Nom De Guerre Research Articles

Αρμόδιος και Αριστογείτων

Harmodius and Aristogeiton. An Adapted Tyrannicide in the Greek Pre-revolutionary Theater The tragedy Αρμόδιος και Αριστογείτων (Harmodius and Aristogeiton) is the most radical theatrical play performed by Greek amateur actors in Odessa in the years 1814-1820, since its subject is the tyrannicide as a legitimate resistance of citizens to power, when it arbitrarily abolishes natural law. The tragedy, first staged in 1819, was until now considered to be an original work of Georgios Lassanis (1793-1870), but my article proves that in fact it is a theatrical adaptation of a part of the novel Aristides und Themistocles (1792), written by the German scholar Ignaz Aurelius Feßler (1765-1839), a member of the Illuminati Order. A comparison of the novel with the ancient sources for the two tyrannicides shows that the changes made by the enthusiastic Kantian Feßler (mainly the concealment of the homoerotic character of the relationship between the two heroes) aimed to adapt the historical material to Kant’s conception that morality is based on the autonomy of the will. Lassanis kept the changes of Feßler and added some new inventions which emphasize even more the autonomy of the will as a condition of morality. The close relationship of Lassanis’ dramaturgy with his engagement as a member of the Filiki Etaireia becomes obvious not only in the choice of the subject of death for the homeland and democracy but is also manifest in his (pen-)name «Lyssanias». Lassanis’ nom de guerre is not a phonic variant of his name (as it has commonly been assumed until now) but rather refers to the verse of Aristophanes «Λυσανίαι πατρῴων μεγάλων κακῶν»; it therefore denotes one who liberates the homeland from sorrow and pain.

How the Rise of the Rapid Support Forces Sparked Sudan's Meteoric Descent

AbstractThe processes that transitioned Sudan from a deeply securitized kleptocracy into a fledgling democracy have generated stressors that are now threatening its collapse. The country's two rival generals—Abdel Fattah al‐Burhan of the Sudan Armed Forces and Mohammed Hamden Dagalo (nom de guerre Hemedti) of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces—have plunged Sudan into a bloodbath. Khartoum, the capital that had been an island of civility since it was ransacked by Dervishes in 1885, has been engulfed in fierce battles since the two groups turned on each other in April 2023. Unpacking the host of factors that prompted the bloody conflict is a complex task, but the rivals and their allies are the chief culprits. Once created as a means to run counterinsurgency strategy on the cheap, the Rapid Support Forces has expanded its capacity and become a major power center. Originating in Darfur as a plunder machine of the Janjaweed militias, the group outgrew its function and became a private army capable of routing overlords in quick succession. This article traces the roots of the Rapid Support Forces to demonstrate the structural factors threatening Sudan's stability.

Ignacy Bator (1916–1944) – jeden z cichociemnych

Ignacy Bator (1916-1944), nom de guerre “Opór” (“Resistance”) was a lieutenant of the Polish Air Force in Great Britain, participant in the Warsaw Uprising, one of the 316 Silent and Unseen - special paratroopers of the Home Army. In 1939, he took part in the defense of Poland, then he reached France, where he joined the Polish Armed Forces in the West. In 1940, he made his way to Great Britain, where he served in the air force as a shooter-radio operator in No. 301 Polish Bomber Squadron and No. 138 (Special Duties) Squadron RAF. In 1942, he volunteered to serve in the Home Army in occupied Poland. After training, he was dropped to Poland on the night of January 25/26, 1943. He served in the radio communication structures of the Home Army Headquarters. As a radio operator of the Home Army, he took part in the Warsaw Uprising, during which he died in August 1944. He has been awarded many times for his service by Polish and British military decorations, incl. with the Silver Cross of the Order of Virtuti Militari, four times with the Cross of Valor, with the “Distinguished Flying Cross” and others.

