival data indicate that the United States treated its POWs very well for the most part, with a couple of dreadful exceptions, and that the POWs' participation helped us to win the war. Italian-Americans interested in their heritage and students of World War II will find these unique stories compelling and informative.

During World War II, the US government interned more than 1,200 captured Italian soldiers at the Letterkenny Army Ordnance Depot located near Chambersburg, Pennsylvania. These troops collaborated with the United States in a collective effort to defeat the Axis powers. They formed the 321st Italian Quartermaster Battalion, and their work consisted mainly of stocking and shipping materials--ammunition, military vehicles, weapons, and machinery parts--to the war fronts in the European and Pacific theaters of operation. For entertainment, the soldiers formed an orchestra and band and for sport, several different company soccer teams. As a sign of their faith, they built a chapel and bell tower, which are still used today. Many POWs forged deep friendships with Americans, and after the war, a few married their sweethearts and returned to live in the United States. Today, warm relations still continue between children and grandchildren of the POWs and the wider Chambersburg community.

During World War II 51,000 Italian prisoners of war were detained in the United States. When Italy signed an armistice with the Allies in September 1943, most of these soldiers agreed to swear allegiance to the United States and to collaborate in the fight against Germany. At the Letterkenny Army Depot, located near Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, more than 1,200 Italian soldiers were detained as co-operators. They arrived in May 1944 to form the 321st Italian Quartermaster Battalion and remained until October 1945. As detainees, the soldiers helped to order, stock, repair, and ship military goods, munitions and equipment to the Pacific and European Theaters of war. Through such labor, they lent their collective energy to the massive home front endeavor to defeat the Axis Powers. The prisoners also helped to construct the depot itself, building roads, sidewalks, and fences, along with individual buildings such as an assembly hall, amphitheater, swimming pool, and a chapel and bell tower. The latter of these two constructions still exist, and together with the assembly hall, bear eloquent testimony to the Italian POW experience. For their work the Italian co-operators received a very modest, regular salary, and they experienced more freedom than regular POWs. In their spare time, they often had liberty to leave the post in groups that American soldiers chaperoned. Additionally, they frequently received or visited large entourages of Italian Americans from the Mid-Atlantic region who were eager to comfort their erstwhile countrymen. The story of these Italian soldiers detained at Letterkenny has never before been told. Now, however, oral histories from surviving POWs, memoirs generously donated by family members of ex-prisoners, and the rich information newly available from archival material in Italy, aided by material found in the U.S., have made it possible to reconstruct this experience in full. All of this historical documentation has also allowed the authors to tell fascinating individual stories from the moment when many POWs were captured to their return to Italy and beyond. More than seventy years since the end of World War II, family members of ex-POWs in both the United States and Italy still enjoy the positive legacy of this encounter.

“Even after capture, the full horrors of war still persisted. Bombed and strafed by our own planes, and shelled by our own artillery, the words ‘For you the war is over, Tommy,’ had a hollow ring...November 1942, after five months in Suani Ben Adem, we sailed from Tripoli, en route to Naples. We were held in the hold of a coal boat, battened down, with only a few buckets for sanitation purposes. Packed in like sardines, we would have had no chance of survival, had the ship come under attack from the Royal Navy, not an uncommon occurrence.” These are the words of Private Bill Blewitt, 1st Battalion, The Sherwood Foresters, captured near Gazala in the Western Desert. He survived his capture, but over a thousand did not. Laid to rest alongside the battle casualties in the Commonwealth War Graves Cemeteries in Italy are these prisoners of war. They died from neglected wounds or diseases, were accidentally or deliberately shot both inside and outside their camps or were victims of friendly fire incidents. Some lost their lives when trying to cross the mountains to freedom, and some were betrayed by spies. Some had taken up arms again, had fought with the partisans and had died alongside them. Others had been captured whilst on dangerous missions and summarily executed. Many, but not all, have a name.

In addition to the presentation speeches and the Nobel lectures, these volumes also provide brief biographies and the Nobel laureates' own accounts of their many years of preparation and effort that led to their achievements.Equally important to our understanding of history and humanity are the great works of literature. The Nobel Prize for literature recognizes modern classics and the efforts of authors to bridge gaps between different cultures, time-periods and styles.Below is a list of the prizewinners during the period 1996 ? 2000.(1996) WISLAWA SZYMBORSKA ? for poetry that with ironic precision allows the historical and biological context to come to light in fragments of human reality; (1997) DARIO FO ? who emulates the jesters of the Middle Ages in scourging authority and upholding the dignity of the down-trodden; (1998) JOS SARAMAGO ? who with parables sustained by imagination, compassion and irony continually enables us once again to apprehend an elusory reality; (1999) GšNTER GRASS ? whose frolicsome black fables portray the forgotten face of history; (2000) GAO XINGJIAN ? for an oeuvre of universal validity, bitter insights and linguistic ingenuity, which has opened new paths for the Chinese novel and drama.