Word: widowing
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...asked directly. "Liang's book may present an inglorious picture of China's past, but political changes after Mao's death make such a picture politically safe for the author. Deng Xiao-Ping, the new premier, entered office with a movement to discredit the "leftist" policies of Mao's widow, Jiang Qing, and her "Gang of Four", Liang sees those policies as the source of the problems he narrates, and properly disassociates the new from the old regime. Significantly, the book shows almost no opinion on the new regime or its policies, and that reticence renders many of Liang...
...leniency now? One reason is that Mao is still widely revered in China, and the execution of his widow would be seen as a dishonor to his memory. It might also make her something of a martyr and inflame those ultraleftists now in hiding. By sparing her, the new government can reinforce its image of moderation and self-confidence. Says a Chinese official: "A political consideration is, of course, foremost: to preserve the current unity and stability in our country. Besides, she no longer has the ability to stir up trouble...
...which lock up proceeds from books and other ventures to satisfy claims by victims or their survivors. One such moneyed killer is Jack Henry Abbott, author of the prison memoir In the Belly the Beast, who stabbed an aspiring actor to death in New York City in 1981. The widow, Ricci Adan, is using New York's Son of Sam law as one basis for getting damages from Abbott...
...anyway. Explained their lawyer, William McKenney: "The public thinks that when they see a blue uniform they can take a punch at it, that the police officer can take it. But police officers want to be treated as human beings." Nor was money the whole point when Elliott Jones, widow of Washington Cardiologist and Author Michael Halberstam, sued her husband's killer, a millionaire burglar named Bernard Welch. Jones won a $5.7 million award, but the IRS has first claim on Welch's assets. Even if she never gets a penny, Jones found a different recompense. "It gives...
...very little of either to the subjects of this memoir. Among the three "difficult women" in question, only Feminist Germaine Greer emerges from Plante's portrayal with a shred or two of personal dignity. Novelist Jean Rhys, who died in 1979, and Sonia Orwell, George Orwell's widow, who died a year later, have been observed in the distorting half-light of their declining days, when illness and alcoholism had served to dim the mind and obscure the spirit...