Secret Cables of the Comintern, 1933–1943

Secret Cables of the Comintern, 1933–1943

Ishtyle : Accenting Gay Indian Nightlife by Kareem Khubchandani

Reviewed by: Ishtyle : Accenting Gay Indian Nightlife by Kareem Khubchandani Sony Coráñez Bolton (bio) Ishtyle: Accenting Gay Indian Nightlife by Kareem Khubchandani. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2020. Xxiv + 262 pp. $34.95 paper. ISBN: 978-0-472-07421-1. Kareem Khubchandani's Ishtyle: Accenting Gay Indian Night Life is a performance studies ethnography centering the subcultural lives of queer South Asian (mostly) men in Bangalore and Chicago. Using an innovative form of participant observation that speaks to Khubchandani's positioning in these communities as a drag artist (whose nom de guerre is LaWhore Vagistan), he elicits spectacularly rich ethnographic descriptions that read against the presumed heteronormativity of "Bollywood tropes, narratives, and choreographies" (xiv) while also embracing the queer meanings that are inherent to them as they [End Page 507] play out Indian nightlife—indeed, "drag [is the] research method" (xiv). His is a refreshing study written with verve and rigor that should be widely read and embraced in Asian American and queer of color studies. Khubchandani defines "ishtyle" as a "form of vernacular performance" or "accented style" emerging in response to the social normalizations of multinational capitalism. Ishtyle "enables alternative affective, erotic, and social transactions by accenting the night with vernacular articulations of Indianness" (2). Such "accents" are so conceptually powerful because they "not only wield the performative force of history they have acquired in repetition to conjure gender, race, and class, but [also] their kinetic force physically 'punctures' space and time to bring bodies into new proximity and relation" (9). In other words, ishtyle is a repertoire of stylized acts, speech, and sartorial flair that forges queer community through its ontological difference from mainstream cultural formations shaped by Orientalism and white supremacy. At base, this is a book about subjectivity and agency—subjecthood that you cannot miss (and wouldn't want to) for how flamboyant, queer, jocular, witty, and irreverent it is. Chapters 1 and 2 focus on the politics of accented styles under respectability regimes in Bangalore. Chapter 1 analyzes the contradictory cultural impulses of Hindutva normativity that draw on British colonial antecedents and the anxieties around westernization under economic modernization. Chapter 2 takes up the unenviable though brilliantly ironic task of analyzing the politics of social dance under legal mandates in Bangalore outlawing it between 2006 and 2014. Chapter 3 speaks to the complicated politics of interracial desire centered on the Boystown "gayborhood" in Chicago. A centerpiece chapter of the study in general, it substantiates the overall claim that Indianness and its queer brownness are a performative node around which we can come to a more nuanced understanding of race, sexuality, nation, and desire not limited to South Asian diasporic subjects. I was struck by the attention given to the fungibility of brownness that causes misrecognitions between Latinx and Indian bodies—an interchangeability that was a welcome and profound contribution that exceeds the seemingly narrow parameters of "gay Indian nightlife." I found this so valuable because it provided a deep and powerful justification to foreground interracial encounter rather than perpetually affixing queer subject-making to a central signifying whiteness. Through vim, humor, and candor emblematic of an intellectually rigorous "ishtylized" ethnography, Khubchandani implores us to prioritize "axes of desire" that "center queer interracial intimacies" that displace the "sexual racism and unrequited desire from white men" (100). Sign me up. Chapter 4 speaks to the author's own grassroots efforts to build queer Desi community in Chicago through the serialized party Jai Ho! Here the analytical framing of ishtyle is extended to theorize its "capacity … to unsettle whiteness [End Page 508] and its accompanying Orientalism in gay nightlife" (111). While I do not doubt ishtyle's ability to potentiate such a critique, I was curious about a tendency to overly romanticize queer migrant cultures, particularly vis-à-vis settler colonialism. The author reflects on the "ability to emplace migrant subjects, not as settlers with possessive attachment to land but as performers who have permission to feel at home every once in a while" (111, emphasis mine). This opens up a productive conversation on the ways that queer migrant culture generally in settler colonial countries might present implicit and deeply structural contraventions to indigenous sovereignty. I wish...

The New New Journalism

The New New Journalism Davis Schneiderman (bio) Tinyman for President Q. Synopsis I-BeaM Books https://shop.spybeambooks.com/product/tinyman-for-president 150 Pages; Print, $20.20 That this anonymous novel’s price is that of the vexed year it covers is one of the many small details lovingly girding the body of this metafictional text. Another is the name of the purported author, a pseudonym for a small-press writer whose impressive work has been seriously underappreciated, even while maintaining a those-in-the-know impressiveness for those, well, in the know. In fact, it was because an ABR editor approached me to review a work by this specific author under their real name that caused me to agree to write this review. Only when Tinyman for President arrived in the mail did I discover the nom de guerre; after corresponding with the editor, I was told the author would prefer I review the work “as a novel by ‘Q. Synopsis’ rather than mentioning that ‘Synopsis’ is one of his pseudonyms” (though he added, “if Davis feels comfortable doing it this way”). Since I’ve long ago given up any sense of comfort, I agreed, although the preceding sentence suggests this is not the first Kierkegaardian identity our intrepid author has deployed. That I started writing this several days before the inauguration of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, and a mere week and change after the insurrection at the Capitol that provides a truth-is-stranger-than-fiction for Tinyman, it’s also true that the book manages to carry more than enough insightful surprises. These hold water during a period where everything about the United States is leaky. Or maybe air filled, as the Tinyman cover shows an untethered balloon with American flag design (foreground) about to be popped, optical illusion style, on the tip of the Capitol dome (background). There’s no middle ground anywhere. Q’s frame — diametrically opposed to the QAnon cult and its role-paying-game paranoia — is one part New Journalism (see the back cover comparisons to Hunter S. Thompson) and three parts questioning of a “what the actual f*&% is going on?” mode. Put those in a blender with a bit of barely credible comic-book backstory, and you have a satire not for the ages but for this age. This now. This muddle. Let me explain. In the novel, Tinyman is the most pathetic type of self-involved superhuman, in a world that has more than its fair share: Not a maniac, but endowed with superpowers with which a true maniac could cause severe mayhem…Tinyman was not tiny. In socks and sandals, he stood about 5’8 3/4”, 98 pounds. Though he was obliged to fight crime, he had a nonconfrontational disposition and social anxiety, insecurity, hypersomnia, and his supersenses were prone to hallucinations…. Also, unlike his many glamorous supercolleagues, his entertainment properties were slim, and amounted to a three-issue comic book run, long out of print. Q. runs with the joke, as Tinyman takes on various public- and self-deprecating aspects that collect against the dominant narrative of omnipresent superhero stories. In a world without The Tick, The Boys, etc., this might be enough of an animating spark, but it’s precisely the sense of imminent deflation (cue soon-to-be-popped cover balloon) that make Tinyman work so strangely compelling. It’s not the plot, which is deliberately simple — Tinyman and his team try to get him both elected and not elected as President, and he persists nonetheless; there’s a Watchmen (1987) like chill over the proceedings, as heroes are forbidden from using their powers, and the ambiguous toggle of Tinyman’s un/electability proves an acerbic commentary that exists both narratively and as a seeming act of meta-narrative omniscience. In any event, Tinyman doesn’t want to be President (or does he?), and the while the enterprise benefits from the Bartelby-like ambiguities of the titular here, the novel’s crypto-protagonist is his hapless campaign manager Johnny Werd, who works for Tinyman precisely because Werd doesn’t really believe Tinyman can win (and despite their mutual disdain for Trump...

