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the tortellini of Emilia. Tortellini were the chief specialty of the
sagre
of “red Emilia Romagna”! They were an icon of the partisan movement, a symbol of democracy, the banner of the revolutionary struggle!
    In attacking Emilian tortellini, D’Alema, a Roman, had probably not predicted the severity of the blow when he stated point-blank (just before being elected president of the Council of Ministers!) that he did not intend to cry over “a Left made up of liberal militants capable only of distributing flyers, putting up posters, and making tortellini.” 2 Such skills, D’Alema declared, were not enough “to lead the nation.”
    As it turns out, in all probability he was the one this declaration prevented from leading the nation. The government of D’Alema lasted less time than expected (from October 27, 1998, to December 18, 1999), and one of the causes of its downfall was the lack of support on the part of the Emilian hard core, made up of former partisans and their supporters: voters from the central “tortellini” regions, who did not have much liking for D’Alema to begin with and who, after hearing speeches like this, definitively turned their backs on him. It would have been difficult to wound these voters more painfully. And in fact the former Communist mayor of Bologna, Guido Fanti, hurled a fierce reply back to D’Alema: “If we hadn’t cooked our tortellini, you wouldn’t be there.” 3
    Indro Montanelli, immediately grasping the gaffe of the leader of the Left, indicated in an article that, by raising his hand against Emilian tortellini, D’Alema had attacked something sacred. 4 But the DS leader stubbornly did not give up: “There is a difference between a tortellino of government and a tortellino of the struggle.” 5
    The Left was defeated a few months after these sacrilegious statements about Emilian tortellini, and Bologna, a red stronghold for forty years, was also swept up in the fall. The new anti-Communist mayor of Bologna (the first of the postwar period), Giorgio Guazzaloca, a butcher, sausage maker, and veal cutlet pounder, was advised by judicious individuals to publicly proclaim his devotion to tortellini. 6
    Tortellini forever, as long as Italy reigns! When at the end of 2000 the anti-globalists organized pickets in front of McDonald’s (see “The Later Gifts from America”) to coincide with the conference of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in Bologna, tortellini were distributed gratis in front of the American fast-food outlets. 7 It was an expression of class struggle, of revolutionary ardor, of popular pride. The trumpet of battle sounded and the “tortellino of the struggle,” rejected by D’Alema, resumed its rightful place.
    Like the many cultural activities that inevitably conclude with refreshments, local
sagre
in honor of a city’s patron saints, like Communist rallies, project a clear symbol of social reconciliation. Psychologists, sociologists, philosophers, and writers (such as Elias Canetti) describe how these events dissolve and extinguish conflict, creating a mollified public. The common celebration of religious rites and, on a secondary level, the convivial banquet can have this effect on the population. The crowd rejoices, forming an immense Rabelaisian collective body. It reconciles, eating an enormous communal meal: a roasted wild boar, a colossal fried fish, a gigantic frittata, a gargantuan polenta, a cyclopean mountain of pasta. In many cases the
sagra
represents a collective religious celebration (in honor of the local saint), in others the common exaltation of political ideas (the feasts of
L’Unità
, the anti-globalist tortellini), but in all cases it culminates in the consumption of a ton of good food. As a result,
sagre
are a very strong ennobling and reconciling force.
    What’s more,
sagre
and political picnics disseminate