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	<title>Centre for Romanian Studies &#187; &#8220;Centre for Romanian Stdudies &#8211; London&#8221;</title>
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		<title>Romanian-Jewish Topics (Part I)</title>
		<link>http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/2009/05/romanian-jewish-topics-part-i/</link>
		<comments>http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/2009/05/romanian-jewish-topics-part-i/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 10 May 2009 22:21:51 +0000</pubDate>
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				<category><![CDATA[Books]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA["Ana Pauker"]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA["Blouse Roumaine - the Unsung Voices of Romanian Women"]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[Tags: "Blouse Roumaine"]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[“Helen O'Brien”]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[“Ioana Raluca Voicu-Arnàutoiu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Ionela Manolesco”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Irina Codreanu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Lady Florence Baker”]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[“Lena Constante”]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[“Lilly Marcou”]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[“Lizica Codreanu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Lola Bobesco”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Lucia Hossu-Longin”]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[“Lucretia Jurj”]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[“Madeleine Cancicov”]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[“Pss Georges Ghika”]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[“Rodica Dràghincescu”]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[“Sabina Wurmbrand”]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[“Sandra Cotovu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Silvia Constantinescu”]]></category>
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		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/2009/05/romanian-jewish-topics-part-i/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Romanian-Jewish Topics (Part One of Two): Quotations from an Alternative Anthology: “Blouse Roumaine – the Unsung Voices of Romanian Women” Presented and edited by Constantin Roman, Preface by Catherine Durandin, published by the Centre for Romanian Studies (London), 2009 1,100 pages, 160 biographies, 600 quotations, 4,000 references, credits, discography and URLs , 6 Indexes http://www.blouseroumaine.com/orderthebook_p1.html [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<div id="attachment_461" class="wp-caption alignleft" style="width: 234px"><a href="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/rosenthal12.jpg"><img class="size-medium wp-image-461" title="rosenthal12" src="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/rosenthal12-224x300.jpg" alt="Daniel Rosenthal - 'Revolutionary Romania' (19th c)" width="224" height="300" /></a><p class="wp-caption-text">Daniel Rosenthal - &#39;Revolutionary Romania&#39; (19th c)</p></div>
<p>Romanian-Jewish Topics (Part One of Two):<br />
Quotations from an Alternative Anthology:<br />
“<strong>Blouse Roumaine – the Unsung Voices of Romanian Women”</strong></p>
<p>Presented and edited by <strong>Constantin Roman, Preface by Catherine Durandin,</strong> published by the Centre for Romanian Studies (London), 2009</p>
<p><strong>1,100 pages, 160 biographies, 600 quotations, 4,000 references, credits, discography and URLs , 6 Indexes</strong></p>
<p>http://www.blouseroumaine.com/orderthebook_p1.html</p>
<p>&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8211;<strong> </strong></p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<div id="attachment_472" class="wp-caption alignleft" style="width: 247px"><strong><strong><a href="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/lauren-bacall.jpg"><img class="size-medium wp-image-472" title="lauren-bacall" src="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/lauren-bacall-237x300.jpg" alt="Lauren Bacall, Movie Star (Lauren's mother was born in Romania and migrated to New York with her parents." width="237" height="300" /></a></strong></strong><p class="wp-caption-text">Lauren Bacall, Movie Star (Lauren&#39;s mother was born in Romania and migrated to New York with her parents.</p></div>
<p><strong>Lauren BACALL,</strong></p>
<p>“Betty” (née Betty Joan Perske), Miss Betty Bacall, Mrs. Humphrey Bogart, (b. New York, 16 September 1924)<br />
First-generation Romanian-American, film star, wife of Humphrey Bogart</p>
<p><strong>Romanian immigrants:</strong></p>
<p><em>Mother left Romania by ship – aged somewhere between one and two – with her father, mother, elder sister, baby brother. Her father had been in the wheat business, had been wiped out, and had turned out whatever silver and jewellery there was left to a sister for money, enough to transport his family to the promised land – the New World – America. They arrived in Ellis Island and gave their name – Weinstein Bacal (meaning wineglass in German and Russian). The man must have written down just the first half of the name – too many people from too many countries, too many foreign names  &#8211; so it was Max and Sophie Weinstein, daughters Renée and Natalie’s, son Albert.</em><br />
(Lauren Bacall <em>By Myself,</em> pp. 5, Jonathan Cape, London, 1979)<br />
<strong> </strong></p>
<p><strong>Happy Times:</strong><br />
<em>We had happy times, my grandmother cooking, singing German songs, reading constantly in French, German, Romanian, Russian and English. She and mother spoke Romanian and German when she did not want me to understand.</em><br />
(Lauren Bacall, <em>By Myself,</em> op.cit. 5)</p>
<p>Read more about Lauren Bacall:</p>
<p>http://www.blouseroumaine.com/orderthebook_p1.html</p>
<p>&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;-</p>
<p><strong>Georgeta (Georgette) CANCICOV</strong>, née Maria Jurgea<br />
“The Angel Saviour of Moldavian Jews”<br />
(b. 29 May 1899, Godinesti, County Bacàu – d. Bucharest, 16 April 1984),<br />
Novelist, essayist, violinist, nurse in WWI, wife of Liberal justice minister and politician Mircea Cancicov</p>
<p><strong>Georgeta Cancicov &#8211; Saviour of Moldavian Jews:</strong><br />
<em>Taking advantage of the fact that Marshall Antonescu stayed at her house whenever he visited Bacàu and given the good relationship she had with him, Mrs. Cancicov interceded robustly and ensured that no ghettos be set up in Moldavia.<br />
(…)<br />
Then, there was the question raised that  Jewish women be  forced to perform labour in town. We again interceded with Mrs. Cancicov in a petition addressed to Marshall Antonescu, who decreed that the women should only do such work as befitting their profession, which was a gain in our favour.<br />
(…)<br />
On the eve of 22nd August 1944, there was an order to evacuate all Jews. (Consequently), on the morning of 23rd August, in the courtyard of the Church of Our Lady,  a detachment of 600 Jews was gathered for evacuation. You can imagine their distress, as they had to leave behind their families and be driven among (the retreating) Hitler’s armies. As I intervened with Mrs. Cancicov, she communicated  to me in writing that no Jews should be evacuated and I presented this order to the (military) commander. He checked with Mrs Cancicov, who confirmed, on her authority, that nobody should go, so he freed everybody. As a result no Jews from the any other detachments were evacuated either.<br />
(…)<br />
Of course, there were countless other little matters on which Mrs. Cancicov acted as the protecting angel and saviour of our wretched and oppressed Jewish people.</em><br />
(D. Ionas, President of the Jewish community of Bacàu, Petition to the Prefect of the County Bacàu, dated 9th September 1945, in favour of Georgeta Cancicov, whose house was requisitioned by the Soviet Army, quoted by the Memoria)<br />
(http://www.memoria.ro/?location=view_article&amp;id=821&amp;l=ro)</p>
<p><strong>Jewish Ghettos:</strong><br />
<em>There will be no Jewish ghettos set up here: (I defy you, that) should there ever be any of these set up, then I am going to be an inmate in one of them myself.</em><br />
(Georgeta Cancicov, reassurance given to Schiller, the representative of the Jewish Community in Bacàu, quoted by D. Ionas, op.cit)</p>
<p>Read more about Georgeta Cancicov:</p>
<p>http://www.blouseroumaine.com/orderthebook_p1.html</p>
<p>&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;-</p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<div id="attachment_469" class="wp-caption alignleft" style="width: 165px"><strong><strong><a href="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/ninacassian1.jpg"><img class="size-full wp-image-469" title="ninacassian1" src="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/ninacassian1.jpg" alt="Nina Cassian, Poet" width="155" height="147" /></a></strong></strong><p class="wp-caption-text">Nina Cassian, - a successful Poet under dictatorship, who sought refuge in America at the end of Communism</p></div>
<p><strong>Nina CASSIAN</strong> (Renée Annie Cassian)<br />
(b. 27 November 1924, Galati),<br />
Poet, novelist, translator, composer, exile and now expatriate living in New York since 1985</p>