Warda: A Novel by Sonallah Ibrahim

BOOKS IN REVIEW Sonallah Ibrahim Warda: A Novel Trans. Hosam Aboul-Ela. New Haven, Connecticut. Yale University Press. 2021. 376 pages. MANY OF SONALLAH IBRAHIM’S novels explore how former Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser’s version of socialism was “a dream.” Yet Warda, originally published in Arabic in 2000, examines the fate of the Dhofar Liberation Front, an Arab Marxist movement that sought to drive the British out from Oman and Yemen in the 1960s and 1970s. This political movement is intertwined with the Egyptian narrator’s personal dreams and memories of Warda, the nom de guerre of an Omani activist with whom he fell in love at Cairo University in the late 1950s. Informed by impressive research, the novel tells the little-known story of the Dhofar Liberation Front, an eclectic mix of Arab intellectuals, herders, and tribal folk who were initially drawn to the group because they desired a more equitable society. The novel opens in 1992 with the narrator’s, Rushdy’s (presumably the alter ego of the writer), dreams of Warda. Because of the disturbing dreams, Rushdy heads to Oman to find Warda, which means “rose” in Arabic. He ties in his quest with a visit to relatives, his cousin Fathy, and his wife, Shafiqa, who work in Oman. The novel alternates between Rushdy’s point of view, set in the shiny, superficially modern yet repressive Oman of 1992 and the “found” xeroxed diary of Warda set in the 1960s and 1970s, delivered mysteriously to the narrator, in ironically, Western brand-name plastic bags. No novelists, thus far, have examined the Dhofar Liberation Front that sprang to life out of the zeitgeist and context of the 1960s. After the Egyptian setback with Israel in 1967 and the British retreat from Aden, the DLF gained more popular support in the Arab world. At this time, the Russians and the Chinese were eager to expand their sphere of influence in the Arabian Gulf— they threw money and ammunition at this small Marxist group, which they might have ignored at another historical juncture. Through Warda’s diary, Ibrahim gives us a sense of the nitty-gritty life “on the ground” of a committed revolutionary in the DLF, a woman no less. Warda is a feisty, liberated character, who is at first doctrinaire but eventually rejects violence and even questions the goals of the DLF by the end. Her diary details the phases of the movement through a personal lens: 1960–1965, Warda’s training and recruitment in Lebanon ; Arrival to the Dhofar Mountains, 1965–1968, division of the area and guerilla operations against British targets; 1968–1970, Warda’s withdrawal as a fighter and work on literacy and feminist projects with local women; 1970–1972, Sultan Said Bin Taimur’s overthrow by his son, Qaboos, with the support of the British in 1970 (members of the DLF are co-opted by Qaboos with payoffs and financial incentives); 1972–1975, in-fighting among members and retreat from Sultan Qaboos; and finally, 1975, members hiding in caves. Warda and her lover, Dahmish, another fighter, plan a suicidal trek across the Saudi desert, to sneak back into Oman and revive the movement. Being a revolutionary might seem glamorous to the naïve, but Warda finds out that soldiering in the desert is cruel and demanding . Throughout her diary, she offers serious ruminations on political ideology and fascinating tidbits about other revolutionary groups on the world stage. She also describes violent guerilla operations, nasty power struggles, and executions of deserters. Ibrahim’s penchant for the absurd is palpable in the diary. Warda makes some wry observations about the difficulties of trying to lead traditional, uneducated men in her militia—and not all of the creatures of the desert are warm and fuzzy . . . SONALLAH IBRAHIM 96 WLT AUTUMN 2021 0 deserts her, and her father succumbs to religious charlatans. Married as a teen to a man twice her age, Nancy watches her husband get drunk every night. When he dies in an accident at a tuna-packing plant, she wonders if she’ll be granted “a moment alone with the 2,500 cans containing my deceased husband.” When disease attacks her uterus, she...

