Chapter III Research Topic

Chapter III Research Topic

This chapter will first provide some valuable insights into the practice of Oral History in the countries of the former Soviet Bloc. Needless to say, the focus will be placed on Romania where a surge in the number of oral history projects is noted. The second subchapter offers an analysis carried out at the intersection between orality and translation. Finally, the main pillars of this thesis, Oral History and Translation, will be concurrently investigated.

1. Oral History on Romanian communism

1.1 An outline of communism in Romania

In what follows I distil the representative features of the communist regime in Romania by looking at its evolutionary path and its main turning points. Any analysis of communism should, however, provide first a definition of the term itself. With this purpose in mind, I cannot bypass the works of Richard Pipes who has written extensively and vividly about the Russian revolution of 1917 as well as the Bolshevik regime. In the work mentioned hereinabove, he posits that the term ‘communism’ dates back to the 1840s being created in Paris (cf Pipes 2001:

IX). What is more, Pipes distinguishes three main concepts emanating from communism: the ideal, the programme and the regime implemented to attain this ideal.

William J. Miller (The Meaning of Communism, 1963), Robert Service (Comrades

Communism: A World History), J. Edgar Hoover (A Study of Communism, 1962), Richard

Pipes and Romain Ducoulombier, to number just a few, detect in Plato’s writings (like The

Republic or The Laws) the notion of an ideal that can only by buttressed by social equality and

the seamless incorporation of people in their community. The universality of the idea of

communism received its first interpretations in Ancient Greece and Rome, followed by the

postulates of Middle Ages priests and the utopian worlds envisaged by Thomas More in the 16

century or the French thinkers of the 18

and 19

century.

Marx and Engels bring up the rear with their The Communist Manifesto (1848) which even if inspired by German philosophy, French social theory and the British school of economic theory, carved out a revolutionary path of its own, aiming to establish a modern tailor-made form of communism. Still perceived as the cornerstone of socialist theories, Marx’s writing is developed around the tenet that a society defined by equality and the lack of private property should supersede the old establishment. Further, as economy naturally evolves, evolution is bound to happen.

Stern underlines Marx’s tenet that dialectical conflict (Stern 1990:11) is not generated by mere ideas but by material agents. Therefore, this theory put forward by Marx is also known as dialectical materialism or a way of looking at history through a materialist lens (Carew Hunt 1962: 19; Miller 1963: 22-23; Hampsch 1965: 10-13; Service 2007:13; Stern: 10-11; Brown 2009:23). This concept became a springboard for the formulation of numerous socioeconomic theories ringing with a call for revolutionary action.

French historian Alain Besançon makes a rigorous analysis of communism by analogy with Nazism (Le Malheur du Siècle: Sur le communisme, le nazisme et l’unicité de la Shoah 1998 ; Nenorocirea Secolului: Despre comunism, nazism şi unicitatea “Şoah-ului” 1999, 2017, Humanitas). A deep examination of his work would entail an unpermissive extension of the main topic of the thesis. Therefore, I will only mention the ideas that form the main tenets of Besançon’s work.

First, he sees communism through the prism of destruction wreaked not only on physical level, but also on a political one. The former is achieved following a five-stage plan:

“expropriation, concentration, mobile killing operations, deportation and extermination camps”

(2017: 22; my translation from Romanian). Communists may have dismissed the last category, yet, this was offset by famine and judicial executions. The latter involves the elimination of political life and of all forms of association or representation as people are forced into a new societal configuration.

Second, the moral destruction is dissected with great care, as both Nazis and communists

practised the falsification of the good and a “pedagogy of the absurd” (Besançon 2017: 38) that

laid claim to people’s minds and souls. This explains why the moral damage is more difficult to

repair as the experiences of the past fit neither our terminology nor our imagination.

To continue, in his succinct yet lucid article Kolář emphasises the singular role played by Eastern Europe in the history of communism (2014: 203). It is here that the communist ideology has reached unfathomable depths that make any investigative attempts rather ponderous. The case of Romania is no exception, yet, a few observations must be made about the interesting trajectory followed by the regime in this country.

The Communist Party was established in 1921 only to be outlawed three years later.

Deprived of its legality the party could hardly count one thousand members. In the light of its

“non-Romanian profile” (Boia 2016: 22) it was shunned by Romanian intellectuals who were eventually lured into the far-right movements. It appealed, however, to ethnic minorities and to Romanian Jews. Saying then that communists got off to a bad start can hardly be an overstatement. Yet, how did such humble beginnings lead to creation of a solid and omnipotent party? The answer lies in the economic and cultural context of interwar Romania.

First, the majority of the population was composed of land-owning peasants who could hardly survive on their less-than-a hectare patches of land. Second, people’s cultural level was low. According to Boia, only “57 % of the inhabitants could write and read” (2016: 24), so the lack of education plagued Romanian society. The cultural argument put forward by the Romanian historian is congruent with that of Kolář who remarks that Eastern Europe was the

“‘backward’ and ‘inferior’ counterpart to a progressive and civilised Western part of the continent, a narrative that can be traced back to the Enlightenment” (2014:203). Consequently, a composite of poverty, illiteracy and political instability offered the fertile conditions in which the communist regime could develop.

On 23 August 1944, following King Michael’s declaration to the country, Romania

changed sides in the Second World War joining the Allied Forces in the fight against Nazi

Germany. Between this landmark decision and 30 December 1947 when the King was forced to

abdicate, the Communist Party tightened its hold on power. Needless to say, a concurrence of

events favoured this political ascension. Nevertheless, what played undoubtedly a decisive role

was the extension of the Soviet Union in Eastern and Central Europe. As Boia and Applebaum

note, communist regimes went as far as the Red Army could go (2016: 26; 2013: 24-44). For a

more comprehensive analysis of the Soviet Union’s brutal foray into Eastern Europe and its

consequences readers are invited to consult Applebaum’s work Iron Curtain: The Crushing of

Eastern Europe (Penguin Books, 2013).

Let me now return to Romania that fell irretrievably in the Soviet sphere of influence. A radiography of the regime with its turning points and inevitable collapse is offered by Denis Deletant in his seminal book Romania Under Communist Rule (1999). Like Boia, he points out that the Romanian Communist Party worked solely on Kremlin orders (1999: 77; 2016: 26). Its major objective was, evidently, full submission to the Soviet Union. As a result, backed up by Moscow and included in different coalitions cosmetically obscured as democratic rather than communist, the new communist government formed on 6 March 1945. With Petru Groza as first leader, the Party skilfully played the card of economic progress and social equity gaining adherents among the lower social classes.

During the 1946 elections the communists won by a landslide. The results were, however, falsified, the true winner being Iuliu Maniu’s National-Peasant Party. The electoral fraud could be easily engineered as the communist government was omnipotent and exerted absolute control over all forms of communication. As Boia pertinently remarks, “the end of the democratic fiction” (2016: 3) took place in 1947 when the entire leadership of the National Peasant Party was arrested and given long prison sentences (life imprisonment for the party leaders, Iuliu Maniu and Ion Mihalache). Finally, on 30 December 1947 (the day of the King’s forced abdication, as I have previously shown) the Romanian People’s Republic was declared which further solidified the creation of the totalitarian state.