<p><strong>Conviction:</strong><br />
<em>I worked to be understood by the farmers and workers, I was torturing myself and distorting my artistry. Some of us Romanian writers did it with conviction. That was the worst.</em><br />
(Nina Cassian)</p>
<p><strong>Excluded:</strong><br />
<em>They don&#8217;t want me there, I&#8217;m not sure why. They used to consider me eccentric and rebellious&#8230;But now maybe it&#8217;s because they resent that I&#8217;m living a better life in America.</em><br />
(Nina Cassian)</p>
<p><strong>Uprooting:</strong><br />
<em>It is a terrible tragedy, at age 60, to leave one’s country and live in a place where one is surrounded by a foreign language and with two impossible professions &#8212; poetry and classical music, I have had my share of fame and glory, and didn&#8217;t expect more.</em><br />
(Nina Cassian)</p>
<p>Read more about Nina Cassian:</p>
<p>http://www.blouseroumaine.com/orderthebook_p1.html</p>
<p>&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;-</p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<div id="attachment_477" class="wp-caption alignright" style="width: 129px"><strong><strong><a href="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/maria_forescu.png"><img class="size-full wp-image-477" title="maria_forescu" src="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/maria_forescu.png" alt="Maria Forescu, Romanian Movie star of the silent cinema: died at Buchenwald" width="119" height="166" /></a></strong></strong><p class="wp-caption-text">Maria Forescu, Romanian Movie star of the silent cinema: died at Buchenwald</p></div>
<p><strong>Maria FORESCU</strong> (née Maria Füllenbaum)<br />
(15 Jan 1875 Cernàuti, Bukowina –  (?) 23 November 1943, Buchenwald Concentration Camp, Thuringia, Germany)<br />
Movie star, operetta singer, Nazi concentration camp detainee, killed at Buchenwald</p>
<p><em>Maria Forescu (née Maria Füllenbaum) is one of Europe’s earliest stars of the silent movie. She dedicated herself to her career with great zest,  acting  in over one hundred and sixty films from 1911 to 1933, a thread which was abruptly severed by  Nazi censorship which resulted in her  dramatic deportation to  the infamous Buchenwald cocentration camp where she was killed ten years later, in 1943.</em><br />
(Extract from the Biography of Maria Forescu published in “Blouse Roumaine – the Unsung Voices of Romanian Women”, 2009)</p>
<p>Read more about Maria Forescu:</p>
<p>http://www.blouseroumaine.com/orderthebook_p1.html</p>
<p>&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8211;</p>
<p><strong> Nicoleta (Nicolette) Franck</strong> (née Apotheker/Apoteker)<br />
(b. 21st July 1920, Iasi, România)<br />
Lawyer, political analyst, journalist, translator, exile in Switzerland</p>
<p><strong>Political illiteracy:</strong><br />
<em>The tragedy of the vote  (for presidential elections) of 26th November 2000 cannot be explained in any other way than in the perspective of the political illiteracy of the Romanian people. Our schools had not yet made good the teaching of history, and so distorted has it remained that our past is not correctly understood and thus we cannot shape the present or  have a glimmer in the future.</em><br />
(Nicoleta Franck)</p>
<p><strong>Rumours:</strong><br />
<em>Certainly after half a century of outright lies peddled by the communist régime, Romanians now believe only in rumours rather than public declarations. Consequently they are easily misled through whispered rumours, which are aimed at the calumny of honest people, pointing out their failures rather than at their achievements, &#8211; the latter, alas, being few and far between and rather slow in materializing.</em><br />
(Nicoleta Franck)</p>
<p>Read more about Nicoleta Franck:</p>
<p>http://www.blouseroumaine.com/orderthebook_p1.html</p>
<p>&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;-</p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<div id="attachment_473" class="wp-caption alignleft" style="width: 240px"><strong><strong><a href="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/clara-haskil.jpg"><img class="size-full wp-image-473" title="clara-haskil" src="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/clara-haskil.jpg" alt="Clara Haskil, Romanian born pianist: her talent was discovered by Carmen Sylva, Queen Elisabeth of Romania who gave her a scholarship to study in Vienna." width="230" height="290" /></a></strong></strong><p class="wp-caption-text">Clara Haskil, Romanian born pianist: her talent was discovered by Carmen Sylva, Queen Elisabeth of Romania who gave her a scholarship to study in Vienna.</p></div>
<p><strong>Clara HASKIL,</strong><br />
‘La Princèsse de la Musique’,<br />
‘Clarinette’, (nickname given by Dinu Lipatti)<br />
(b. 7 January, 1895, Bucharest– d. 7 December 1960, Brussels),<br />
Pianist, exile in France and Switzerland</p>
<p><strong>Clara Haskil about Georges Enesco:</strong><br />
<em>I always felt alone when I played with Enesco. I could not see what we had in common. This great man and little me. Yet we were both Romanian, and apparently our playing blended perfectly. But what else? Such a towering figure. And me?</em><br />
(Clara Haskil, ibid.)</p>
<p><strong>Clara Haskil about Dinu Lipatti:</strong><br />
<em>Oh, I could spend hours talking about Dinu. He was always so aware, so alive, in spite of all the terrible pain he had to suffer. And his music-making! I really can’t find the words to describe what I felt whenever I hear him play. I often thought he felt almost guilty he had been blessed with so much genius.”</em><br />
(Clara Haskil, ibid.)</p>
<p><strong>Clara Haskil about Dinu Lipatti:</strong><br />
<em>How much I envy your talent, may the Deuce take it! Must you have so much talent and I so little? Is there justice in this world?</em><br />
(Jean-Yves Conrad, <em>Roumanie, capitale Paris, Guide des promenades insolites, sur les traces des Roumains célèbres de Paris, </em>page 130)</p>
<p>Read more about Clara Haskil:</p>
<p>http://www.blouseroumaine.com/orderthebook_p1.html</p>
<p>&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8211;</p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<div id="attachment_474" class="wp-caption alignleft" style="width: 249px"><strong><strong><a href="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/helen-78919-6b-detail22-11-1934.jpg"><img class="size-medium wp-image-474" title="helen-78919-6b-detail22-11-1934" src="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/helen-78919-6b-detail22-11-1934-239x300.jpg" alt="Helen, Queen Mother of Romania and Mother of King Michael: during WWII she fought fearlessly to save Jewish lives: her tribute is alive at Yad Vashem" width="239" height="300" /></a></strong></strong><p class="wp-caption-text">Helen, Queen Mother of Romania and Mother of King Michael: during WWII she fought fearlessly to save Jewish lives: her tribute is alive at Yad Vashem</p></div>
<p><strong>Princess HELEN of Greece and Denmark,</strong><br />
<strong>Romania’s ‘Queen Mother’</strong> (Regina Mamà Elena)<br />
(b. 2 May 1896, Athens &#8211; d. 28 November 1982, Lausanne, Switzerland)<br />
consort of  King Carol II,</p>
<p><strong>Helen, Queen Mother of Romania, seen by Great Rabbi Alexandru Safran:</strong><br />
<em>I would like to refer to the posthumous award of the title of “The Righteous Among the   Nations” to Helen, Queen Mother of Romania. This letter is meant to bring to the fore two fundamental aspects pertaining to this matter: (1) actions by which the Queen Mother saved the lives of many Jews during the Second World War; (2) the risks personally taken by the Queen Mother in undertaking such actions.” (…)<br />
“Such consciousness of possible risks extended over the whole period between 1941 and 1944. My own contact with the Queen Mother allowed me to gage her sharp and lucid perception of the realities of these unstable and turbulent times and at the same time to be appraised of her apprehensions concerning such risks. I can, at the same time bear witness that the Queen Mother constantly interceded on behalf of the Jews and that she saved Jewish lives in spite of all apprehensions: she was drawn to it by her kindness and her moral values.<br />
Hoping that this letter will be helpful to the Commission of the Righteous Among Nations Award…</em><br />
(Alexandru Safran, Grand Rabbi of Switzerland)</p>
<p>Read more about Helen Queen Mother of Romania:</p>
<p>http://www.blouseroumaine.com/orderthebook_p1.html</p>
<p>&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;-</p>
<p><strong></strong></p>
<div id="attachment_475" class="wp-caption alignright" style="width: 110px"><strong><strong><a href="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/magdaelenalupescu5.jpg"><img class="size-full wp-image-475" title="magdaelenalupescu5" src="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/magdaelenalupescu5.jpg" alt="Lupescu - The indomitable Romanian royal seductress: she became King Carol II third wife: her remains were recently transferred from the Braganza chapel in Lisbon to a monastery in the Carpathians " width="100" height="171" /></a></strong></strong><p class="wp-caption-text">Lupescu - The indomitable Romanian royal seductress: she became King Carol II third wife: her remains were recently transferred from the Braganza chapel in Lisbon to a monastery in the Carpathians </p></div>
<p><strong>Elena LUPESCU,</strong><br />
(née Elena Grünberg, alias ‘Wolf’),<br />
