Ana Pauker: The Rise and Fall of a Jewish Communist [Hardcover]

Robert Levy (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0520223950 | ISBN-13: 978-0520223950 | Publication Date: March 22, 2001 | Edition: 1

In her own day, Ana Pauker was named "The Most Powerful Woman in the World" by Time magazine. Today, when she is remembered at all, she is thought of as the puppet of Soviet communism in Romania, blindly enforcing the most brutal and repressive Stalinist regime. Robert Levy's new biography changes the picture dramatically, revealing a woman of remarkable strength, dominated by conflict and contradiction far more than by dogmatism. Telling the story of Pauker's youth in an increasingly anti-Semitic environment, her commitment to a revolutionary career, and her rise in the Romanian Communist movement, Levy makes no attempt to whitewash Pauker's life and actions, but rather explores every contour of the complicated persona he found expressed in masses of newly accessible archival documents.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Virtually unknown internationally today, Pauker appeared on a 1948 Time cover, described inside as "the most powerful woman alive." In Romania, she's remembered as a dogmatic, fanatically subservient Stalinist, emblematic of the terror and repression of the 1947-1952 period in which she served as foreign minister and more briefly as de facto behind-the-scenes leader. Levy easily refutes this image, since Pauker was purged on Stalin's urging precisely for being too soft. What's more difficult is to discover who she really was. Levy concisely describes the recurrent, historically precarious position of European Jews as social pioneers eventually viciously displaced as "parasites" a pattern repeated with revolutionaries like Pauker. Though ultimately unsuccessful in avoiding this fate, she displayed high levels of historical self-awareness, acting in often surprising ways. The central chapters explore her roles in agriculture, party purges and Jewish emigration, which provoked the major accusations against her. As agriculture secretary she opposed forced collectivization and supported higher prices for agricultural products; as a party leader, she opposed the purge of popular leader Lucretiu Patrascanu and the foreign, disproportionately Jewish veterans of the Spanish Civil War and the French Resistance, while her complex relations to her Jewish heritage, identity and compatriots were typically demonized by the anti-Semitism that doomed her. Though Pauker the person remains enigmatic, the political figure's complexities and contradictions, as portrayed by Levy, belie the caricature her homeland clings to, and challenge simplistic notions of the Cold War's darkest hours. 20 b&w photos, 1 map. (Mar.)
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

In his introduction, Levy describes Ana Pauker as "the daughter of poor religious Jews rising to the pinnacle of power in a country traditionally disdainful of both Jews and women." Officially Romania's foreign minister from 1947 to 1952--the first woman to hold such a post--Pauker was actually the unofficial head of Romania's Communist Party after World War II, and for a number of years she was the country's true behind-the-scenes leader. Levy examines Pauker's life and career; the evidence reveals a person characterized more by contradictions than by dogmatism, a Communist leader fanatically loyal to Stalin and the Soviet Union but actively opposing the Stalinist line and deliberately defying Soviet directives on a number of important issues. The remainder of the study covers her years in power and subsequent purge. The book will be of interest to students of the history of communism in Eastern Europe and of one of its most important figures. George Cohen
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 419 pages
• Publisher: University of California Press; 1 edition (March 22, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0520223950
• ISBN-13: 978-0520223950
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.1 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,225,828 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #100 in Books > History > Europe > Romania

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars from a, October 20, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Ana Pauker: The Rise and Fall of a Jewish Communist (Hardcover)

Sorry, no arguments will convince me to relativize the following fact: at the time of her political activity, Ana Pauker had to know the criminal (genocidal, to be accurate) nature of the political party she was a leader of. My mother still cringes when she remembers the slogan "Ana Pauker si cu Dej - baga spaima in burgeji" (Ana Pauker and [Gheorghiu] Dej scare the bourgeois) cried out at forced mass rallies. The "bourgeois" mentioned in this aggresive rhime had reasons to be scared of Pauker. Hundreds of thousands Romanians are estimated to have been emprisoned for political reasons, thousands of them tortured and killed, burried without a grave. Pauker believed she can "change things from inside?". Would _you_ join the Nazi party (for example) to improve its ethics???

6 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Explosive and Informative, March 25, 2004

By 

Cal (Los Angeles, CA.) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Ana Pauker: The Rise and Fall of a Jewish Communist (Hardcover)

"Ana Pauker" is an excellent and compelling biography that blows old notions about East European communists out of the water. While hardly glossing over Ana Pauker's serious delusions and often cynical compromises, Robert Levy meticulously and convincingly demonstrates that Pauker was remarkably resistant to Soviet dictates during the most perilous years of Stalin's reign. This is a fascinating, well-written account based on recently unearthed communist archives and personal interviews of participants and eye-witnesses. Anyone interested in communist history or contemporary East European Jewish history will find this book utterly informative.

2 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Explosive and Compelling, March 25, 2004

By 

Roberta (Los Angeles, CA.) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Ana Pauker: The Rise and Fall of a Jewish Communist (Hardcover)

"Ana Pauker" is an excellent and compelling account that blows old notions of East European communists out of the water. While not glossing over Ana Pauker's serious delusions and often cynical compromises, Robert Levy convincingly demonstrates that Pauker was remarkably resistant to Soviet dictates during the most perilous period of Stalin's reign. Meticulously documented with a massive amount of archival documents and interviews of participants and eye-witnesses, this wonderfully written book is a must-read for anyone interested in communist and East European Jewish history.