Byline: Paul Bailey

1912 + 1 by Leonardo Sciascia Carcanet Pounds 10.95 pp133, TO EACH HIS OWN by Leonardo Sciascia Carcanet Pounds 10.95 pp146, AGES APART by Enrico Palandri Collins Harvill Pounds 11.95 pp192, LINES OF LIGHT by Daniele Del Giudice Vikin g Pounds 11.95 pp154 .

Leonardo Sciascia's subtle novel, 1912 + 1, written like so much of his recent fiction in the form of a discursive essay, is a sustained attack on the ``airin ess'' of the literature and politics of Gabriele D'Annunzio, whose dire influenc e persists in Italy to this day.

The title is explained on the very first page: 13 is an unlucky number in northern Italy, and in 1913 D'Annunzio inscribed a c opy of one of his many books with the date ``1912 + 1''. Sciascia maintains that 1913 was, in retrospect at least, a lucky year for the self-proclaimed superman , in spite of the fact that his inability to pay his debts had sent him into exi le in Arcachon. Universal suffrage came to Italy in 1913, and with it the notori ous Gentiloni Pact, the first in a long line of ``transactions, reconciliations and agreements accompanied by a more or less clamorous publicity''. Only in Bolo gna did socialism prevail: in the rest of the country the stage was set for fasc ism.

1912 + 1 is a characteristically short work, but it is dense with historical and political allusion. At its centre is an account of the trial of Signora Maria Oggioni, born Contessa Maria Tiepolo, for...