(aka ‘Magda’, aka ‘Duduia’, aka ‘Princess Elena’)<br />
Mrs. Elena Tâmpeanu &#8211; by her first married name<br />
(b. 1896, Herta, România, or 1899, Iasi Moldavia – d. 1977, Estoril, Portugal)<br />
Socialite, royal concubine, third wife of King Carol II, exile</p>
<p><strong>Limerick on Madame Lupescu:</strong><br />
<em>Have you heard of Madam Lupescu,<br />
Who came to Romania’s rescue?<br />
It’s a wonderful thing<br />
To be under a King:<br />
Is Democracy better I ask you?</em><br />
(Anonymous)<br />
<strong></strong></p>
<p><strong>Bleeding:</strong><br />
<em>While he whom I adore, he in whom I put all my hope for the good of my country did not send me a telegram, not even a single line in order to share with me his happiness, happiness to which I had contributed… my heart is sad, it is bleeding because I expected to be the first to whom you would send a telegram.</em><br />
(Elena Lupescu’s letter to Carol, Quoted by Lilly Marcou,<em> Le Roi trahi – Carol II de Roumanie</em>)</p>
<p>Read more about Elena Lupescu:</p>
<p>http://www.blouseroumaine.com/orderthebook_p1.html</p>
<p><strong>Romanian-Jewish Topics</strong>(continued in Part Two):</p>
<p><strong>© copyright Constantin ROMAN, 2003-2009, all rights reserved</strong></p>
]]></content:encoded>
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		<title>ROMANIAN-JEWISH TOPICS: (Part two of two)</title>
		<link>http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/2009/05/romanian-jewish-topics-part-two-of-two/</link>
		<comments>http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/2009/05/romanian-jewish-topics-part-two-of-two/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 10 May 2009 22:15:15 +0000</pubDate>
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				<category><![CDATA[Books]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA["Blouse Roumaine - the Unsung Voices of Romanian Women"]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[“A.lice Steriade Voinescu”]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[“Ana Aslan”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Ana Blandiana”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Ana de România”]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[“Anca Diamandy”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Anca Visdei”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Angela Gheorghiu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Anita Nandris-Cudla”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Anna de Noailles”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Anne-Marie Callimachi”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Annie Samuelli”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Aretia Tàtàrescu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Aurora Fúlgida”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Blouse Roumaine - An Anthology of Romanian Women”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Blouse Roumaine – the Unsung Voices of Romanian Women”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Blouse Roumaine”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Bucura Dumbravà”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Carmen Groza”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Carmen-Daniela Cràsnaru”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Catherine Caradja”]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[“Cella Delavrancea”]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[“Cornelia Pillat”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Countess Leopold Starszensky”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Doina Cornea”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Doina Jela”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Dora d'Istria”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Ecaterina Bàlàcioiu-Lovinescu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Elena Arnàutoiu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Elena Bràtianu- Racottà”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Elena Bràtianu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Elena Caragiani-Stoenescu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Elena Ceausescu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Elena Lupescu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Elena Stefoi”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Elena Theodorini”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Elena Vàcàrescu  “Leontina Vàduva   “Ana Velescu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Elisabeta Rizea”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Elisabeth of Romania”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Elisabeth Roudinesco”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Élise Bràtianu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Elizabeth Asquith Bibesco”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Elvira Popescu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Eugenia Roman”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Florenta Albu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Florica Cristoforeanu   “Pss. Elena Cuza”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Gabriela Adamesteanu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Gabriela Melinescu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Georgeta Cancicov”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Hariclea Darclée”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Helen O'Brien”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Helen of Greece”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Hélène Chrissoveloni”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Henriette-Yvonne Stahl”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Hensi Matisse”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Herta Müller”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Hortense Cornu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Hortensia Papadat-Bengescu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Ileana Cotrubas”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Ileana Màlàncioiu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Ileana of Romania”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Ioana A. Marin”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Ioana Bràtianu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Ioana Celibidache”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Ioana Meitani”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Ioana Raluca Voicu-Arnàutoiu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Ionela Manolesco”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Irina Codreanu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Lady Florence Baker”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Lauren Bacall”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Laurentia Arnàutoiu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Lena Constante”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Letitzia Bucur”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Lilly Marcou”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Lizi Florescu]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Lizica Codreanu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Lola Bobesco”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Lucia Hossu-Longin”]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[“Lucretia Jurj”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Mabel Nandris”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Madeleine Cancicov”]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[“Magdalena Popa”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Margarita de România”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Maria Cantacuzino”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Maria Cebotari”]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[“Maria Golescu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Maria Mailat”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Maria Prodan Bjørnson”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Maria Rosetti”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Maria Tànase”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Mariana Nicolesco”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Marie Ana Dràgescu”]]></category>