An example of Bî‘at-nâme: Nakşî İbrahim Efendi’s Bî‘at-nâme

Hz. Peygamber, ashabı ile farklı zamanlarda ve değişik konularda biatlar gerçekleştirmiştir. Bu biatlara zaman zaman kadınlar da eşlik etmiştir. Biatların içeriğini çoğu zaman itaat, takva, cihat ve güzel ahlâk oluşturmakla birlikte biata katılanlar verdikleri biattan dönmeyeceklerine dair söz vermişlerdir. Söz verme hadisesi tek taraflı olmayıp iki tarafı da bağlayan bir sözleşmedir. Hz. Peygamber’in Birinci ve İkinci Akabe biatları ayrıca Hudeybiye’de gerçekleştirdiği Bi‘atü’r-Rıdvan bu minvalde teşekkül etmiş biatlardır. Kur’an-ı Kerim’de “mübâya‘a” şeklinde ifade edilen bu ibare, hem Arap hem de Türk-İslâm kültürüne mensup müelliflerin dikkatini çekmiş, Resul-i Ekrem’in biatlarını ihtiva eden Bî‘at-nâme türünde edebi metinler kaleme almışlardır. Türk edebiyatında en belirgin örneğini Sun‘ullah-ı Gaybî’de (ö. 1676 ?) müşahede ettiğimiz Bî‘at-nâme, Sünbülî tarikatı şeyhi Nakşî mahlaslı İbrahim Efendi (ö. 1702) tarafından da kaleme alınmıştır. İstanbul’da doğan şair, burada farklı camilerde vaaz ve nasihatlarda bulunmuştur. Halvetiyye’nin Sünbüliyye koluna intisap ederek bu tarikatın manevi eğitim ve terbiyesinden geçmiştir. Arapçaya da vâkıf olduğu bilinen şair, XVII. asırda Türk tasavvuf edebiyatının önemli bir temsilcisi konumundadır. Divan’ı ile meşhur şairin beş sayfadan müteşekkil “Hâzâ Risâle-i Kutbü’l-Ârifîn Nakşî Efendi es-Sünbülî” başlıklı Bî‘at-nâme risalesi Hz. Peygamber’in Akabe ve Bi‘atü’r-Rıdvan sözleşmelerini muhtevidir. Bu makalede kısaca “biat” kelimesi, içeriği ve Hz. Peygamber’in biatları konu edilmiştir. Sonrasında yurt içi kütüphanelerinde kayıtlı Bî‘at-nâmelerle birlikte müellifin biyografisi ve söz konusu eserinin çevriyazılı metni verilmiştir.

ДІЯЛЬНІСТЬ СТАРШИНСЬКОЇ ШКОЛИ УПА ІМЕНІ ПОЛК. Є. КОНОВАЛЬЦЯ НА КОЛОМИЙЩИНІ (ІЗ ОСОБИСТИХ ЗІЗНАННЬ ФЕДОРА СТЕФАНОВИЧА-«КРОПИВИ»)

For an unbiased interpretation of the history of the Ukrainian people’s struggle for independence it is necessary to conduct versatile studies on the activity of Ukrainian liberation movement, particularly, on its personnel structure. Cadres play the most important role in any organization. Consequently, the clarification of the peculiarities and possibilities of their preparation makes up an important scientific problem. The article provides the protocol of the interrogation of colonel Fedir Stepanovych, whose nom de guerre was «Kropyva» («the nettle») and who was the organizer and the first head of Colonel E. Konovalets’ Officer School of the UPA in the Hutsul region. It should be underlined that the aforementioned document is an important source for a complex research of Ukrainian liberation movement in general and the peculiarities of preparation of master sergeants (starshyn) and staff sergeants (pidstarsshyn) specifically. The published protocol clarifies the question of functioning of master and staff sergeants schools of the UPA in MD-4 «Hoverlia». F. Stepanovych’ own evidence describes the officer school’s disposition place, strength, the names of administrative staff, programs, productivity of work. Besides, it gives the general information on the administrative staff of the OUN and UPA in Stanislaviv land.There is no separate complex research on the functioning of centres of preparation of commanding and rank-and-file staff of the UPA’s MD-4 «Hoverlia». That is the reason why this article purposes to provide the available information on the peculiarities of functioning of master sergeants (starshyn) and staff sergeants (pidstarsshyn) schools in MD-4 «Hoverlia».In the territory of Karpatskyi Krai (the Carpathian area of OUN) the shortage of master sergeants (starshyn) and staff sergeants (pidstarsshyn) cadres was acute. This problem was solved by both enrolling of persons who served in the armies of other states and by the independent preparation of such. For that purpose separate training courses were organized in accordance with independently developed programs to prepare commanding and rank-and-file staff. On the whole, master and staff sergeants training lasted from one to four months. Their instructors were those who had previous military experience. In addition, the UPA sergeants schools which absorbed the skilled staff of instructors who began intense training differed qualitatively from the rest. After the decision to organize military preparation for a number of OUN members the OUN leadership took to carrying it out. It is found out that there functioned 14 master and staff sergeants schools in the Karpatskyi Krai territoryHence, for the Ukrainian insurgents, combating for the restoration of their own state, the provision of their structures with professional cadres was a priority task. This question was solved by organization of their own training courses, under the supervision of skilled insurgents who had earlier participated in military service in the armies of other states and received direct fighting experience. Almost ten years of the Ukrainian liberation movement’s opposition to the Soviet punitive system became a bright acknowledgement of the effective work of training structures in MD-4 «Hoverlia».

