Submission, Resistance, Exile Cover Image

Supunere, împotrivire, exil
Submission, Resistance, Exile

Author(s): Ion Vianu
Subject(s): Cultural Essay, Political Essay, Societal Essay
Published by: Institutul Cultural Român
Keywords: Ion Vianu; totalitarianism; autobiography; communism; communist party; Romania; Romanian communism; Ceauşescu; Ceauşescu doctrine; joining communist party; Gheorghe Gheorghiu Dej; Cornel Burtică; Marxist doctrine; Lenin; Marx; anti-communism; Al. Paleolog

Summary/Abstract: A psychiatrist, a fine intellectual and an anticommunist, the author decides one day to join the communist party. Why does he do it, when he is not tempted either by social privileges or financial advantages. Perhaps his decision comes from his loathing everything he sees, hears, experiences. Fortunately for him, a friend whom he asks to him a recommendation displays cynicism when analyzing the way in which functions a social mechanism that does not claim a genuine consent, just one’s obedience. This revelation makes the author question his perspective over his own decision and the system. This is how Vianu’s exercise of honesty begins, outstanding autobiographical pages that do not portray an innocent victim, like so many other confessions, but a lucid analysis of his own weaknesses, resistance, surrender, oppositions, the evolution of a contester who learns from his own mistakes.

  • Issue Year: 2008
  • Issue No: 64
  • Page Range: 10-17
  • Page Count: 7
  • Language: Romanian