Leo Longanesi: 120 Years Since the Birth of an Anticonformist Intellectual

Leo Longanesi, born on August 30, 1905, in Bagnacavallo, was an Italian writer, journalist, painter, publisher, and aphorist, who passed away in Milan in 1957. He grew up in a prosperous family in Romagna. In the 1920s, while in Bologna, he encountered key figures, including painter Giorgio Morandi. Longanesi made his mark in literary journalism, contributing to the fascist magazine L'Assalto starting in 1924 and taking the helm in 1929. He founded L'Italiano in 1926 and created the innovative weekly Omnibus, which ran from 1937 to 1939. After World War II, he launched Longanesi & C. in 1946 and introduced Il Borghese in 1950. He famously criticized the industrial growth of the 1950s, declaring, "It is not freedom that is missing; free men are missing."