Thus, staying firm on the Soviet course the Party set out to implement the Stalinist model. Nationalisation of industry, banks, transport or mining industry was shortly followed by the collectivisation of agriculture. Ownership of land was no longer permitted as the state systematically pursued the elimination of ‘kulaks’ (a Soviet word referring to “rich peasants”

(1999: 82). Despite their stubborn resistance

most of the peasants were assembled into state farms as collectivisation was finally completed in 1962 (1999: 83; 2016: 59).

The Orthodox Church was not spared either being subjected to stringent measures (see section 3.2.2). Inarguably, the developmental stage of the regime featured a high degree of oppression and coercion (Deletant 1999: 103; Kolář 2014:208). The latter element can be exemplified by the intense use of forced labour legitimised in 1950 which led later to the creation of work colonies (Deletant 1999:103). The work colonies filled with peasants opposing

1 According to Deletant approxiamtely 80,000 peasants were arrested for their refusal to join the collective farms

(1999:83). Nevertheless, according to Cosmin Budeancă (expert IICCMER) the number must be regarded with

suspicion, as Deletant’s source was the communist paper Scânteia (5371, 7 December 1961, p. 2).

collectivisation, deportees, former army officers, lawyers, factory owners etc. (ibid.). Their numbers defy any precise calculations, yet, it was believed that almost two hundred thousand people were working in the labour camps dotting the country.

The infamous Danube-Black Sea Canal was the site of eight labour camps, which, according to Besançon, claimed the lives of “200,000 people, serving as tomb for the old elite”

(2017: 27)

. Survivors have provided a unique glimpse into camp life underlining the back- breaking labour, the unattainable norms, the lack of food and cold. Moreover, the penal colonies in the Danube Delta were scattered around Balta Brăilei (Salcia) and the village of Periprava with its three main sections of Centru, Grind and Bacuri (Budeancă 2018:165).

Moving into less documented territory, Vasilescu documents how camp food became a form of repression. Interviewing several survivors, he confidently argues that the lack of food was a major cause of death among detainees. Supplying these floating prisons with food was actually no easy task. Former detainees describe how they were forced to cross the frozen Danube to the village of Periprava to take horse meat (from old and exhausted animals) and bring it back to the camps (2018:174). People were more often than not underfed so they resorted to other sources of food, eating grass, potato peels, raw corn, reed roots, wild horseradish, thistle seeds, rats or lizard and snake eggs (2018:189). Additionally, the exhausting work and the brutality of the wardens pointed at the “malevolent consensus” (2018:168) between camp and central administrations. Needless to say, when questioned about camp food during a trial following the fall of communism, Ioan Ficior (in charge of a communist labour camp) refuted all the accusations.

Additionally, the literature on detainees’ testimonies is replete with references about the Bărăgan steppe where the greatest number of camps were clustered together. It was in this scarcely populated and unaccommodating land that the Serbs and Germans of Western Romania (Banat) were massively deported in the 1950s due to the growing uneasiness between Romania and Yugoslavia. Carrying only a few belongings, they were herded to train stations and corralled into wagons. Following an exhausting journey, they were “dumped in the middle of nowhere in

2 However, the number is perceived as exaggerated and groundless by Cosmin Budeancă (expert IICCMER). The Romanian researcher identified the prison records of 76,000 inmates in the Archive of the National Administration of Prisons (a number approved by Octav Bjoza, president of The Former Political Detainees in Romania, AFDPR).

For further reference see https://www.iiccr.ro/resurse/fisele-matricole-penale/.

What is more, according to the Civic Academy Foundation, the number of those who perished (in prisons or

deportations) was estimated at 24,000 (Romulus Rusan ed., Cartea morților din închisori, lagăre, deportări, Academia

Civică, 2013, p. 11).

the full glare of the sun” (Deletant 1999:108) being forced to build their own houses and start anew.

Labour camps were not, however, the only punishing instrument applied by the regime.

Prisons started to fill up and they were differentiated from one another due the specific prisoner categories. For instance, Sighet, in the northern part of Romania, confined to its cells mainly political prisoners. The most prominent ones were indeed Prime Ministers such as Iuliu Maniu (The National-Peasant Party) and Constantin I. C. Brătianu (The National Liberal Party). In addition, several bishops of the Roman Catholic and Greek Catholic Churches were also imprisoned at Sighet together with Romania’s interwar leading elite.

Other notorious prisons were in Gherla, Aiud or Jilava. They are a recurrent feature of the survivors’ accounts as prisoner mobility was a common practice. I should not fail to mention the

“prison of silence” at Râmnicu-Sărat (1955-1963). The lack of sound sharpened prisoners’ sense of hearing to such a degree that “they got to know the ‘music’ of each cell, being able to tell which door opened and which door closed” (2018:237; my translation from Romanian). Given these constraints on speech, detainees found ingenious ways of communication. They would use the Morse Code by coughing (one cough signalled a full stop), knocking on walls or writing with different objects. Their resourcefulness, as Budeancă emphasises, testifies to an immense “power of adaptability and will to survive” (2018:270).

The severity of the Romanian totalitarian regime remains unrivalled in Eastern Europe.

Its infamous ‘re-education’ system of Piteşti prison struck fear and terror in the detainees as its main purpose was brainwashing and the creation of a new man (Ierunca 2013: 52). The greatest atrocities were committed, not only in terms of physical violence but also in terms of emotional and spiritual torture. The demeaning nature of the experiment was meant to result in the prisoners’ loss of dignity and disavowal of the old social conventions and even of their families.

Needless to say, the over-arching purpose of re-education was mental subordination and enslavement. Not surprisingly, it surpassed many people’s power of endurance, as Ierunca clearly shows in his work “Fenomenul Piteşti” (2013 Humanitas). Both Ierunca and Deletant divulge the names of those who masterminded the Piteşti experiment: Ţurcanu and Nicolski of the Securitate (Deletant 1999: 110; Ierunca 2013: 52).

Many of those who rose against communism and were not immediately captured

organised into small bands. Self-termed as ‘partisans’ they put up resistance from the Carpathian

Mountains from approximately 1945 to 1962 when the last member of such a group was executed. Ion Gavrilă-Ogoranu was the leader of the partisans in Făgăraş, whereas Toma Arnăuţoiu and Gheorghe Arsenescu were in charge of the “Haiducii Muscelului” (Outlaws of Muscel), the longest-surviving band (see Chapter III, 1.3). The group’s actions benefited from the unyielding support of Elisabeta Rizea who described her role in a poignant book (see Chapter III, 1.3).

It seems adequate at this point to clarify the causes that generated a need for armed resistance. What served primarily as a catalyst for opposition was a series of political and economic changes. The former included the strong antagonism between the Romanian historical parties (the Liberal Party and the National-Peasant Party) and the communist one which, supported by Moscow, eventually triumphed. More than that, as Dobrincu clearly shows, these upheavals accounted for constraints on political forms of expression or large-scale administrative and military purges (2005:163). Finally, as I have previously explained, the new economic order that forcefully imposed nationalisation and agricultural collectivisation upset the old governing structures of the Romanian society. The cumulative effects of economic and political makeover led to a surge in the establishment of anti-communist groups and organisations.

Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej’s era (1947 to 1965) was marked by a fiendish manhunt and a crackdown on the anti-communist resistance groups in the mountains. A strong proponent of Stalinism, he made the Romanians cower in terror and become silent accomplices in the validation of the communist agenda. During his time in office, thousands of Romanians including the high layers of society lost their lives. It goes without saying that this monstrous plan of action could not have been accomplished without the Securitate (created in 1949 and attached to the Ministry of the Interior). However, it is worth mentioning that at the beginning of the 1960s the reign of terror subsided as prisoners started being released with many pardons granted by the communist leader.

Dej’s successor, Nicolae Ceauşescu (1965-1989) followed the same political path as his

precursor: a precipitous industrialization and an independent stance in foreign policy. In the latter

case, a policy of autonomy in the Eastern bloc was pursued exemplified by Ceauşescu’s

condemnation of the Soviet invasion of Prague in 1968. Nevertheless, the courageous standpoint

that he expressed and which endeared himself to the population, contrasted sharply with his

national policy. As such, he turned gradually into a ruthless leader, unresponsive to the Romanians’ demands.

This form of neo-Stalinism employed by Ceauşescu was marked by economic downturn and a series of restrictions. A wave of unrest started to spread through the population as a surge in strikes was noted (for instance, the miners’ strike in the Jiu Valley in 1977). The population grew more vocal in a series of protests against attempts to rationalize food and energy, reduce wages or heating quotas. All these drastic changes caused an angry outcry from the population that culminated with the rebellion of the Steagul Roşu Plant in 1987 in Braşov (an important industrial centre).

Nevertheless, these public signs of unrest could do nothing to steer Ceauşescu off his course. Dissidents like university lecturer Doina Cornea (forced to renounce her teaching position after using texts on Western philosophy in her lectures) or Mariana Celac (a fierce opponent of the leader’s urban and rural resettlement programme; Deletant 1999:193) faced detention and house arrest.

The open letters that the former sent to Ceauşescu were also broadcast on Radio Free Europe. They were a rational account of the destruction wreaked by communism on the Romanian nation. Therefore, in Cornea’s view, what the regime did was to “ strip people of their human dignity, to reduce them to an animal state where their major daily concern was to struggle to find food, to institutionalize misery, and to atomise and homogenize the peoples of Romania” (Deletant 1999:199).

Finally, Ceauşescu’s policy was met with opposition not only outside the party but within the party itself. Two letters circulated secretly in the West in the summer of 1989. One raised objections to the re-election of Ceauşescu, whereas the other was an interrogation of the Romanian leader concerning economic mishandling and violations of human rights.

The action failed to have any consequential effects as the Romanian leader retained his political dominance until December 1989. Ceauşescu soldiered on with his plans, unwilling to listen and realize that, as Volkogonov perceptively explains, “the dominant trends in the world had become integrative processes, that a shift had taken place from confrontation to co- operation, to social unification and to the search for harmonious forms of co-existence” (1995:

XXII).

It was during that first winter month that the revolution began in Timişoara (the western part of Romania) and ended violently with the precipitous trial and execution of Nicolae Ceauşescu and his wife, Elena. The event was recorded and beamed across the world. All the same, this apparent hint at transparency could do little to silence the numerous questions still hanging like an albatross around the nation’s communist past.

1.2 Oral History in Post-Socialist countries

Oral history was both reinvigorated and refined as a scholarly discipline in the 1950s and 1960s, feeding off the works of researchers like Portelli (Italy), Thompson, Evans and Perks (the United Kingdom) or Ronald Grele (the United States). It weaved its way into the orbit of social sciences at a time when the world was experiencing major political and cultural disturbances. As Khanenko-Friesen and Grinchenko (2015) minutely explain, the disintegration of European colonialism, the emergence of new nations and the spread of cultural and ideological activism (for human rights, gender equality or environment) coupled with technological breakthroughs (the tape recorder for example) made the world increasingly aware of its pluralism.

In their seminal work Reclaiming the Personal: Oral History in Post-Socialist Europe (2015) Khanenko-Friesen and Grinchenko zoom in on the way oral history narratives are constructed in Eastern Europe, more precisely in the former Socialist countries. The Romanian case does not come under scrutiny but the other examples provided can be easily extrapolated to other countries as well. No stone is left unturned and no document is neglected as their work is a laborious attempt to provide answers to a number of questions.

Why did not oral history develop in socialist countries? As the two historians argue, the answer clearly lies in the refusal of governments to let people, ideas, merchandise and capital freely circulate in their countries, cutting off any connections with the effervescent western world (2015: 6). More than that, these regimes tended to conceal the wide gamut of human experiences using instead hackneyed language about equality, unity and interethnic harmony.

The socialist ideology cultivated the image of a unitary state with common past memories and visions of the future.

Following the collapse of the Soviet Bloc, alternative memories and experiences of

socialism that had been previously hushed up started to find their way back into the public

discourse (Khanenko-Friesen/Grinchenko 2015: 7). It became then obvious that post-socialist

countries had “more than one past” (ibid.), which could be accessed via oral history interviews with first-hand witnesses. Oral history rose as a unique and indispensable tool in discovering the histories, achievements, universe and identities of entire groups of people, sharing their recollections, memories and stories.

As Khanenko-Friesen and Grinchenko pointedly remark, the development of the discipline was commensurate with the growing need to expose the stories of the past. However, as the practice of oral history is inescapably underlain by politics, it goes without saying that politicians were prompt to capitalise on its power (Khanenko-Friesen/Grinchenko 2015: 8). New national projects heavily relied on the methods of oral history to bring the suppressed narratives of communism into the public eye and thus to incriminate the former regime. One of the first examples is offered by the oral history project unfolding in Hungary in the 1980s intended to harvest data about the 1956 Revolution.

More than that, research institutions and various programmes invested with the power to investigate totalitarianism spawned across these countries, with oral history being, of course, the main tool used to condemn communism. To give just a few examples, the National Institute for the Study of Totalitarianism (1993), the Memory Institute of the Slovak Nation, the Polish Institute of National Remembrance (1998), the Institute for the Investigation of Communist Crimes in Romania (2005), and the Czech Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes (2007), are all dedicated to a trenchant analysis of the crimes perpetrated by the communist regime.

Apart from archival work, they have also set out to interview thousands of victims in their attempt to prove the pernicious and corrosive impact of communism in Eastern Europe.

Yet another important function exercised by oral history in post-socialist countries reflects the effect of this burgeoning field on the humanities and social sciences. Parting with the social classes and institutions and away from the collectivist take on history, the new public discourse brought into the limelight the experiences of individuals who lived under the regime.

