Word: communisme
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...glorious Sixties. Instead, she grew up as a mildly disgruntled member of the silent generation, rousing herself to march sluggishly in the Rear Guard of the New Left. Then feminism revolutionized her life. She re-examined her political roots and the result is The Romance of American Communism...
...material Gornick extracts from the interviews, she presents a fairly standard interpretation of the Party's appeal in the '30s, when many of her subjects signed on. Time and time again, the former Party members recall the Depression, the Spanish Civil War and the rise of European fascism. Communism seemed a viable alternative. Looking back 40 years later, a surprising number of those she interviewed still believed that Revolution--not merely Prosperity--then lurked around the corner...
...weave numerous interviews together in a readable fashion. One wishes, nonetheless, that Gornick devised transitions more imaginative than bulletins announcing with which ex-Communist she drank coffee and with whom she guzzled Scotch. Descriptions of living room decor also fail to enhance the reader's understanding of American Communism's nature, romantic or otherwise. And, in most instances, her discourses on her subjects' family histories are of interest only to an eager parlor Freudian...
...politics are clearly to the left of center. She wants to believe that men and women will continue to struggle to overcome the "warring elements of the race to humanize itself." She turns to passion and hope as a means to this end. The Romance of American Communism lacks coherence, though, because of its purgative function for the author. Gornick cannot overcome the contradictions inherent in her dual role as an intellectual critic and a sentimental admirer. For despite her ideological opposition to American Communism as she has known it, she remains an emotional fellow traveler...
...about their political future. Says one writer: "Sometimes when I wake up pessimistic in the morning, I wonder what will happen after Kádár. The problem is that you cannot make him into an institution." Perhaps the only thing that Hungarians can count on is that Communism will continue to rule their lives, and that whoever rules the party dares not risk offending Moscow. The Soviets keep 90,000 troops encamped on Magyar soil...