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		<category><![CDATA[“Marie-France Ionesco”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Marie-Jeanne Lecca”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Mariea Plop – Arnàutoiu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Marina Stirbey”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Marioara Ventura”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Marta Caraion-Blanc”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Marta Petreu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Marthe Bibesco”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Maruca Cantacuzino-Enesco”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Mica Ertegün”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Micaela Eleutheriade”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Milita Pàtrascu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Mioara Cremene”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Mite Kremnitz”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Monica Lovinescu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Monica Theodorescu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Nadia Comàneci   “Denisa Comànescu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Nadia Gray”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Natalia Dumitrescu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Nelly Miricioiu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Nicole Valéry-Grossu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Nicoleta Franck”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Nina Arbore”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Nina Cassian”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Oana Orlea”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Olga Greceanu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Otilia Cazimir”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Otilia Cosmutzà”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Pss Georges Ghika”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Pss Grigore Ghica”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Rodica Dràghincescu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Rodica Iulian”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Ruxandra Racovitzà”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Sabina Wurmbrand”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Sanda Stolojan”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Sandra Cotovu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Silvia Constantinescu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Silvia Marcovici”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Smaranda Bràescu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Stella Roman”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Sylvia Sidney”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Varinca Diaconú”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Veronica Micle”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Veturia Goga”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Victorine de Bellio”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Viorica Cortez”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Viorica Ursuleac”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Virginia Andreescu Haret”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Virginia Zeani”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Wanda Sachelarie Vladimirescu”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Yvonne Blondel”]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[“Zoe Bàlàceanu”]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/2009/05/romanian-jewish-topics-part-two-of-two/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[ROMANIAN-JEWISH TOPICS: (PART TWO OF TWO) (continued from Part ONE) Quotations from an Alternative Anthology: “Blouse Roumaine – the Unsung Voices of Romanian Women” Presented and edited by Constantin Roman, Preface by Catherine Durandin, published by the Centre for Romanian Studies (London), 2009 1,100 pages, 160 biographies, 600 quotations, 4,000 references, performances &#38; exhibition credit, [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><span style="color: #ff6600;">ROMANIAN-JEWISH TOPICS: (PART TWO OF TWO)</span><br />
(continued from Part ONE)<br />
Quotations from an Alternative Anthology:<br />
“<strong>Blouse Roumaine – the Unsung Voices of Romanian Women”</strong></p>
<p><strong>Presented and edited by Constantin Roman, Preface by Catherine Durandin,</strong> published by the Centre for Romanian Studies (London), 2009</p>
<p><strong>1,100 pages, 160 biographies, 600 quotations, 4,000 references, performances &amp; exhibition credit, discography and URLs , 6 Indexes</strong></p>
<p>http://www.blouseroumaine.com/orderthebook_p1.html</p>
<p>&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8211;</p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<div id="attachment_495" class="wp-caption alignleft" style="width: 160px"><strong><strong><a href="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/ana_novac1.jpg"><img class="size-full wp-image-495" title="ana_novac1" src="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/ana_novac1.jpg" alt="As a young girl from Hungarian-occupied Transylvania, Ana NOVAC knew the whole gamut of Nazi concentration camps. She was a surviver of both Nazi and Communist dictatorship who opted for freedom in France." width="150" height="244" /></a></strong></strong><p class="wp-caption-text">As a young girl from Hungarian-occupied Transylvania, Ana NOVAC knew the whole gamut of Nazi concentration camps. She was a surviver of both Nazi and Communist dictatorships, who opted for freedom in France.</p></div>
<p><strong>Ana NOVAC, (née Zimra Harsany)</strong><br />
‘The Romanian Anne Frank’<br />
(b. Dej, Transylvania, 21 June 1929)<br />
Actress, playwright, poet, novelist Auschwitz, Kratzau, Plaszow  camps survivor, exile living in Paris<br />
<strong> </strong></p>
<p><strong>Nationality:</strong><br />
<em>I was born in 1929 in Transylvania (România). One good morning when I was 11 years old I woke up to be a Hungarian citizen without having moved to another place, another street, or even without having changed my shirt. At the age of 14 I was deported to Auschwitz as a Jew. On my release in 1945 I had again become a Romanian citizen. That is why I have the greatest difficulty in establishing my nationality, other than from my identity papers which specified that I was Jewish.</em><br />
(Ana Novac, <em>The Beautiful Days of My Youth: My Six Months in Auschwitz and Plaszow</em>)</p>
<p><strong>‘Anti-semite’:</strong><br />
<em>That text was rejected by the censors as ‘anti-Semitic’….’It is useless to explain to a bureaucrat trembling for his job and his life that one can be Jewish, persecuted, and a bastard at the same time; that martyrdom and heroism do not necessarily go together; that misfortune does not imply any merit and does not confer any more right to glory than a car wreck, or an earthquake.</em><br />
(Ana Novac, <em>The Beautiful Days of My Youth: My Six Months in Auschwitz and Plaszow</em>)</p>
<p>Read more about Ana Novac:</p>
<p>http://www.blouseroumaine.com/orderthebook_p1.html</p>
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<p><strong>Ana PAUKER (née Hannah Rabinsohn, or Rabinovici)</strong></p>
<div id="attachment_497" class="wp-caption alignright" style="width: 119px"><a href="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/pauker_time_magazine1.jpg"><img class="size-full wp-image-497" title="pauker_time_magazine1" src="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/pauker_time_magazine1.jpg" alt="Ana pauker together wit Elena ceausescu shares the distinction of belonging to the Romanian Communist Demonology" width="109" height="121" /></a><p class="wp-caption-text">Ana Pauker together with Elena Ceausescu shares the distinction of belonging to the Romanian Communist Demonology</p></div>
<p>‘A Jewish Female Bukharin’<br />
(b. 1893, Codàesti, County Vaslui, Moldavia – d. Bucharest, 1960)<br />
Granddaughter of Rabbi Hersch Kaufmann Rabinsohn, communist activist prior to WWI, political prisoner, exile in the Soviet Union, NKVD operative/ spy, returnee,<br />
vice-president of the Council of Ministers, (1949-52), Foreign Minister, (1947-53),<br />
Politburo Member responsible for the enforced collectivization of agriculture, (1944-56),</p>
<p><strong>Rabbi Alexandru Safran on Ana Pauker:</strong><br />
<em>“Ana Pauker, a rabbi’s daughter…. when she was Minister of Foreign Afairs, wanted everybody to know, especially when I was present, that she was not a Jew, she was a communist”….<br />
“… when she saw me approaching the Prime Minister and the other ministers she stepped out of the line and turned aside for a moment in order not to greet me. She thus thought to demonstrate that she, the communist, did not want anything to do with the Chief Rabbi and Jewry; that she had less in common with him than even the other members of government….”<br />
“…the expression of Ana Pauker’s face during her time of glory, had always been impertinent”.</em><br />
(Alexander Safran, Grand Rabbi of Switzerland, formerly Grand Rabbi of Romania: <em>Resisting the storm, Romania 1940-1947</em>, op.cit 139, 161, 166)</p>
<p><strong>Tesu Solomovici on Ana Pauker:</strong><br />
<em>The most shining star amongst the huge number of Moscow-trained spies and activists was, undoubtedly the Jewish communist Ana Pauker. She knew Joseph Vissarionovitch Stalin personally and worked under the orders and direct command of the henchmen of the Soviet repressive services, Lavrentie Pavlovitch Beria, Victor Semionovitch Abakhumov, Piotr Vassilievitch Fedotov and Pavel Mihailovitch Fitin and furthermore she enjoyed the admiration of yet another dinosaur of Soviet power – Vyactheslav Molotov. Notwithstanding all that, Gheorghiu-Dej succeeded, with a patient cunning to pluck out all her feathers.</em><br />
(Solomovitch: 54-55)</p>
<p>Read more about Ana Pauker:</p>
<p>http://www.blouseroumaine.com/orderthebook_p1.html</p>
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<p><strong> </strong></p>
<div id="attachment_493" class="wp-caption alignleft" style="width: 123px"><strong><strong><a href="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/roudinesco_9.jpg"><img class="size-full wp-image-493" title="roudinesco_9" src="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/roudinesco_9.jpg" alt="Elisabeth Roudinesco Parisian-born Psychoanalist of Romanian stock" width="113" height="111" /></a></strong></strong><p class="wp-caption-text">Elisabeth Roudinesco Parisian-born Psychoanalist of Romanian stock</p></div>