More than that, in the second half of the 20

century history itself, as an academic

discipline, steered away from a positivist stance (focussing on nations, politics, conflicts) to a

more social type of history, that reclaimed the importance of daily life, ideas and “the history of

humanity whatever the context” (Khanenko-Friesen/Grinchenko 2015: 12). These mutations and

the reassertion of biographies, personal stories and narratives (as methods of historical

investigation) occurred concertedly, catapulting the individual onto the public arena.

Consequently, using mainly the interview as research tool, oral history can undoubtedly be considered at the leading edge of the developing post-socialist social sciences.

Last but not least, oral history legitimises and validates the individual as an active participant in history. Interestingly enough, Khanenko-Friesen and Grinchenko confidently claim that if the discipline was framed theoretically in the West, its more practical approach was undoubtedly delineated in the East by the very singular nature of its territories.

1.3 Oral History on Romanian Communism

The topic of my translation from Romanian into English is communism as it addresses an episode from a not too distant past that is still being examined and questioned today. The 1989 Revolution saw the demise of communism in Romania. However, thirty years onwards, the Romanian society is still haunted by its past as it desperately grapples with economic and political problems while trying to regain its sense of self.

Consequently, talking about communism means not only unearthing hidden truths, but also gaining a better understanding of the regime so that people could come to terms with the past and act sensibly in the present. In the space of more than 30 years after the Revolution research on communism has evolved rather sluggishly as historians themselves have to approach their discipline anew.

Furthermore, it should be noted that historians’ archival examination is complemented by valuable field work that aims to recover the truths of the past by turning and listening to its witnesses. The foundation of the Oral History Institute in 1997 (at Babeş-Bolyai University, Cluj-Napoca) has stimulated the publication of numerous oral history interviews with former political prisoners, dissidents, members of armed-resistance groups that provide a first-hand narrative of their communist experiences. In line with the views upheld by Khanenko-Friesen and Grinchenko (2015), Romanian historian Doru Radosav emphasises the “publicity” attracted by oral history in post-communist countries, including Romania (2008; Anuarul Institutului de Istorie Orală). According to him, the discipline enables a certain “appropriation” of the past (2008: 7) as oral testimony turns into “deposition”.

Drawing on the three-fold matrix ‘history – memory – orality’ it can be easily inferred

that the testimony assumes different guises: as a historical document, legal deposition and a

confession with theological and ethical nuances (ibid.). What is more, Radosav perceptively comments on the existing strain between memory and deposition, especially when testifiers act under coercion as was the case with the anti-communist fighters. As a result, the manipulation of memory during investigation exposes the strained relation between testimony and deposition.

The victim’s first-hand account of persecution “is per se the testimony of persecution” (Radosav 2008: 8) even though the boundaries between testimonies, confessions, depositions and evidence may be hardly detectable.

What is more, post-communist testimonies framed either as “‘untold or retold stories’, become the expression of a counterhistory, more specifically, the expression of a departure from the clandestinity of ‘silent disapproval’” (ibid.). Needless to say, ethical aspects also come into play inasmuch as the Romanian historian provides a deeper look at history as justice.

Nevertheless, his analysis is too broad to include here. I will only add an argument that derives from various efforts to render memory ethical. This makes reference to a tripartite dimension: the responsibility to tell, to recognise and testify (Radosav 2008: 9).

Victor Pica, an active participant in the anti-communist resistance, sensibly observed that the responsibility to tell is inextricably bound to the responsibility to remember. It is important not to forget and therefore generate that “great postponed confession” (2008: 9) following the fall of communism. What is more, this responsibility to recognise stems from the “ necessity to reconcile an ‘unfinished history’ of the communist past, a history that that does not go away with its ‘impossible justice’ (ibid.).

In this context, memory qualifies as an indispensable mechanism in the creation of history. Finally, the responsibility to testify triggers undoubtedly “an appropriation of the past as sharing, reconciliation, return, repentance, and expiation” (Radosav 2008: 9). The testimony effects thus significant ramifications, both on a cognitive and psychological level.

In what follows, I will highlight the major oral history works related to communism in

Romania. As such, amongst the most prominent books, I can single out Rezistenţa anticomunistă

din România: Grupul "Capotă-Dejeu" (1947-1975): mărturii (2006) by Cosmin Budeancă and

Bodeanu Denisa or “Suferinţa nu se dă la fraţi...”: Mărturia Lucreţiei Jurj despre rezistenţa

anticomunistă din Apuseni (1948-1958), by Cosmin Budeancă and Cornel Jurju (2002). Another

important oral history project is pieced together by Doru Radosav’s Rezistenţa anticomunistă din

Apuseni: Grupurile: “Teodor Şuşman”, “Capotă-Dejeu”, “Cruce şi Spadă”: Studii de istorie orală (2003).

The works published in the Annals of the Oral History Institute offer complementary perspectives on the Romanians’ fight against communism. The armed resistance in the Carpathian Mountains is well-documented by numerous oral history projects and books on the survivors’ testimonies. Ion Gavrilă Ogoranu (1923-2006) was the only fighting leader who avoided being captured by the Securitate, living as a fugitive in the mountains for almost twenty years. An active participant in the students’ strike of 1946, he was also involved in the Anti- Communist Armed Resistance supported by the historical parties, the Legionary Movement and officers of the Romanian Army. In 1948, he set up the “Carpathian Group of Armed National Resistance” that counted among its members students, pupils and soldiers. Giving up their old ways of life, they formed small guerrilla groups that could easily move from one place to another ready to confront the Securitate forces. Receiving the support of villagers, they still had to cope with the vagaries of the weather and people’s betrayals. Facing the immanence of arrests, trials and executions, the group abided by the Christian morals and teachings.

Ogoranu survived the 1954 clashes with the Securitate and remained in hiding until 1976 when he decided to resume his normal life. Caught by the police and interrogated continuously for five months, he eventually escaped arrest through the intercession of Kissinger, the American Secretary of State. Romanian politics and society struggled to turn the corner in an apparent attempt to improve relations with the United States.

The incredible story of Ogoranu and his group is poignantly retraced in the book Fir Trees break but do not bend themselves: Anti-communist Resistance in the Făgăraş Mountains (6 volumes 1993-2006). In much the same vein, another notable work revolving around another Făgăraş group is Raluca Voicu Arnăuțoiu’s Fighters from the Mountains. Toma Arnăuţoiu. The Group from Nucşoara: Documents related to their interrogation, Trial, and Imprisonment, Bucharest, Vremea, 1997.

If pioneering oral history work centres around the anti-communist armed-resistance in the

Făgăraş Mountains, more recent literature aims to document the actions of small-scale groups

operating in other parts of the country. In this respect, Dobrincu’s attempt to shed light on the

anti-communist fighting in southern Moldavia is highly commendable. Relying on archives and

published testimonies he minutely retraces the stories of different resistance groups in Moldavia.

Amongst the most important ones (or rather the best documented) were ‘The Shield of the Country’, ‘The White Hand’, ‘The Movement of Men of Justice in Romania’, ‘The Falcons of the Liberty Crusade’ or ‘The Anti-communist Clandestine Group’. Last but not least, the resistance centre of Uturea or the organisations led by Ioan Lupeş, Dumitru Oprişan and Constantin Dan were also engaged in hostilities and in a series of subversive actions.