Timor-Leste

Timor-Leste Michael Leach (bio) The year 2017 in Timor-Leste was dominated by a round of national elections and a major breakthrough in the country's long-running dispute [End Page 539] with Australia over maritime boundaries. In the latter part of the year, a newly installed fretilin-led minority government proved unable to pass its program in Parliament, which saw the country head back to the polls in May 2018. (fretilin is the acronym for one of Timor-Leste's major political parties: the Revolutionary Front for an Independent East Timor.) A new maritime boundary and revenue-sharing treaty with Australia negotiated over 2017 was signed in early March 2018. The year started unexpectedly with a joint announcement that the government of Timor-Leste would terminate the 2006 Treaty on Certain Maritime Arrangements in the Timor Sea (cmats) with Australia (Australian Treaty Series 2007). The decision, which Australia did not contest, opened the way for progress in boundary negotiations. Aside from sharing the proceeds of undersea resources, the key feature of cmats was a fifty-year moratorium on boundary negotiations in favor of a series of revenue-sharing agreements, known as "provisional arrangements" under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, or unclos. Having vigorously defended cmats as recently as 2016, several factors explain the change in Australia's position. The 2006 treaty had been tarnished by allegations that Australia had spied on the East Timorese negotiating team in 2004 (smh 2013). Timor-Leste had then challenged the treaty, invoking the Vienna Convention's principle that negotiations should take place in "good faith." Equally significantly, in April 2016 the government of Timor-Leste initiated compulsory conciliation proceedings under unclos with the aim of concluding permanent maritime boundaries with Australia. Australia's opening legal gambit—a jurisdictional claim that the cmats treaty had already settled the border dispute—was dismissed by the conciliation commission in September 2016, which found that Australia's obligation to settle the boundary survived the treaty and its purported moratorium (unclos Conciliation Commission 2016). Having lost this argument, Australia had little further practical use for cmats. An additional factor was the dispute between China and its neighbors in the South China Sea, which raised the regional profile of international law in boundary disputes. In that case, Australia urged China to follow the rule of law, as represented by the decision of the tribunal formed under unclos. The contrast with Canberra's own behavior—its refusal to discuss a boundary in the Timor Sea and its withdrawal from the dispute-settlement provisions of unclos shortly before East Timorese independence in 2002—had created a public relations problem for Australia. For example, the powerful US House Armed Services Committee's National Defense Authorization Act for 2018 was specifically amended to encourage resolution of the maritime-boundary dispute between Australia and Timor-Leste. The committee noted that negotiations would send "a positive signal to other states in the region regarding adherence to a rules-based international order," highlighting the "potential security benefits" likely to flow from a peaceful resolution of the dispute (US House Armed Services Committee 2017, 2). There is little question that this shift in Washington [End Page 540] signaled extra pressure on Canberra to resolve the matter within the unclos conciliation process. These negotiations reached a partial conclusion in September 2017, discussed later in this review. The 2017 round of elections occurred in the wake of a government formed in extraordinary circumstances in early 2015, when the former independence movement leader Xanana Gusmão handed over the prime ministership to an opposition fretilin figure, Rui Araújo. Though best seen as a power-sharing executive rather than a formal government of national unity, this informal "grand coalition" between Timor-Leste's two largest parties—the National Congress for Timorese Reconstruction (cnrt) and fretilin—was a remarkable development, given the bitter tensions between the parties as recently as 2012. Described by a senior cnrt minister as a transition from "belligerent democracy to consensus democracy" (Pereira 2014), this powerful combination left President José Maria Vasconcelos (better known by his nom de guerre, Taur Matan Ruak) as the closest thing to an effective opposition. Ruak did...

Darlings of the Weather Underground

The figure of the fugitive woman radical has occupied a curiously important place in the American popular imagination. Early depictions of women whose political sympathies have drawn them into radical activism and terrorist plots include Susan Isaacson in E. L. Doctorow’s The Book of Daniel (1971) and Marge Piercy’s eponymous heroine in her novel Vida (1979). Fictional characters loosely based on such activist-fugitives as Bernardine Dohrn abound in more recent works as well. Meredith “Merry” Levov, in Philip Roth’s American Pastoral (1997), is no doubt the best known, but radical activist women similarly on the lam include Marin Douglas in Joan Didion’s A Book of Common Prayer (1977). Alice Mellings in Doris Lessing’s The Good Terrorist (1977), Jenny Shimada in Susan Choi’s American Woman (2003), Anna Xenos (nom de guerre Dial) in Peter Carey’s His Illegal Self (2008), Reno in Rachel Kushner’s recent The Flamethrowers (2013), and others. The figure of what Robin Morgan terms the “token terrorist” seems to have survived her immediate political moment and continues to resonate within the American imaginary of a “postpolitical” age. Against the backdrop of recurring contemporary fears about “domestic terrorism” and taking as my primary example Russell Banks’s The Darling (2004), this essay considers the recurrent fictions of the radical woman terrorist and fugitive within the horizon of the eclipse of radical activism and the rise of anxieties accompanying the resurgence of terrorism.