<p><strong>Elisabeth ROUDINESCO (Elisabeta RUDINESCU)</strong><br />
(b. 1944)<br />
Academic, psychoanalyst, historian of science, historian, journalist, editor,<br />
French-born Romanian living in Paris</p>
<p><strong>Antecedents:</strong><br />
<em>“Being Jewish, in such conditions, did not make sense, because I was baptised, but not being Jewish did not make sense either, because this baptism did not imbue in me any integrating principles. How should I answer my classmates who might enquire about my origins and my religion? My father called himself an orthodox convert to Catholicism; my mother rather considered herself a Protestant and both parents felt rather detached from any religious tradition. Furthermore, my mother kept in a drawer a fake birth certificate which was produced for her benefit by a willing abbot, by which she was spared the obligation of wearing the yellow star badge and consequently saved from deportation. How could one believe, in such conditions, in the validity of a ‘real’ birth certificate and how will I know what might be the implications of ‘really’ belonging to a religion?  It took me twenty years to unravel this imbroglio of my Jewish origins.</em><br />
(Elisabeth Roudinesco, <em>Généalogie)</em></p>
<p><strong>Dracula:</strong><br />
<em> “One day, as I returned from the cinema, where I discovered that the most famous Romanian on this planet was Count Dracula, I bought Bram Stoker’s book, which I read breathlessly. As soon as I reminded my father that his worthy ancestors may not have been those whose descendant he claimed to be, he raised his arms to the sky and treated me (in Romanian) of that highest swear word of being a ‘tzigan’. From then on we did not stop wrangling. He was always singing the merits of Voltaire, Anatole France and Paul Valéry, whose friend he was, while I loved Balzac, Michelet and Proust.”</em><br />
(Elisabeth Roudinesco, ibid.)</p>
<p><strong>Immigrant’s delusions:</strong><br />
<em> “My father who emigrated (from Romania to France t.n.) in 1904, passed his time obfuscating his origins. Being wary of anti-Semitism (in France. t.n.) and anxious to prove his desire of being assimilated, he was claiming an Orthodox father and that he himself had converted to Roman Catholic. This is how he could claim, without admitting it, a link with Alexandru Socec. As for any reminiscences regarding his own itinerary, he invented a family novel to suit his imagination, to the point of thinking himself more French than the French themselves and to relegating his native Romania to the status of a country inhabited by vampires and gypsies. He had in his disquisitions  two way of looking at history. A scholarly approach, based on academic books and which he presented and eschewed  in the clearest manner. By contrast his private life was punctuated by mystery and rumor. My father would assign to archives and to the truth a positivist cult, whilst for his own family history, he was covering his tracks and was clouding the genealogies.”</em><br />
(Elisabeth Roudinesco, ibid.)</p>
<p>Read more about Elisabeth Roudinesco:</p>
<p>http://www.blouseroumaine.com/orderthebook_p1.html</p>
<p>&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;-</p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<div id="attachment_488" class="wp-caption alignleft" style="width: 116px"><strong><strong><a href="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/anniesamuelli1.jpg"><img class="size-full wp-image-488" title="anniesamuelli1" src="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/anniesamuelli1.jpg" alt="Annie SAMUELLI, victim of Communist witch hunt" width="106" height="169" /></a></strong></strong><p class="wp-caption-text">Annie SAMUELLI, victim of Communist witch hunt</p></div>
<p><strong>Annie SAMUELLI</strong><br />
(b. 1912 – d. ca. 2003)<br />
Clerk at the British Legation Bucharest, political prisoner, exile</p>
<p><strong>Cosmopolitan bourgeois:</strong><br />
<em>The debased spies, recruited from among the cosmopolitan bourgeois, have finally received their retribution.</em><br />
(The Communist newspaper Unirea commenting on Annie Samuelli’s ‘conspiracy in favour of Great Britain and the U.S.A’. in the 1948 political trials. Quoted by Tesu Solomonovici, in <em>Securitatea si Evreii</em>, vol 2, pp.51l)</p>
<p><strong>Miracle Rabbi:</strong><br />
<em> Carla, aged 40, arrived at our cell: she was a brilliant accountant.  Carla was given a 20 years prison sentence for having been a member of a so-called ‘subversive organization’. Although a Roman Catholic she would tell us about the pilgrimage to the tomb of the ‘Miracle Rabbi’: </em></p>
<p><em>Some hundred years ago, this rabbi would have led his folk on foot all the way to a small Romanian village to escape a pogrom in Poland. This humble and enlightened man handed out wise counsel, which was of the greatest help to the community. After his death at a venerable age, people would still come along to his grave to ask advice. The ritual unfolded in the following way: in memory of the rabbi’s long treck from Poland, the pilgrims, Jews and Gentiles alike, would walk to the cemetery, which was rather far from the city. Along the way, they would pick up a stone. Any request or problem would be scribbled on a piece of paper, which was put under the stone and placed on the rabbi’s grave. In time, all these stones grew to become a gravestone in the shape of a pyramid, which grew and grew. Each time a request or a problem was satisfied, the pilgrim would return to collect the stone and destroy the piece of paper.</em></p>
<p><em> Carla heard the story from an inmate with whom she shared a prison cell in said town. Although she was Romanian Orthodox this woman prisoner was convinced that her husband was praying at the rabbi’s tomb for her to be given a reprieve of her prison sentence, because the rabbi had already miraculously saved their dying son.</em><br />
<em> ‘Well, would you believe it?’ Carla would exclaim. ‘This woman was acquitted within six months. And you know how rare it is for a political prisoner to be freed. She had failed to denounce some refugee and she would have been sentenced to a minimum of five years. Now, owing to the Miracle Rabbi, she could go home’.</em><br />
(Annie Samuelli,  Dayyenu)</p>
<p>Read more about Annie Samuelli:</p>
<p>http://www.blouseroumaine.com/orderthebook_p1.html</p>
<p>&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8211;</p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<div id="attachment_487" class="wp-caption alignright" style="width: 360px"><strong><strong><a href="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/sylvia-sidney1910-1999.jpg"><img class="size-full wp-image-487" title="sylvia-sidney1910-1999" src="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/sylvia-sidney1910-1999.jpg" alt="Silvia SIDNEY, First Generation romanian-American Movie Star" width="350" height="450" /></a></strong></strong><p class="wp-caption-text">Silvia SIDNEY, First Generation romanian-American Movie Star</p></div>
<p><strong>Sylvia SIDNEY (</strong>aka<strong> SYDNEY), </strong>(née Sophia Kosow),<br />
1stly Mrs. Bennett Cerf, 2ndly Mrs. Luther Adler, 3rdly Mrs. Carlton Alsop<br />
(b. Bronx, New York, 8 August 1910 – d. New York, 1st July 1999)<br />
First-generation Romanian-American, film and stage actress, needlepoint artist</p>
<p><em> As in the case of Lauren Bacall, (q.v.), another glamorous New York-born actress with Romanian roots, one may question Sylvia’s inclusion in the Blouse Roumaine. Sylvia’s father, Mr Kosow, was indeed Russian, but her mother was Romanian.</em></p>
<p><em> </em>(Extract  from:<em> &#8216;Blouse Roumaine &#8211; the Unsung Voices of Romanian Women&#8217;</em>)</p>
<p>Read more about Silvia Sidney:</p>
<p>http://www.blouseroumaine.com/orderthebook_p1.html</p>
<p>&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;-</p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<div id="attachment_485" class="wp-caption alignright" style="width: 274px"><strong><strong><a href="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/sandastolojan1.jpg"><img class="size-full wp-image-485" title="sandastolojan1" src="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/sandastolojan1.jpg" alt="Sanda Stolojan: a freedom fighter and sharp observer of Romanian exiles " width="264" height="255" /></a></strong></strong><p class="wp-caption-text">Sanda Stolojan: a freedom fighter and sharp observer of Romanian exiles </p></div>
<p><strong>Sanda STOLOJAN</strong> (née Alexandra Zamfirescu)<br />
(b. 1919, Bucharest – d. 2 August 2005, Paris)<br />
Essayist, poet, memorialist, translator, journalist  human rights activist,<br />
Personal interpreter for four French presidents, exile in France</p>
<p><strong>Franco-Romanian Jews:</strong><br />