The makeup of these organisations was a rather variegated one, including disbanded members of the Army, politicians belonging to historical parties, peasants opposing collectivisation, students and pupils eager to fight for their liberty and democratic convictions. It should be made clear that many of the young people were members of the ‘Brotherhood of the Cross’, the youth organisation of the Legionary Movement. Even though this detail was not allowed to resurface in post-communist publications, it is now established as a fact and contributes to a better understanding of the motivations for fighting.

In terms of practical actions undertaken, the pupils and students wrote anti-communist messages on trains or buildings, disrupted the UTM

meetings or tore apart the portraits of Marx, Lenin and Stalin. Their opposition was only short-lived as they were betrayed by close friends, arrested and persecuted. According to Valeriu Neştian’s account, he was roped together and brutally beaten on the soles of his feet with a whip, a twisted wire and a cosh. He was then forced to run on a wet floor so that his soles could not swell. It goes without saying that he had to put up with hunger, standing up all day or sleeping on straws placed directly on the floor. As he succinctly confesses, “twenty four hours under Securitate arrest meant twenty four hours of internal terror. Always under strain, lying in wait, and in tension” (my translation from Romanian; Dobrincu 2005:184).

The fate of the other groups was in many ways similar. The members of Uturea Centre of Resistance built ammunition depots in the mountains but were eventually betrayed and imprisoned. It should be noted that the Securitate went to great lengths to capture the ‘bandits’, deploying not only large military forces but also sending their own men to join the fighters (in an attempt to cull information) and persuading people closer to the resistance groups to become informers.

Finally, I should mention in passing the article “From armed resistance to communism:

Captain Nicolae Trocan; ‘Romanian Movement of Resistance’” jointly written by Gheorghe

3 The Union Of Communist Youth.

Gorun and Hadrian Gorun. Their findings deserve particular attention as they point to the lesser known organisation ‘Romanian Resistance Movement’ whose pre-eminent purpose was

“military resistance to communist power” (2008:245). Drawing on oral history interviews and Militia Archives the two researchers braid together the engaging story of aviator Nicolae Trocan who first chose to fight against the communists on his own.

As I have shown, the multitude of oral history accounts and testimonies acts as conclusive evidence of the magnitude of anti-communist armed resistance in Romania. This argument is buttressed by the Securitate accounts which point out that between 1945-1959 there were 1196 groups of military resistance and nineteen centres of military resistance (Cartea Albă a Securităţii, vol. III, Bucuresti, Serviciul Român de Informaţii (SRI), 1995, p. 52; quoted by Gorun 2008:216). According to Gorun, the resistance movement was not the result of a carefully planned operation. As he further explains, the dismantling of the National Resistance Movement impaired the relations between the other groups and finally hindered all attempts at unity. This ferocious communist manhunt embodies the binarity ‘us-them’ or ‘friend-foe’ heavily promoted in communist times (Gorun 2008: 2).

The voice behind oral history accounts is more often than not that of men. However, a distinguishing female figure that experienced suffering in communist Romania was Elisabeta Rizea. In the lively and soulful language of a peasant she recounted her ordeal in The Story of Elisabeta Rizea from Nucşoara: Cornel Drăgoi’s Testimony (Bucharest 1993). Arrested and imprisoned for helping the ‘bandits’ in the mountains, Rizea was savagely beaten by the Securitate. Yet, she was obstinate in her refusal to betray anyone, becoming an icon of the anti- communist fighting. It should be mentioned that the book’s editor alerts readers to the lack of a narrative tone as the entire testimony is impregnated with lamentations and bitterness.

Any attempt to draw an exhaustive list of oral history accounts or testimonies on the communist era would be unfeasible. Nevertheless, it is worth mentioning Stanciu Stroia’s book My Second University: Memories from Romanian Communist Prisons published in 2005 by the author’s grandson, Dan Liviu Dusleag (who was also the translator of his grandfather’s memoir from Romanian into English). Framed according to a well-known pattern, Doctor Stroia’s testimony chronicles his life as a prisoner in communist Romania. Accused of helping the

‘bandits’ in the mountains, he spent seven years in captivity (at Aiud, Jilava or the Făgăraş

Castle), putting up with cold or lack of food. Food in prison is invariably evoked in the majority

of testimonies. Stroia’s account is no exception, and as references to food can also be found in the corpus of this thesis, I find it appropriate to sketch out the eating routine in prisons.

Breakfast included customarily:

“a small ladle filled with 30 to 50 grams of corn porridge. […] this infamous dish, an economical version of polenta called terci, turta de malai or simply turtoi, became the trademark of the penitentiary […]. Made of poor quality and insufficiently ground corn flour – the type my mother used to feed to the farm animals – it had a semi-liquid consistency, was shaped like a cone, and was barely the size of two baby fists” (Stroia 2005:139).

Cooking of the turtoi was also deficient, as a part of it remained raw, leading to indigestion and eventually to enterocolitis, a disease affecting the digestive tract. Lunch and dinner consisted of “200 grams of thin, watery soup made of pickled tomatoes from barrels rejected at the local market. Rare onions had their peel still on, and one had to count the beans, because there were so few, as was the case with the pearl barley sometimes added to the mix”

(Stroia 2005:140). Moreover, as Stroia notes, 250 grams of wheat bread was provided twice a week, but there were no vegetables or meat, apart from pork cartilages, hooves or beef heads coming from slaughterhouses (idem). The doctor’s testimony makes for an entertaining reading for it braids heart-wrenching passages with more humorous ones as reflected by his conclusive remark on food: “The only people who managed to survive the prison nightmare were those able to digest prison food” (Stroia 2005:140).

Discussions and debates on the communist era are gathering pace in Romania. This growing interest in the past has been reflected in the publication of numerous memoirs and testimonials of survivors, for most of their part former detainees who experienced the harsh world of confinement, with its brutality, deprivation and forceful labour. A broader discussion of the so-called prison literature would stretch the limits of the present thesis, so I will only make some observations that have emerged from my research.

As such, it becomes evident that the history of communism can be best reconstructed and

rendered meaningful in the first-hand accounts of those who lived it. In all probability, what

galvanised these prisoners into writing their stories was an urgent need to confess – a need to talk

in order to achieve emotional healing and most importantly, to share their experiences with a

wider public so as to avoid ignorance and forgetting.

The whole panoply of concentrationary memories (Silent Escape. Three thousand days in Romanian Prisons, by Lena Constante, 1992; My Prisons Memoirs, by Dumitrescu Vladimir, 1994; Our daily prison, by Ion Ioanid, 3 volumes 1999-2002; Parallel destinies. Echoes from communist detention, by Crisan Andrei, 2002; The prison cell, the destiny of our generation, by Diaconescu Ion 2003

) evokes the reality of terrible suffering that desperately strives for a form of representation. Despite being written by the more professional and precise hand of historians, these works stand for a more direct and unmediated encounter with the past. References to communism can also be found in the interviews given by King Michael of Romania (1940-1947) to Stelian Tanase, political analyst and writer. They were collected in 2004 and published in 2018 (Conversations with King Michael) to commemorate one year since the King’s death.