From Revolutionary Culture to Original Culture and Back: "On New Democracy" and the Kampucheanization of Marxism-Leninism, 1940–1965

Author(s): Galway, Matthew | Abstract: In Mao Zedong’s 1940 essay “On New Democracy,” he states that the Chinese Communists fought to build a new China with new politics, a new economy, and, most crucially, a new culture. Decades later, Saloth Sar (Pol Pot, nom de guerre) read French translations of Mao’s works in Paris, and drew from the Khmer past and Buddhism to call for democratic reform of a Khmer cultural type. While he had read and appreciated Mao Zedong Thought before, it was not until he visited Beijing in 1965–1966 that Sar awoke fully to Mao’s ideas, returning to Cambodia a Maoist convert. In Democratic Kampuchea (DK, 1975–1979), Sar, like Mao, sought to create a new culture, but this time through the lens of Maoism (exported Mao Zedong Thought). Party documents and speeches show how he sought to create a “Kampucheanized” Marxism-Leninism along the lines of Mao’s “Sinified” Marxism and with a “clean” revolutionary culture. This article argues that by tracking Pol Pot’s approaches to rebranding Cambodia, from his earliest political writing to his experiences abroad to the grotesque human experiment of DK, we can uncover the underlying problems of “Kampucheanizing” ideas from Maoist China. As the article shows, despite some similarities, Mao’s application of Marxism to the Chinese case—as he outlined in “One New Democracy”—and his vision for a new revolutionary culture were vastly different from Pol Pot’s efforts in Kampuchea. Keywords: intellectual history, Mao Zedong, Maoism, Pol Pot, Democratic Kampuchea, Cambodia, communism

The Mistress of Paris: The 19th-Century Courtesan Who Built an Empire on a Secret . By Catherine Hewitt

In 1881, Valtesse de La Bigne, one of Paris’s pre-eminent courtesans, attended a performance of the stage adaptation of Zola’s Nana despite her profound objections: as the supposed inspiration for the eponymous character, the sophisticated Valtesse felt as though Zola had betrayed her — she sensed little kinship with his vulgar creation. However, like Anna Wintour at the 2006 premiere of The Devil Wears Prada, Valtesse — a fashion icon in her own right — attended the play in order to reassert control of her own image and claim superiority over her literary double. Zola’s unmitigated failure that night proved to be her absolute triumph. These questions of identity and aesthetic production are at the heart of Catherine Hewitt’s captivating new biography, a portrait of a fascinating woman who became one of the best-known grandes horizontales of her day. The daughter of an impoverished laundress turned prostitute, Louise Delabigne rechristened herself Valtesse (a portmanteau of ‘Votre Altesse’) de La Bigne in 1866 at the age of eighteen. In adopting a royal address and the aristocratic particule, Valtesse laid bare the social ambitions that belied her humble origins — the ‘secret’ of the book’s title. While many of Valtesse’s contemporaries chose similarly colourful monikers, Hewitt convincingly shows that Valtesse’s name was as much a nom de plume as a nom de guerre: Valtesse was an author as well as a muse, and her life was her greatest work of fiction. A model for painters such as Manet, Detaille, and Gervex, Valtesse took up the brush for her own cheeky painting in an avant-garde gallery, and even commissioned portraits of fake aristocratic ancestors, thereby reverse-engineering a pedigree to justify her assumed title of Countess. Publishing under the pen name ‘Ego’, Valtesse also authored a highly circulated (and highly autobiographical) novel called Isola (Paris: Dentu, 1876). Hewitt’s adept synthesis of diverse media — literature, correspondence, newspapers — shows how Valtesse was an expert manipulator of her public image. Of particular note is Hewitt’s explanation of the intertwined industries of fashion and prostitution in nineteenth-century France: many of the women employed in the clothing industry became purveyors of both finery and flesh, and Valtesse’s rise through the ranks from lingère to lionne is a testament to her ambition, intellect, and gift for self-reinvention. Although Hewitt deftly transforms primary materials into an engaging narrative, the reader may wonder if she occasionally overreaches in describing the mental or emotional states of her subjects. About whether Valtesse would accord Zola a sexual favour during his visit: ‘There was no predicting how she would react, and Valtesse knew it. She relished the power that brought’ (p. 148). On a stylistic note, Hewitt’s repeated references to women as ‘females’ enacts a subtle dehumanization that is at odds with the book’s attempt to explore the complicated humanity of its protagonist. All things considered, Hewitt’s monograph is a valuable contribution to our understanding of the complex lives of the great nineteenth-century courtesans, and proves to be a textual encounter much like, according to the rapturous descriptions in Hewitt’s book, an evening spent with Valtesse herself — both pleasurable and edifying.