<em>I went to Beaubourg to the symposium on Benjamin Fondane, on whom I was writing an article in the ‘Cahiers de l’Est’. In the auditorium  many Romanian Jews were gathered , a world with which we other Romanians have few contacts other than some personal friends. An old émigré, Claude Émile Rosen, read one of Fondane’s poems in Romanian. Stefan Lupasco who knew Fondane was there too. Generally the tone of the evening, imprinted by the philosopher Chouraki, a specialist in the Jewish mystique, was Hebraic and anti-Romanian, with pre-war Romania  painted in anti-Semitic colours all over.  Throughout the course of the evening I felt an odd sensation of being there only tolerated, marginalized, in spite of being at the core of a cultural space with which I was very familiar. In a certain fashion I was the “Jew”, the foreigner within this audience. In fact our manner of living our exile is situated at the opposite pole of the sensitivity of these Franco-Romanian intellectuals of Jewish origin. It is all a matter of the past, a question linked to the antecedents of our lives, yesterday in communist Romania, today in Paris. Even further back, there is a matter of ancestors, ours steeped in the glebe of deepest Romania, in its beliefs and traditions, theirs errant for three thousand years; ours lost in the Neolithic mist, theirs mingled to the history of Babylon and Egypt. These are profound matters, old causes, as old as the biblical prophecies and their different interpretations which shaped us. And then there is the recent past, our situation and theirs under communism, which of late has forced us  to take the road of exile, where we see them again, these old errant hands. Today the experience of</em> <em>exile ought to bring us closer to each other, but our contact with them, like that  of last evening, only revealed to what extent we remained attached to our land archetype implanted in the Parisian milieu. What could be more foreign to their spirit than our obsessions, our reactions, our commitment. It is by rejecting this spirit of our soil that Cioran succeeded in placing himself above this state of mind which is justly ours, that of the provincials of Europe, a characteristic which was also his. Paradoxically, it is while strongly denouncing his origins that Cioran discovered his inner depth: for, as he said, ‘Nobody is in control of his own inner depth’. How could one solve this dilemma? How could our exile bring us closer to the Jewish exile?”</em><br />
(Sanda Stolojan, <em>Au balcon de l’exil Roumain a Paris</em>)</p>
<p>Read more about Sanda Stolojan:</p>
<p>http://www.blouseroumaine.com/orderthebook_p1.html</p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<div id="attachment_483" class="wp-caption alignleft" style="width: 172px"><strong><strong><a href="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/sabina-wurmbrand-05.jpg"><img class="size-full wp-image-483" title="sabina-wurmbrand-05" src="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/sabina-wurmbrand-05.jpg" alt="Sabina Wurmbrand - a Pastor's Wife who knew the Communist Prisons" width="162" height="150" /></a></strong></strong><p class="wp-caption-text">Sabina Wurmbrand - a Pastor&#39;s Wife who knew the Communist Prisons</p></div>
<p><strong>Sabina WURMBRAND</strong> (née Sabina Oster)<br />
(1913, România –2000, California, U.S.A.)<br />
Missionary of the underground church, pastor’s wife, political prisoner and prisoner of conscience, exile in the USA</p>
<p><strong>Prison Carcer:</strong><br />
<em>..I was marched to the guardroom and put into a prison cell. It was a narrow cupboard built into the wall in which you could just stand. The iron door had a few holes to admit air&#8230; After a few hours, my feet were burning. The blood in my temples beat with slow, painful thuds. How many hours could they keep me here?&#8230; Drops of water were falling from somewhere on the roof of the box. It was a desolate sound. I counted them to make time pass&#8230; I don’t know how long I did this, but at a certain moment.<br />
I simply began to cry aloud to avoid despair:<br />
’One, two, three, four,’<br />
I cried, and again:</em><br />
<em>‘One, two, three, four&#8230;’<br />
After a time the words became inarticulate. I didn’t know what I said. My mind had moved into rest. It blacked out. Yet my spirit continued to say something to God.</em><br />
(Sabina Wurmbrand, <em>The pastor&#8217;s wife</em>)</p>
<p>Read more about Sabina Wurmbrand:</p>
<p>http://www.blouseroumaine.com/orderthebook_p1.html</p>
<p><strong>© copyright Constantin ROMAN, 2003-2009, all rights reserved</strong></p>
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		<title>Pourquoi Matisse?</title>
		<link>http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/2009/05/pourquoi-matisse/</link>
		<comments>http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/2009/05/pourquoi-matisse/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 06 May 2009 10:56:09 +0000</pubDate>
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		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/2009/05/pourquoi-matisse/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[&#8216;La Blouse roumaine&#8217; de Matisse En peignant La blouse roumaine, Henri Matisse donna à cette dernière une pérennité artistique et une reconnaissance internationale. En fait, la toile qui est aujourd’hui au Musée d’art moderne de Paris, était devenue le symbole de la roumanité et plus particulièrement de la féminité roumaine. Mais POURQUOI une blouse roumaine [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p><span style="color: #ff6600;"><strong><em>&#8216;La Blouse roumaine&#8217;</em> de Matisse</strong></span></p>
<div id="attachment_399" class="wp-caption alignleft" style="width: 234px"><a href="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/palladymatisse1.gif"><img class="size-full wp-image-399" title="palladymatisse1" src="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/palladymatisse1.gif" alt="Matisse et le Roumain Pallady (Nice, 1940)" width="224" height="291" /></a><p class="wp-caption-text">Matisse et le Roumain Pallady (Nice, 1940)</p></div>
<p>En peignant <em>La blouse roumaine</em>, Henri Matisse donna à cette dernière une pérennité artistique et une reconnaissance internationale. En fait, la toile qui est aujourd’hui au Musée d’art moderne de Paris, était devenue le symbole de la roumanité et plus particulièrement de la féminité roumaine.</p>
<p>Mais POURQUOI une blouse roumaine ? Le choix de l’artiste était-il fortuit ? On peut se poser la question, car le peintre était plus connu pour ses modèles vêtus d’atours marocains ou parisiens, plutôt qu’en robe ethnique roumaine, ou mieux encore, pour ses modèles pas vêtus du tout… Alors, pourquoi une blouse roumaine ????</p>
<p>Bien que cela soit moins connu, il est vrai que le grand maître eut au moins une élève roumaine – la fascinante et patriotique artiste moldave Nina Arbore (voir plus loin). Plus tard, Nina Arbore laissa son empreinte sur la scène roumaine dans le mouvement d’avant-garde tout comme peintre de fresques monumentales, qui décorent l’intérieur de cathédrales modernes. Il est plus que probable que Nina Arbore ait porté, à plusieurs occasions, la chemise paysanne roumaine. Aurait-elle été la première <em>‘seductrice’</em>, inspirant au Maître le désir de peindre un tel sujet, ou aurait-elle posé pour lui ? En tout cas, il y a des archives qui laissent à penser qu’un portrait de Nina Arbore par Matisse existerait dans la collection Shtchukin . Cela coïnciderait avec la période durant laquelle Nina était l’élève de Matisse, en 1910-1911. Le fait que le collectionneur russe Shtchukin ait pu vouloir acquérir le portrait d’une élève roumaine de Matisse peut être dû au lien très fort que la famille Arbore, de Bessarabie, avait avec les intellectuels russes en général et avec Pouchkine en particulier (voir Nina Arbore). Il est aussi vrai qu’avant la Première guerre mondiale, la Bessarabie, auparavant une province de Moldavie, faisait partie de l’empire russe (voir aussi Maria Cebotari).<br />
Si l’on observe certaines premières toiles de Matisse, on peut y décerner l’idée d’une broderie ethnique, dans la blouse de la danseuse de 1939, <em>Une danseuse au repos,</em> où l’on voit une femme assise qui porte une blouse roumaine.</p>
<p>La même chose est vraie d’une autre toile de Matisse, <em>Nature morte avec femme endormie</em>, aujourd’hui dans la collection de la National Gallery of Art à Wasington DC. La personne assise est une femme qui porte une blouse brodée à longues manches, décorée dans la partie supérieure de la manche comme le sont les blouses roumaines.</p>
<p>Une version encore antérieure, où les verts prédominent, apparaît en 1937.</p>
<p>Mais comme pour toutes ses peintures, les idées de Matisse furent dans un premier temps essayées sur du papier et là encore, on peut trouver des exemples de blouses roumaines au crayon et à l’encre : l’un de ces dessins, Femme avec une blouse rêvant, est visible à la page 67 de la  monographie de Volkmar Esser (Matisse – 1869-1954, Master of Colour, Taschen, Koln, 2002) et est daté de 1936. Là, les mailles fleuries abondent. C’était l’année où le Maître avait eu une commande pour le décor et les costumes d’un ballet russe.</p>
<div id="attachment_402" class="wp-caption alignleft" style="width: 234px"><a href="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/rosenthal11.jpg"><img class="size-medium wp-image-402" title="rosenthal11" src="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/rosenthal11-224x300.jpg" alt="Romanian Blouse (Danile Rosenthal, 19th c)" width="224" height="300" /></a><p class="wp-caption-text"> Blouse Roumaine (Daniel Rosenthal, 19e s.). Matisse a eu toute une collection de blouses pareilles, offertes par son ami Roumain, Theodor Pallady</p></div>