Finally, a work that has unduly plunged into obscurity since its publication is Stoenescu’s Memoria Stigmatelor (2012 Curtea Veche Publishing). The book is a collection of twenty-two interviews given by former prisoners and deportees. What Stoenescu has attempted, as an interviewer and a deportee herself, is to look at the moral stigmata left on the individuals’

conscience. She convincingly demonstrates how the communist experience branded people for life as the “memory of the stigmata remains awake until death and, maybe, beyond death. These are wounds on the souls that are impossible to heal” (2012: 7). Hence, the notion of stigmata is the founding statement of the book which coalesces, therefore, around the stigmata of deportation, detention, anti-communist resistance or exile.

A close analysis of the interviews consolidates evidence about the existence of (political) organisations aiming to put up resistance to the communist takeover of the country. For example,

“The Guard of the Romanian Youth” (Garda Tineretului Român) was established in 1957 by high school pupils. One of its members, Octav Bjoza, discloses the oath that had to be taken prior to the admission into the group and whose simple wording reflected the will to free the country from the communist occupation and save the dignity of the Romanian people (Stoenescu 2012:

61). The organisation functioned, however, less than a year as its members were arrested and sent to prison or labour camps. A similar organisation was the ‘PNL Collegial Organisation’

(Organizaţia Colegială PNL) mainly comprised of students with liberal views who were driven by a burning ambition to counter totalitarianism.

4 For the whole bibliography please see http://www.fericiticeiprigoniti.net/images/carti/bibliografie-fericiti-cei-

prigoniti.pdf

Despite the significant data culled from the interviews what Stoenescu’s book brilliantly captures is not the historical event per se but rather the meaning it acquired in a person’s life.

The emotional struggles are an underlying feature of all the interviews. As such, a recurrent theme refers to the growing frustration generated by the constant exclusion from universities due an ‘unhealthy’ background or to the subversive activities against the regime. Yet another element that emerges is the tremendous effort demanded to start anew while still carrying the deeply- inflicted stigmata. Lastly, testimonies of detained priests as well as the role played by religion in prison also arouse particular interest and they will be briefly discussed in the following section (Chapter 3, 2).

At the other end of the spectrum are historians and researchers tirelessly engaged in a deeper investigation of communism that could complement survivors’ testimonials. An initiative designed to provide a platform for scholarly discussion is represented by the symposia held at the Sighet Memorial and spanning nearly a decade (from 1994 to 2003). The papers presented by Romanian and international researchers (such as Dennis Deletant) were transcribed and compiled into the ‘Annals Collection’. Consisting of 10 volumes, the collection represents a chronological analysis of the defining stages in communist history. From the installation of the regime in Romania to Stalinist measures, forced collectivisation or armed resistance, this seminal publication stands out through its incisiveness and sharp condemnation of communism as a conclusion to more wide-ranging research.

As in all trials, both sides must be heard for more unbiased and accurate interpretations.

With this purpose in mind, Lucia Hossu-Longin (the same author who published Memorial of pain: darkness and light 2013) set out to interview Ion Mihai Pacepa, one of Ceauşescu’s security generals who fled to the United States in 1978. Published in 2009, Face to Face with General Ion Mihai Pacepa was criticised by historian Ioan Scurtu for the errors contained in some of the general’s statements.

In much the same vein, without being categorised as an oral history work the account of

Ion Craciun, a former Securitate officer, is minutely rendered in We were the day’s gods: The

story of a former Securitate Officer who became the victim of the apparatus he served (2000). In

a reader-friendly language, slightly encumbered by police jargon and the minutiae of the

Securitate departments, the book ends with a series of interviews given by Victor Mitran, another

Securitate officer.

A work particularly precious in the rather meagre literature on communist perpetrators is Doina Jela’s The Damascus Road: the confession of a torturer (Humanitas 1999). The author carefully transcribed the testimony of a former torturer, Franţ Ţandără, which oozes cruelty in an abrupt and stark language indicative not only of the oral style but also of the individual’s moral stature. What might appear unusual or striking is that his testimony is presented in contrast with that of Professor Bădulescu, an opponent of communism who served many years in prison.

Detained for having killed his father, Ţandără is used by the prison administration for different purposes, including surveillance and beating of other inmates.

The singularity of this confession resides in the evident struggle of the torturer to justify his behaviour. With an apparent ice-cold detachment, Ţandără charts his psychological evolution. From the satisfaction derived from beating detainees to a “brainless robot” desperate to liquidate state enemies, he was promised rehabilitation and membership to the party following his release (Jela 1999:11-19). All in all, as suggested by the Christian reference in the title, the torturer’s story ultimately reads as that of a penitent or of a sinner fighting for the right to confess as a form of redemption.

It is worth mentioning that the results of continuous research on communism are published in the Journals of the CNSAS and the ‘Totalitarianism Archives” Journal. What is more, the Association of Former Political Prisoners founded in 1990 has also been involved in the publication of material on anti-communist resistance. Last but not least, “The Memory.

Journal of imprisoned Thinking” is a publication that first appeared in print a year after the fall of communism. Its stated goal is to bring forth “documents and testimonies about the crimes, abuses and violations of human rights during the communist era, both in Romania and abroad”

. The journal indicates thus pertinent questions of analysis in an endeavour to portray the Romanian Gulag and sensitize people (especially the young generation) to its atrocities.

An equally laudable attempt to chronicle life under the communist rule was made by an American. Following her successful ‘Hungarian Health Education Programme’ Susan Shapiro was invited to Romania by the Romanian Soros Foundation so that she could implement the same health-related project. That is how she got to know the people behind the Iron Curtain together with their stories, tinged with hardships, deprivation but also humour and a touch of nostalgia.

5 For further reference see http://www.revistamemoria.ro

Thus, The Curtain Rises: Oral Histories of the Fall of Communism in Eastern Europe (2004) offers fascinating fragments of life under the totalitarian regime by turning the spotlight on families from countries like Romania, Hungary, Macedonia, Lithuania and the Czech Republic. The special appeal of this book lies not only in its great readability but also in the relative ease with which it negotiates the boundaries between present and past, while not neglecting projections about the future. As such, the oral histories of Marius Mateş or of the Baciu and Jakobovits families are not only a clear illustration of people’s adaptability and resourcefulness in times of adversity. Rather, Shapiro’s work serves as a sharp indicator of the triptych paradigm that ineluctably defines human existence: past, present and future. In the indiscernible movement between past and present, the narrators invariably think about the future - a future that would be better, both for themselves and their children. Notwithstanding its historical content, the book elicits a universal portrayal of human struggle and strivings.