Crimean Secession in International Law

The contemporary expansion of Russian influence in the former Soviet bloc has not been accompanied by an objective approach to framing the Crimean conflict between Russia, Ukraine, the European Union (EU), and the United States (US). The US promised that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) would not move one inch eastward, if the Berlin Wall fell. It did. NATO moved eastward, right up to Russia’s borders. The western press forgot about the US reaction in 1962, when Russian missiles were being introduced into Cuba.After the War, the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia splintered into multiple nations. A half dozen oblasts in Russia’s backyard subsequently announced unilateral declarations of independence. Of these, Crimea has the most potential for removing Lite from the term Cold War Lite. If Ukraine obtains the nuclear missile defense shield it now seeks, Russia's President Putin has announced that he will move nuclear weapons into Crimea.Remedial secession is the nom de guerre for many of today's separatist movements. But its very existence clashes with various fundamentals of the international legal system.This book chapter provides detailed insights into the validity of remedial secession, the two major judicial opinions that have addressed it, and the steep, but evolving, path to legitimacy it may now be travelling. This chapter does so within the context of Crimea's secession referendum, declaration of independence, and de facto statehood, and Russia's annexation of Crimea. It covers the international community's reaction to these events — and the disparity among academic reactions to the vitality of remedial secession. It traces the UN General Assembly's 2014 Crimean debate — concluding that it is the most authoritative referee for judging Russia's claim to the validity of the Crimean secession.

Fidel Castro's first-born son foments a nanotech revolution.

In a Q&A, Fidel Castro Díaz-Balart reveals the truth behind his nom de guerre in Russia and his efforts to launch a nanotechnology R&D center in Havana.

Résistance du roman: genèse de Non” d’André Malraux par Jean-Louis Jeannelle, “Non”: fragments d’un roman sur la Résistance par André Malraux

Jeannelle, Jean-Louis. Résistance du roman: genèse de “Non” d’André Malraux. Paris: CNRS, 2013. ISBN 978-2-271-07740-0. Pp. 328. 25 a. Malraux, André. “Non”: fragments d’un roman sur la Résistance. Paris: Gallimard, 2013. ISBN 978-2-07-014055-8. Pp. 131. 15,90 a. Colonel Berger took leadership of the Alsace-Lorraine Brigade in September 1944. Prior to commanding under that pseudonym, Malraux was a member of the maquis in Corrèze, Dordogne. There he was known as Berger among other leaders of the regional réseaux, namely Soleil, Loiseau, and Grandet. The latter name from the Spanish Civil War was fictionalized in Malraux’s novel L’espoir (1937). Many readers of this novel expected Malraux to publish a sequel about the Resistance. Pertinently, “Non” is an incomplete, episodic collection of Resistance anecdotes. The text was constructed by Jean-Louis Jeannelle and Henri Godard from the archives of Jacques Doucet’s personal library. The archival work to produce this tentative narrative is described in detail in Résistance du roman, a scholarly companion to“Non”that appeals to readers interested in genetic criticism. Jeannelle and Godard had the manuscripts by Malraux and the typescripts produced by Sophie de Vilmorin. Having worked with collections of original literary manuscripts, I can attest to the difficulty of the work by these scholars, from deciphering words to making choices about which versions and/or pages to include/exclude in the published text. They respected Malraux’s pagination where indicated. Otherwise, they had to make decisions about what was pertinent to the perceived overall project. This project offers much to be studied in the context of the evolution of Malraux’s literary work as well as his life relative to his literary choices. For example, Jeannelle’s presentation rekindles the critical fires about why Malraux, as one of the great practitioners of the novel in L’espoir, did not follow up Les noyers d’Altenburg (1943) with another novel (“Non”) on the Resistance but decided instead not to pursue this literary form. Did Malraux decide not to publish it after the War, or was he editing and revising it until his old age? Many such questions come up as the reader recognizes in“Non”a fictionalized Colonel Berger evolving from the maquis to the Brigade. Certainly, the word non brings up the writings by Camus, Nietzsche, Dostoevsky, and many others about the human rejection of a stifling authority and the preparation for gaining integrity. The defining alternative is identified by Malraux’s narrator: “L’esclave dit toujours oui” (Malraux 118). The title also suggests the wordplay on nom in nom de guerre, the crucial use of an alias to disguise the players in the Resistance. The episodic style of these memoirs is familiar to many a combat veteran such as myself who remembers snippets of what happened in war rather than the linear story one might expect in a traditional novel or from a military historian. Jeannelle’s study assists the reader of“Non”in identifying some consistencies among the anecdotes. He provides links to some of Malraux’s published fiction, his known Resistance activity, and the mythomania he encouraged about it. Insofar as Malraux also claimed to want to make a movie about the Resistance, many of the scenes in “Non” resemble snapshots of what it was like to be part of the subversive, mostly heterogeneous, 216 FRENCH REVIEW 88.3 Reviews 217 opposition to Nazi tanks roaming in attack formations throughout the forests of the Dordogne.Weapons such as bazookas, parachuted in from England, became lifesavers in front of the Panzer tank,“le gros insecte” (Malraux 53) that menaced the countryside looking for partisans trying to get organized in secret places.“Non”also anecdotally bears witness to the roles women played in the Resistance. Other memories that still speak to us today recall, for example:“nos amis communistes”(Malraux 27) when the Left and the Right worked together for the same goal; the galvanizing moment when Jean Moulin was arrested at Caluire in Lyon; the use of torture by both sides to acquire information; and the specific uses of language such as the tutoiement employed...