<p>Donc, de ces exemples et d’autres, dont de nombreux couvraient un mur entier à la galerie Maeght lors de l’exposition rétrospective de Matisse, en 1945, on peut penser sans équivoque que l’idée n’était pas neuve dans l’esprit de l’artiste. Quoi qu’il en soit, ce qui était nouveau à cette occasion, en 1940, était que la <em>BLOUSE ROUMAINE</em> était devenue au centre du sujet, le portant au premier plan et lui donnant une identité spécifique, nommée. Le modèle dans la version de 1940 est moins contemplatif comparé aux versions précédentes et regarde droit dans les yeux, avec une grande intensité et détermination. La toile a dû faire l’objet d’une discussion, voire même l’idée a pu en être soufflée lors de la visite d’un vieil ami, le peintre roumain Theodor Pallady (1871 – 1956), dont le portrait a été dessiné par Matisse, à Nice en 1940 . Selon la critique d’art Ioana Vlasiu , Pallady aurait même fait cadeau à son vieil ami Matisse d’une collection de blouses ethniques brodées. L’amitié entre Matisse et Pallady remontait à l’époque où ils étaient ensemble à l’Ecole des Beaux Arts de Paris (1891 – 1899) et qu’ils fréquentaient le studio du peintre symboliste Gustave Moreau (1826 – 1898). Moreau était un ami de Chasseriau dont le modèle préféré n’était autre que la tante de Pallady, la princesse roumaine Maria Cantacuzino  (1820 – 1898). Maria devait épouser plus tard Puvis de Chavannes qui l’a prise comme modèle pour symboliser sainte Geneviève, dans les fresques qui décorent le Panthéon à Paris. A travers leur correspondance qui dura presque un demi-siècle, un lien étroit se tissa entre le Français Henri Matisse et le peintre roumain Theodor Pallady. Excepté leur proximité dans le style et l’attitude, les deux amis partageaient un grand nombre de points communs, parmi lesquels l’image des muses roumaines, plus en vue en France au XXeme siècle, était un sujet récurrent. Dans sa correspondance, Matisse accompagnait ses lettres de dessins et utilisait Pallady comme une oreille compatissante, parlant parfois de ses angoisses personnelles et artistiques. Au Musée national d’art abrité dans le Palais royal à Bucarest, la collection d’art contemporain possède un dessin au fusain d’une femme qui porte une blouse paysanne roumaine et une veste, signé de Matisse, dessin qui précède ses peintures à l’huile bien connues sur le même thème.</p>
<p><strong>Une blouse roumaine par Picasso ? Le triangle Pallady – Matisse &#8211; Picasso</strong></p>
<p>Un fait a été mis en avant lors de l’exposition rétrospective de 2002 à la Tate Moderne de Londres consacrée à Matisse et Picasso  : les deux peintres empruntaient souvent l’un à l’autre des thèmes, tout en les traitant dans leur idiosyncrasie. <em>La Blouse roumaine</em> aurait-elle pu être l’un d’entre eux ?<br />
Picasso ne semble pas avoir donné un tel titre à aucune des toiles qu’il a peintes. Quoi qu’il en soit la monographie d’Yves-Alain Bois révèle un travail de Picasso ostensiblement inspiré par <em>la Blouse roumaine</em> de Matisse. Il s’agit de La femme aux mains bleues (collection privée), peinte par Picasso en février 1947, soit seulement quatorze mois après la rétrospective Matisse de décembre 1945 à Maeght. Le traitement que Picasso fait de la blouse est plus abstrait que celui de Matisse, mais là aussi l’artiste a décoré la robe avec de riches dessins qui couvrent les manches courtes et les épaules de la blouse mais en y ajoutant un genre de coiffe typique, portée par les demoiselles vierges roumaines, dont les fichus étaient serrés derrière la nuque. Même l’idée d’une <em>fota </em>(tablier ou jupe folklorique roumaine) géométrique est suggérée sur la jupe que porte la femme assise. Quoi qu’il en soit, on ne doit pas se laisser entraîner trop loin par de tels parallèles. Il suffit de dire que ce thème n’était pas récurrent dans le travail de Picasso, tout comme de nombreux autres thèmes que l’artiste emprunta à Matisse. Quoi qu’il en soit, en observant plus attentivement la toile, il est évident que les zigzags et les motifs nodules qui dominent dans la robe de la femme peinte en 1947 par Picasso sont empruntés aux vingt-cinq versions de blouses roumaines de Matisse, exposées en 1945, si l’on ajoute au douze Blouses les treize versions du <em>Rêve</em>.</p>
<p>Retournons à la plus célèbre version de la Blouse roumaine de Matisse, qui est exposée au Musée d’art moderne de Paris. Elle fut peinte en 1940, durant l’une des périodes la plus sombre de la guerre que la France ait eu à vivre sous l’occupation Nazie. Matisse allait bientôt abandonner Nice, qui allait être bombardée par les avions allemands, pour la relative sécurité de l’arrière-pays, à Vence. En lisant certains passages des journaux intimes de l’artiste écrits à cette époque, on peut se rendre compte que la gaîté de la Blouse roumaine agissait comme une antidote à la guerre, qu’elle représentait une lueur d’optimisme et d’espoir. Dans ce contexte, la signification de la Blouse roumaine pris de l’ampleur comme elle devenait l’objet d’une méditation philosophique. Que dit l’artiste ?</p>
<p><strong><em>Le rêve</em> (1940)</strong><br />
<em>De nouveau la guerre. Il y a ici un tel cafard, une angoisse générale qui vient de tout ce qui se dit et répète sur la prochaine occupation de Nice que j&#8217;en suis très affecté par contagion et mon travail est particulièrement difficile. Heureusement je viens de finir presque un tableau commencé il y a un an et que j&#8217;ai mené à l&#8217;aventure -en somme chacun de mes tableaux est une aventure. D&#8217;abord très réaliste, une belle brune dormant sur ma table de marbre au milieu de fruits, est devenue un ange qui dort sur une surface violette -le plus beau violet que j&#8217;aie vu, -ses chairs sont de rose de fleur pulpeuse et chaude -et le corsage de sa robe a été remplacé par une blouse roumaine ancienne, d&#8217;un bleu pervenche pâle très très doux, une blouse de broderie au petit point vieux rouge qui a dû appartenir à une princesse, avec une jupe d&#8217;abord vert émeraude et maintenant d&#8217;un noir de jais. Que tu es belle, ma messagère au bois dormant ! Tes yeux sont des colombes derrière leurs paupières. Et elle rêve d&#8217;un prince français prisonnier d&#8217;antan dont j&#8217;ai lu et relu les poèmes pour en faire un choix. Je me suis toujours méfié de la littérature, mais je ne l&#8217;ai pas seulement illustrée, je l&#8217;ai soigneusement, amoureusement recopiée, et l&#8217;on en trouve l&#8217;émerveillement dans mes thèmes.</em><br />
(<em>Cantique</em> de Matisse)</p>
<p>Donc le grand Matisse, alors presque âgé de 70 ans, rêve d’une princesse roumaine sous les traits d’une beauté endormie, et qui apporterait le réconfort durant les temps incertains de la guerre et de la vieillesse. La scène qu’il évoque est empruntée au Paris d’avant-guerre et même à un temps encore antérieur, à la Belle époque, avant la Première guerre mondiale, période que Matisse a connue dans sa jeunesse. C’était une époque où les princesses roumaines séduisaient les Français : Matisse avait peint vingt-cinq versions de ce thème, si l’on ajoute la série <em>Le rêve</em> à celle de <em>la Blouse roumaine.</em></p>
<p><strong>La Roumanie avant la Seconde guerre mondiale et l’Occident</strong></p>
<p>Il y eut des égéries roumaines qui fréquentèrent les salons parisiens. Voilà quelques-unes d’entre elles :<br />
On pensera en premier lieu à Maria Cantacuzino (Marie Cantacuzene) dont le portrait par Théodore Chasseriau (1819 – 1856) décore le Panthéon. Elle y représente Geneviève, la sainte patronne de Paris.<br />
Elena Vacarescu (Hélène Vacaresco), dont les poèmes d’amour furent chantés par Tino Rossi (Si tu voulais) et dont la vie amoureuse inspira le roman à succès de Pierre Loti L’Exilée. Elle donna son nom à un prix littéraire, le prix Vacaresco Femina (qui est une partie du prix Femina).<br />
Ou la célèbre comtesse de Noailles, née princesse Bassarabe-Brancovan (Basarab-Brancoveanu), la première femme à devenir commandeur de la Légion d’honneur. Les poèmes d’Anne de Noailles reçurent le Premier prix de l’Académie française, au tournant du siècle. Son portrait fut sculpté par Rodin et peint par Zuloaga.<br />
Ou sa cousine, la poétesse parnassienne et femme du monde Marthe Bibesco, qui inspira Marcel Proust, Cocteau, Paul Valéry et d’Annunzio et qui attira dans son entourage tous ses contemporains dont le nom comptait, avec le zèle de l’entomologiste consumé, qui épinglerait les coléoptères dans son armoire à prix.<br />
Ou peut-être la tragédienne Marie Ventura – un pilier de la Comédie Française qui surpassa la célèbre Sarah Bernhardt et devint l’actrice inoubliable des meilleures pièces classiques de Corneille, Racine, ou Molière.<br />
Ou encore, la fascinante Elvire Popesco (Elvira Popescu), comtesse de Foy, du <em>théâtre du Colombier</em> et plus tard de la <em>Comédie Française</em>, qui enchanta le public par son apparition dans <em>Ma cousine de Varsovie</em> et devint célèbre sous le sobriquet de <em>Notre dame du théâtre.</em> Popesco joua avec Sacha Guitry dans <em>Le paradis perdu</em>… Sans aucun doute, <em>Le paradis perdu</em> était un sujet de grande anxiété pour Matisse et le retour à la vie du souvenir de ces muses éthérées roumaines sous la forme de <em>la Blouse roumaine</em> était un acte de foi.</p>
<p><strong>La Roumanie d’après-guerre et l’Occident</strong></p>
<p>La guerre allait mettre un terme à cette liaison fertile entre la Roumanie et les cercles artistiques et littéraires parisiens, tout comme le lien naturel qui existait entre la Roumanie et l’Occident fut brisé par le rideau de fer. Alors, le pays allait vivre pendant cinquante ans les âges sombres de la censure idéologique, de l’emprisonnement et de l’extermination.<br />