As this subchapter has shown, oral history has been widely employed as a catch-all term defining a multitude of practices. However, in this expansion of role, has oral history lost its idiosyncratic nature? Professor Ştiucă warns that the boundaries of the discipline have yet to be discerned in Romania where many printed works have been erroneously lumped together as ‘oral history’. In her lucid article “Istoria Orală – Note Polemice” (Oral History – Polemical Notes, published in the IEF ‘C. Brailoiu’ Annals, vol. XVII, p. 29-34, 2006), she discusses the major fault line corrupting the true meaning of oral history.

To begin with, Ştiucă makes clear that oral history is invested with a greater role in the former communist countries where “written history (from treatises to school books) is a perverted one, deeply impregnated by ideology” (2006: 1). Therefore, there is an urgent need to document the memories and experiences of those neglected by history in an attempt to offer new perspectives on the past. What is more, the novelty value of the discipline resides in its interactive power, as history becomes an interlocutor in a face to face conversation.

Nevertheless, the apparent simplicity of the practice belies in fact a compound of elements and structures.

Ştiucă’s article provides a riposte to the number of books published in Romania which conceal the complexities of historical interviews. As such, these publications present only the

‘aesthetically’ refined transcriptions which offer but a brief glimpse into the technicalities of the

research project. What is more, Stiuca cautions that what is being published today in Romania as

oral history can be juxtaposed with anthropological literature. Hence, the new terminology emerging in sociology and inclusive of concepts like “life stories, récit de vie, family history and histoire de vie sociale” (Ştiucă 2006: 3) can be more aptly used to define Romanian publications.

Finally, the Romanian professor suggests a few guidelines that can be incorporated in a more solid and authentic oral history project. Thus, the most important stages are those of research, methodology, choice of interviewees and recording. Inarguably, the historian’s role is a significant one as he co-participates in the reconstruction of someone’s life story in a conversational setting. For this reason, the biographical and autobiographical paradigms should be discarded in favour of the dialogical one which fits in perfectly with the oral history approach.

Slightly expanding the meaning of dialogue, it would then be perfectly justified to encourage academic exchange between oral history and psychology, social sciences and the humanities.

Such an interdisciplinary cooperation can round out historians’ research.

As far as the interviewees are concerned, they are a tangible part of history, serving as living sources of information about the horrors of a more recent past. Those who withstood the vicissitudes of communist times and held firm were not left unscathed. However, they survived and became the ones chosen to “to tell the tale” (Şandru 2008:169). These victims, as Liiceanu writes in his preface of The Story of Elisabeta Rizea from Nucşoara: Cornel Drăgoi’s Testimony (2012), were not “redeemed by universal human justice”, but they have the right to be listened to by us (2012: 9). These oppressed people do not ask for vengeance, but for justice to be made not by themselves, but by the power of laws and individuals at large.

To conclude, oral history in Romania has indisputably grown out of a need for confession and restoration of the past. It is a lived history that can only be made intelligible by the accounts of first-hand witnesses. In this respect, the words of Cornel Drăgoi, a former political prisoner, are evocative of the tremendous importance of the victims as “Our acts are enough anyway to make a history” (Nicolau/Niţu 2012: 12). In other words, oral history challenges the historical record by capturing a multitude of voices and perspectives. It is about the voices of ordinary people caught in the spinning maelstrom of communism – it is not then difficult to see why their accounts may sometimes turn, as in Rizea’s case, into a “ long wail” (Nicolau/Niţu 2012: 14). A cry of pain, when words cannot describe the indescribable.

Last but not least, I would like to call attention to the research undertaken by the

“Cultural Foundation Negru Vodă” of Făgăraş (more than one hundred oral history interviews

with supporters or family members of those involved in the anti-communist resistance on the northern slopes of the Făgăraş Mountains) and the “Third Europe Foundation” of Timişoara that resulted in works on the resistance in the Banat Mountains.

All these works demonstrate, as Tismaneanu himself acknowledged (1998: 3) that the past (as in the case of many other former socialist countries) is inextricably linked to the present and cannot be simply repudiated or overlooked.

2. Communism and Religion

Dialectical materialism and scientific atheism lie at the core of Marxist philosophy (Kenrick 1931; Gallagher 1947; Kania 1947; Bennett 1960; Stedman Jones 2002; Geoghegan 2004; Enache 2009; Pfaff 2012; Daji 2014; Madsen 2014;), being antagonistic to the essentially Christian foundations of European civilisation (1947: 35). Hence, Marx dislodges religion from its central position in society, attributing a primal role to material existence. As such, conscience is shaped by social connections and their economic outcome. In order to apply this materialistic principle capitalism must be annihilated, for it provides a fertile ground for the spread of religion.

As a result, drawing on historical materialism and scientific atheism, Soviet communism was manifestly anti-religious. If it initially proclaimed religious freedom and argued in favour of religious tolerance, it radically changed its discourse after securing its hold on power. In what follows, I will provide a synoptic view of the manoeuvers and strategies employed by communists in their relentless attempt to suppress religion.

In his insightful article “Religion under communism”, Madsen ascribes the idiosyncratic feature of Marxist atheism to its association with class struggle (2014: 1). In Marx’s view, religion functions as ‘the opium of the people’ insofar as it provides a temporary alleviation of suffering while, on the other hand, deflecting people’s attention from the construction of a class consciousness. To attend to this problem, communism promises freedom from religion as one of its over-arching goals.

Stalin’s six-tiered model provides a summary picture of the calculated steps undertaken

to eradicate religion (Madsen 2014: 4). The first one, as previously discussed, refers to religious

freedom guaranteed by the State Constitution. In reality, the covert purpose of this measure was

to steer people away from the main church and compel them to look for other faiths. The second measure was more practical in its designs as it targeted the church aiming to seize its property and limit its role to a merely liturgical one. As the measures increased so did the level of violence. More specifically, the third step implied the imprisonment and execution of the prominent church hierarchy. This act was allegedly motivated not by anti-religion purposes but rather by revolutionary ones as the priests were blocking the consummation of the revolution.

The fourth step belay the treacherous nature of communist designs insofar as it made reference to the creation of clerical and lay organisations subservient to the state that could level criticism at church leaders. The annihilation of the church hierarchy led to the fifth measure that involved the appointment of submissive clergy in top positions. Last but not least, antagonistic action was taken against minority religions that might have originally offered their help in the assault on the Russian Orthodox Church. Providing a summary picture of this detailed and malign plan of action, Madsen resolutely concludes that “the dominant church will now be a […]

hollowed-out shell” (2014: 14), stripped of its power and employed as a mere political tool.

In light of this, it is hardly necessary to elaborate on the suffering and pain caused by this carefully contrived plan of attack as thousands of people were caught in its maelstrom.

Unsurprisingly, such episodes of violence, torture and life-long hardship were obscured prior to the fall of communism. However, Gallagher writes eloquently about the various stages of persecution in Soviet Russia starting with the early 1920s and ending with the late 1930s that coincided with the Stalinist purges (1947:425). He makes a perceptive remark about the more lenient policy towards religion during the Second World War when Stalin tried to nullify Hitler’s propagandistic claims about atheist Russia (Madsen 2014: 5).

Nevertheless, despite a number of compromises, the Russian Church remained in the grip of the State and its more or less vigorous persecution continued following the end of the war.