How Soon Is Now? Medieval Texts, Amateur Readers, and the Queerness of Time and Opening Up Middle English Manuscripts: Literary and Visual Approaches

How Soon Is Now? Medieval Texts, Amateur Readers, and the Queerness of Time and Opening Up Middle English Manuscripts: Literary and Visual Approaches

“Barabasz” and the Jews: From the history of the “Wybraniecki” Home Army Partisan Detachment

The article demonstrates hitherto not described events from the history of the Home Army partisan detachment “Wybraniecki”, which was famous in the Kielce region. It was under command of the legendary Marian Sołtysiak (nom de guerre “Barabasz”), who was at the same time the commanding officer of the Kielce Home Army Sabotage Directorate (Kedyw). Initially, the detachment was a seven-person strong sabotage group. In June 1943 it already had a few dozen members and was quartered in a forest camp. In spring 1944 it was transformed into a partisan detachment, which belonged to the 4th Infantry Regiment of the Home Army Legions and which participated in the Operation Tempest. The events described in the article took place between the autumn of 1943 and spring of 1944, when the detachment’s squads were quartered in a few separate places and met from time to time during the concentrations ordered by the commander. At that time some Jews in hiding were murdered. Among those shot were: the group kept in hiding by the Pole Stefan Sawa (posthumously decorated with the Righteous among the Nations medal) in a cottage near Daleszyce, Michał Ferenc – Zajączków municipality clerk, Roman Olizarowski “Pomsta” – a “Wybraniecki” detachment soldier, who was liquidated after the discovery of his Jewish origin, Izaak Grynbaum from Chęciny and about three Jews hiding in bunkers near Mosty. After the war the following people stood trial: Edward Skrobot, Józef Molenda, Władysław Dziewiór, Mieczysław Szumielewicz and Marian Sołtysiak. The authors reconstruct the facts of those executions, discuss the motivations of the perpetrators and analyze them against the background of the functioning of the underground judiciary, and call into question the validity of some of its sentences. They also discuss the methods and line of defense of the accused ex-partisans.

„Barabasz” i Żydzi. Z historii oddziału AK „Wybranieccy”

The article demonstrates hitherto undescribed events from the history of the Home Army partisan detachment “Wybraniecki”, which was famous in the Kielce region. It was under command of the legendary Marian Soltysiak (nom de guerre “Barabasz”), who was at the same time the commanding officer of the Kielce Home Army Sabotage Directorate [Kedyw]. Initially, the detachment was a seven-person strong sabotage group. In June 1943 it already had a few dozen members and was quartered in a forest camp. In spring 1944 it was transformed into a partisan detachment, which belonged to the 4th Infantry Regiment of the Home Army Legions and which participated in the Tempest Operation. The events described in the article took place between the fall of 1943 and spring of 1944, when the detachment’s squads quartered in a few separate places and met from time to time during the concentrations ordered by the commandant. At that time some Jews in hiding were murdered. Among those shot were: the group kept in hiding by the Pole Stefan Sawa (posthumously decorated with the Righteous among the Nations medal) in a cottage near Daleszyce, Michal Ferenc – Zajączkow commune clerk, Roman Olizarowski “Pomsta” – a “Wybraniecki” detachment soldier, who was liquidated after the discovery of his Jewish origin, Izaak Grynbaum from Checiny and about three Jews hiding in bunkers near Mosty. After the war the following people stood trial: Edward Skrobot, Jozef Molenda, Wladyslaw Dziewior, Mieczyslaw Szumielewicz and Marian Soltysiak. The authors reconstruct the facts of those executions, discuss the motivations of the perpetrators and analyze them against the background of the functioning of the underground judiciary, and call into question the validity of some of its sentences. They also discuss the methods and line of defense of the accused ex-partisans.

Hail the impact of training on some of the variables associated with performance stages Nom de guerre of one of the beginnings of the balance beam

This research aims to use a combination of cardamom and training so as to know their impact on the Development of some variables, physical (flexibility - balance - Fitness - speed muscular power) and the development of efficient central nervous system and improve the milestones nom de guerre of skill free jump of the balance beam for the students specialty Gymnastics third year and the researcher used the experimental method with a measurement tribal dimensional to one group, the sample size (17) Student and duration of training for eight weeks, twice a week and search tools tests and physical exercises, cardamom and testing the efficiency of the central nervous system and analysis Elkinmatiky means an assessment of the stages of performance characteristics, the researcher used the following statistical treatments (the mean - standard deviation - the mediator - - test “T”) and Analysis Elkinmatiky (track motor to the center of gravity - the angular velocity - the wheel angle), and it was the most important results, there were significant differences in the variables associated with the stages of motor performance of motor the skill free jump the balance beam.