Renzo Novatore

• Region — Western Philosophy • Era — 20th-century philosophy • Name — Renzo Novatore • Born — 12 May 1890 • Birthplace — Arcola, Liguria, Italy • Died — 29 November 1922 • Place of death — Genoa, Italy • School Tradition — Individualist anarchism, Egoist anarchism, Futurism, Existentialism • Main Interests — The individual, ethics, nihilism • Notable Ideas — The creative nothing

Abele Ricieri Ferrari was born in Arcola, Liguria, Italy on May 12, 1890, in a poor peasant family. He did not adjust to school discipline and quit in the first year, never coming back after that. While he worked in his father's farm, he self-educated with an emphasis on poetry and philosophy. Around his town, he was surrounded by a vibrant anarchist scene, which he started to come close to.

He discovered Max Stirner, Errico Malatesta, Peter Kropotkin, Henrik Ibsen, and Friedrich Nietzsche, whom Novatore often quoted. From 1908 on, he embraced individualist anarchism. In 1910, he was charged with the burning of a local church and spent three months in prison, but his participation in the fire was never proven. A year later, he went on the run for several months because the police wanted him for theft and robbery. On September 30, 1911, the police arrested him for vandalism. He justified refusal of work and he thought, in his personal philosophy of life, that he had the right to expropriate from the rich what he needed for his daily survival, and using force wasn't a problem for him. In 1914, he began to write for anarchist papers. He was drafted in 1912 but quickly discharged for unknown causes. As the Great War approached he deserted his regiment on April 26, 1918, and was sentenced to death by a military tribunal for desertion and high treason on October 31. He left his village and fled, propagating the desertion from the Army and the armed uprising against the state. Novatore was married with two children at the time and when his younger son died in the last months of 1918, Novatore came back to his home, risking arrest only to give him a last goodbye. He was involved in an anarcho-futurist collective in La Spezia which he led (along with Auro d'Arcola) to be active in the militant anti-fascist Arditi del Popolo. He was close friends with Enzo Martucci and Bruno Filippi. Renzo Novatore wrote for many anarchist papers (Cronaca Libertaria, Il Libertario, Iconoclastal, Gli Scamiciati, Nichilismo, Pagine Libere) where he debated with other anarchists (among them Camillo Berneri). He published a magazine, Vertice, which has been lost apart from few articles. Novatore collaborated in the individualist anarchist journal Iconoclasta! alongside the young Stirnerist illegalist Bruno Filippi.

In May 1919, the city of La Spezia fell under the control of a self-proclaimed Revolutionary Committee, and Novatore fought alongside it. On June 30, 1919, he was hidden in a hut in the country near the city of Sarzana. A farmer told the police about him, and he was sentenced to ten years in prison, but was released in a general amnesty a few months later. He decided to go underground as fascism rose in Italy, and in 1922, he joined the gang of the famous robber of anarchist inspiration Sante Pollastro. Novatore was killed in an ambush by carabinieri in Teglia, near Genoa, on November 29, 1922, while with Pollastro, but Pollastro managed to escape. On Novatore's body, the detectives found some false documents, a Browning gun with two full magazines, one hand grenade, and a ring with a secret container filled with a lethal dose of cyanide.