Moreover, motivated by imperialist ambitions, Soviet Russia sought to use the churches of the

newly conquered territories as political tools assisting in the legitimation of the communist

authority. Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia and Romania provide the most relevant case studies

(Gallacher 1947:426; Madsen 2014: 6-10). The adoption of the Stalinist model both in Russia

and in these sovietised countries made extensive recourse to violence and translated into three

directive lines: imprisonment, working camps and deportation (Gallagher 1947: 51).

The installation of communist power in Romania entailed not only a political and social reconfiguration, but also a religious one. In light of its ideology, the new regime was antagonistic to religion perceiving it as a major deterrent to revolution. Trying to bring the Church into subjection, the party-state took recourse to a wide repertoire of measures. These targeted not only the Church hierarchy but also the population at large in an effort to extirpate all spiritual patterns underlying people’s lives.

The situation of the first category is better documented (Pope 1992; Turcescu 2007;

Leustean 2009; Silvesan 2010; Applebaum 2012; Stan 2012; Vasile 2015) and it mainly emphasises the position adopted by the Romanian Orthodox Church. Pope (1992), Leustean (2009) and Silvesan (2010) mark the beginning of the ordeal in 1948 when a new Law on Religious Cults redefined the relation between Church and State. In addition to the religious freedom and freedom of conscious, already stipulated by the Constitution, this new law enabled the state to bring all religious communities under its supervision (more than that, all churches were to be legally administered by the Department of Cults; 1992: 4; Silvesan 2010

).

The crackdown on religion employed a top-down approach as it sought to counter all religious manifestations, however innocent they might have appeared. The inculcation of atheism had to be pursued systematically (being primarily directed at young people) in an attempt to efface any religion-inspired forms of expression. Once again, Leustean uses compelling evidence to support this claim, contending that “children who made the sign of the cross upon hearing the church bells near their school on Saint Nicholas Day were expelled and their parents criticised ” (2009:107). What is more, according to some Radio Free Europe accounts made by ordinary people, “to believe in God is looked upon as a disgrace and to manifest faith is still worse”

(ibid.).

Thus, following the terror campaign against political opponents (started in 1947) and the Law on Religious cults, the communists also intensified religious persecution. Turcescu (2007), Leustean (2009) and Zara (2018) touch upon the stringent measures taken against Romanian clergy, with the second cogently remarking that “Individual priests were defrocked, denied moral and financial support, or thrown in jail” (Turcescu 2007: 81). What is more, Stan and Turcescu sharply and precisely note that twenty two churches were knocked down in Bucharest

6 For further reference see https://istorieevanghelica.ro/2010/05/12/cultele-religioase-in-romania-comunista/

while others were closed or literally transported to more unfavourable locations (Turcescu 2007:

69; Stan 2012: 3).

Moreover, eliminating some of the old clergy, the state appointed a new one favoured by the party. As in the other communist states, the Church was bereft of its educational and social roles. Inarguably, coercive actions and close supervision of all clergy were all methods used to kneel down the church. However, if ‘religious persecution’ receives a transparent and clear treatment in specialised literature, the ambivalent position of the Orthodox Church has inspired heated debates and conflicting interpretations.

Turcescu is, for example, inflexible in his belief that the “ church collaborated closely with the communist regime in exchange for protection of its assets from nationalization and for a privileged position among denominations in Romania” (2007: 68). His argument is substantiated by Leustean (2009) and Lelutiu (2012) who adduce even more evidence pointing to the incorporation of the Greek Uniate Church into the Orthodox Church (1948) and the aggressive campaigns against the other religious confessions (Roman Catholics, Lutherans, Reformed, etc.).

It becomes then evident that, despite the apparent privileged status it enjoyed, the Orthodox Church remained shoehorned between a series of constraining measures intended to ensure its subservience.

Finally, Turcescu distinguishes four different types of relations between Church and State, as mirrored by the positions taken by individual priests (2007: 74-75). If the first category refers to priests who sidestepped all forms of collaboration but did not mount any opposition against the regime, the second one includes all the priests who were more outspoken in their criticism of the regime. According to some estimates, a hundred thousand priests were detained in the 1950s being subject to a violent treatment that was, more often than not, the leading death cause. Incarcerated in the cells of the Ministry of the Interior, with meagre food and lack of hygiene, many priests broke down but some of them set an example through their verticality and unyielding courage in the face of adversity.

Two distinguished priests were Gheorghe-Calciu Dumitreasa (1925-2006) and Dumitru Staniloae (1903-1993). The former was one of the declining numbers of priests opposing the regime in the 1980s, spending more than twenty years in communist prisons. He was a distinguished figure in the fight against communist atheism and the seven sermons (entitled

“Seven Words for Youth”) he gave at the Bucharest Seminary were made public by Radio Free

Europe. He talked to the young people about “friendship and faith, overcoming one’s fear and building churches instead of razing them down” (my translation from Romanian)

.

The documentary dedicated to Calciu-Dumitreasa and produced by Hossu-Longin (2016) pointedly shows how the Securitate sought to block students’ access to the sermons but was eventually outsmarted by the students who climbed the walls to listen to the Father. Their shouts are poignant and their visionary power provides a glimpse into the subsequent development of events. “Father, we’ll go to the very end, no matter what. God is with us” (my translation from Romanian; ibid.). This quote expressly demonstrates that atheism, or the philosophy of despair according Calciu-Dumitreasa, was rejected by the population who saw their salvation in God.

God was on their side and they knew that.

To continue, the other two categories cover priests who became the informers of the Securitate, denouncing other clergy. Some of them never admitted to carrying out this role, while others were candid about their collaboration and publicly repented.

As a final remark, it should be noted that the association between Church and state in communist Romania compels a more rigorous analysis in light of its complexity and multi- layered interpretations. However, the prevailing argument is that, relying on the century-old concept of ‘symphonia’

, the Church saw it fit to continue collaborating with the state, be it a communist one. This cooperation though did not mitigate the effects of religious persecution and brought the church in a state of servitude. By contrast, while more obscured from public view, the brave resistance of simple priests or lay people proclaimed the perennial nature of love, faith and hope. Whether the Church could have taken a more active stand and not renege on its moral and Christian principles, remains a contentious issue to this day.

3. Orality in translation

Research carried out at the intersection between orality and translation studies is fairly recent. As Paul Bandia aptly explains, the link between orality and translation is as profound as it is complex, as “the very act of speaking, which sets human apart from other living species, involves the translating of thought into audible words or speech” (2015: 1). Therefore, in light of 7 For further references see http://www.apologeticum.ro/2012/11/mereu-actuale-cele-sapte-cuvinte-catre-

tineri-ale parintelui-gheorghe-calciu-dumitreasa/

8 ‘Symphonia’ was indicative of the harmonious fusion that had to be established between church and state. This

theocratic Byzantine model invested the Christian emperor with a double-sided role, namely a political and spiritual

one. The church acknowledged its primarily religious mission and attributed to the emperor the role of guardian and

defender of faith. In turn, the emperor was compelled to conform to the spiritual guidance of the church.