Le fossé causé par ce retrait de la scène française fut comblé, d’une certaine manière, par un certain nombre d’exilés qui refusèrent de retourner dans leur pays perdu, mais leur joie de vivre fut émoussée par les angoisses liées à leur survie immédiate. Dans de rares occasions après la guerre froide, une soprano roumaine ou une ballerine pouvaient faire leur apparition, étincelante, sur la scène française, mais à cette époque le feu et l’imagination du public avait changé et l’impact n’avait plus rien à voir avec celui d’avant la guerre ou de la <em>Belle époque.</em> De plus, la Roumanie n’était désormais plus porteuse d’une image d’excellence intellectuelle mais était plutôt perçue comme un pays déshumanisé, la prison de l’histoire. Là-bas, non seulement les femmes partageaient les prisons de leurs maris, frères et fils, mais elles étaient de plus condamnées, à travers leurs corps,  à remplir les attentes du Démiurge en ce qui concernait la hausse de la natalité, comme lors d’expériences génétiques interminables de proportions kafkaïennes:</p>
<p><em>Un peuple entier,<br />
Pas encore né,<br />
Mais condamné à voir le jour,<br />
En colonnes avant de voir le jour,<br />
Foetus contre foetus,<br />
Un peuple entier,<br />
Qui ne voit pas, n’entend pas, ne comprend pas,<br />
Mais qui avance.<br />
A travers le corps ondulant des femmes,</em><br />
<em>A travers le sang des mères<br />
Qu’on ne consulte pas.</em><br />
(Alan Blandiana, <em>La croisade des enfants,</em> 1984)</p>
<p>La descente dans un tel cauchemar, auquel la femme roumaine sous le communisme a dû faire face sans pitié, n’était autre que celui choisi par la femme même du Démiurge, acclamée dans des vers extravagants par les poètes du jour, comme on peut le voir dans les vers de Corneliu Vadim Tudor, qui, après 1990, est devenu un dirigeant politique d’un parti et un membre du Parlement, représentant le mouvement de l’extrême-droite nationaliste, Romania Mare. Voilà ci-dessous les vers qui s’adressaient à Elena Ceausescu elle-même, cités par Gail Kligman (p.128) dans son livre <em>The politics of duplicity</em> – <em>controlling reproduction in Ceausescu’s Romania</em> (University of California Press 1998) :</p>
<p><em>Femeie creatoare – Slava Tie (Salut à toi, femme créatrice !)</em></p>
<p><em>Soit bénie, femme inventive !<br />
L’amour de la nation t’enveloppe,<br />
Erudite, personnage politique et mère en même temps.<br />
Toi, fort modèle à émuler, de charme et de sagesse<br />
Qui sera toujours sentie et suivie<br />
Sois pour toujours heureuse, toi, éternel symbole<br />
Des héroïnes roumaines que tu es devenue</em><br />
<em>Poussée de l’avant aux côtés du héros du pays<br />
Tout au long de la grande épopée du peuple roumain !</em></p>
<p>Durant un tel leadership épique d’un personnage si bien éduqué, incarné par Elena  &#8211; <em>La femme symbole de la création, aux côtés de son mari-héros Nicolae</em> &#8211; il n’était pas question pour aucune autre femme roumaine de se voir autoriser quelque exercice de création que ce soit, sauf en termes de reproduction.</p>
<p>Comme si une politique aussi inhumaine n’était pas suffisante, les Roumains sous Ceausescu souffrirent aussi de la menace constante d’être expropriés de leurs maisons, sous prétexte de la modernisation du pays, avec une vingtaine de centre-ville rasés jusqu’au sol, et l’architecture historique s’évanouissant avec eux, dans le but de faire de la place pour les blocs d’appartements de style staniliste. Les gens avaient 72 heures pour récupérer leurs affaires et déménager dans des cages à lapin. Ils abandonnaient leurs meubles et leurs animaux familiers dans les rues (d’où les chiens errants de Bucarest, qui sont devenus proverbiaux.)<br />
Pour ajouter à ce cauchemar social, afin de rendre le peuple peureux dans une soumission totale et de voler sa mémoire et sa fierté, durant le début des années 80, Ceausescu décida que la dette extérieure, contractée pour cause d’industrialisation déraisonnable, devrait être payée, et pour cela exporta la plupart des produits agricoles. Les Roumains se retrouvèrent sans denrées alimentaires de base et des queues de plusieurs mètres se formèrent devant les coopératives d’état, des queues où l’on attendait pendant des heures dans l’espoir que quelque chose de comestible soit achetable. Il n’y avait ni viande, ni poisson, ni oeufs, ni légumes – seulement quelques pommes de terre pourries, de temps en temps, qui ne convenaient pas pour nourrir les cochons et dans un bon jour on pouvait trouver des griffes de poulet avec lesquelles ont pouvait préparer un bouillon (voir Eugenia Velescu).<br />
Le désespoir complet lié à la faim est résumé dans une lettre ouverte envoyée par les femmes de Roumanie à Elena Ceausescu, en 1980 (voir faim, pommes de terre), lettre qui fut publiée à l’Ouest. Les Roumains, connus pour leur esprit rebelle qui les autorise à rire même quand ils souffrent, comme l’expression d’une ultime catharsis ( <em>a face haz de nacaz</em>) pouvaient au moins sourire amèrement lorsqu’ils entendaient les enfants bohémiens roumains chanter leur parodie d’un chant de Noël, en 1980, neuf ans avant que le tyran et sa femme ne tombent, un jour de Noël.</p>
<div id="attachment_405" class="wp-caption alignleft" style="width: 198px"><a href="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/rizea_cover.gif"><img class="size-full wp-image-405" title="rizea_cover" src="http://www.romanianstudies.org/content/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/rizea_cover.gif" alt="Elisabeta Rizea, paysannes des Carpates qui a subi la torture des prisons communistes pour avoir aide le maquis" width="188" height="270" /></a><p class="wp-caption-text">Elisabeta Rizea, paysanne des Carpates qui a subi la torture des prisons communistes pour avoir aidé le maquis</p></div>
<p>Durant presque un demi-siècle, l’esprit de <em>la Blouse roumaine </em>souffrit d’une longue période d’éclipse, mais survécut pour raconter son histoire : ce sont les voix des femmes roumaines que nous avons introduites dans cette anthologie – quelques-unes célèbres, d’autres abominables et la plupart d’entre elles avec la fraîcheur de celles qui ne savent pas qu’elles sont des héroïnes – de simples fermières qui dépérissent dans des camps en Sibérie, des femmes de pasteur qui souffrent à cause de leur croyance religieuse, des femmes effacées qui furent envoyées dans des camps de concentration pour expier les choix politiques de leurs maris, ou pour d’autres pêchés que d’avoir publié le travail de leurs femmes – des femmes qui dans le cours normal des événements auraient traversé la vie sans qu’on les remarque, mais dont les tourments sous un régime génocidaire les mit en lumière dans la conscience de leur pays, pour leur bravoure, l’expression lyrique de leur souffrance, des femmes qui luttèrent dans le maquis et qui furent enterrées sous de fausses identités, et d’autres dont le corps fut jeté dans une fosse commune, sans nom – les noms de ces héroïnes ne peuvent se compter mais leur accumulation mérite notre attention.</p>
<p>Après la chute de Ceausescu, l’image de <em>la Blouse roumaine</em> retrouva graduellement sa place, lentement, comme le réveil après un cauchemar surréaliste : est-ce que la transition existe ? Est-ce pour de vrai ? Le passé va-t-il se répéter ? Dans ce sens, une mise en garde fut émise par le porte-parole du Parlement polonais lorsqu’il déclara : « <em>Il ne faut que quelques semaines aux Empires pour s’écrouler, mais la mentalité impérialiste a besoin de plusieurs générations avant de disparaître.</em> »</p>
<p>Les blouses ethniques portées par les femmes paysannes étaient à la mode parmi les classes sociales supérieures depuis que les princesses de la famille royale roumaine ont commencé à les porter, vers le milieu du XIXeme siècle, a l’instar d’Elisabeth de Roumanie (voir Carmen Sylva) et plus tard, de la reine Marie et de ses filles.</p>
<p>Si l’on prend en compte le passage tumultueux de l’histoire récente, on peut se demander si les femmes roumaines vont reconquérir leur réputation étincelante, telle qu’elles l’avaient connue avant la guerre. Vue d’ici, la réponse n’est pas simple et la route tortueuse. La seule réputation qu’elles semblent avoir gagné actuellement à l’Ouest, est, tristement, une réputation de pauvreté et de désespérance, qui a poussé les statistiques sur les jeunes femmes issues de la Balkan vortex a de hauts niveaux de prostitution. Bien après la chute de Ceausescu, ses enfants qui furent un jour “condamnés a naître” sont aujourd’hui destinés à mendier pour assurer leur subsistance, à vendre leurs corps…</p>
<p>Cela prendra du temps avant que la Beauté endormie de la toile de Matisse ne se réveille pour enchanter une fois encore la scène mondiale.<br />
Ce jour viendra, mais dans le même temps la princesse de la Blouse roumaine devra être vigilante à ce que le rêve devienne réalité, tout comme l’ange dépeint par le Maître, dans son journal écrit par temps de guerre.</p>
<p>(Extrait de l&#8217;Anthologie des femmes Roumaines, traduction du livre paru en Anglais sous le titre: <em>&#8216;Blouse Roumaine &#8211; the Unsung Voices of Romanian Women&#8217;,</em> introduced and edited by Constantin ROMAN,  Centre for Romanian Studies, London, 2009.<br />
<strong>http://www.blouseroumaine.com/orderthebook_p1.html</strong></p>
<p><strong>© copyright Constantin ROMAN, 2003-2009, all rights reserved<br />
</strong></p>
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