Word: commissar
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...Koestler, one of the best political-novelists of the last decade (Darkness at Noon), is also a stubborn, highly independent thinker-a religious skeptic whose materialism is spiced with idealistic fervor, a radical in search of something to replace his lost faith in Communism. In The Yogi and the Commissar (TIME, June 4, 1945) Koestler tried to find a workable compromise between the pure, but passive life of the sage, and the earthy, but highly active existence of the political reformer. In his new book he stabs at a more ambitious project-"an inclusive theory of ethics, esthetics, and creative...
...indignation of all his friends, he sent his harem packing, broke himself of the opium habit. He went to Europe, studied in Moscow at the Eastern Toilers' Institute. In 1931, he was made commander in chief of the Chinese Red army, while Mao became political commissar. Chinese peasant legends, gleefully fostered by Communists, attribute superhuman powers to Chu-he could fly, he could see 100 li (33 miles) in all directions; he could stir dustclouds or winds against an enemy...
When nearby Yenching University was occupied, the commissar of local Red forces called on the university's administrative committee. He apologized for interruption of electric service and promised the university would have current from the newly captured Peiping power station within three days...
...Quiet." Speaking at a mass meeting of Yenching students, the commissar said Chinese Reds desired friendly relations with all foreign countries, including the U.S., and eventually hope to be admitted into the United Nations. The speech avoided all the usual attacks on "American imperialism." A few days later the same commissar visited neighboring Tsinghua University, a Chinese government institution, and made the same professions of Communist respectability. The fact that his first concern had been for American-endowed Yenching was not lost on the courtesy-sensitive Chinese...
...years ago. After Mussolini marched on Rome in 1922 Vidali got away to Moscow, for three years of study. In 1926, as Emilio Sormenti, he turned up in the U.S. and in 1927 fled to avoid deportation. Ten years later, in the Spanish civil war, he was Carlos Contreras, commissar of the Fifth Loyalist Regiment. After Spain he was based in Mexico...