Doina Bumbea

Guido Olimpio,  “Rapita dalla Nord Corea, diventa spia del regime: la storia di Doina Bumbea”, Corriere della sera 6/8/2017.

La ragazza romena, vissuta per anni in Italia e morta a metà degli anni ‘90, è una delle centinaia di donne straniere sequestrate da Pyongyang e costrette a collaborare. Come quelle coinvolte nell’assassinio di Kim Jong Nam, fratellastro del leader nordcoreano

WASHINGTON – L’agguato contro Kim Jong nam, il fratellastro del leader nord coreano eliminato con una sostanza tossica a Kuala Lumpur, è un “pezzo” di guerra di spie. Ancora da decifrare nella sua interezza, ma che sembra confermare la tradizione degli 007 di Pyongyang. Pazienti quanto tenaci, con piani a lungo termine. Mosse che ritroviamo in un’altra storia del passato, con una donna nel ruolo di vittima: Doina Bumbea, vissuta in Italia, deceduta a metà degli anni ’90 in Corea del Nord dopo una vita di svolte, cadute, speranze. Vicenda purtroppo comune a quella di centinaia di straniere inghiottite dal regime di ferro. Quanto segue è stato ricostruito da una nostra inchiesta e dal lavoro, svolto nel periodo 2006-2007, da Claudia Tripiciano con due media giapponesi, Fuji Tv e Tv Asahi.

Incontri (e viaggi) misteriosi, poi la scomparsa

Doina nasce in Romania, il padre ufficiale, la mamma casalinga. E’ una bella ragazza, le piace l’arte, sogna chissà quale futuro. Invece le cose si non mettono per il verso giusto o comunque la sua strada non è facile. Conosce un italiano di Bologna, Gilberto B., lo segue nel nostro paese e dopo qualche tempo si sposano. La relazione non dura, divorziano. La ragazza si trasferisce a Roma in cerca di opportunità, lavoro e successo. Frequenta la scuola di Belle Arti ed entra in un’associazione fondata e guidata Sergio F., campione sportivo con la passione per la pittura. Facile per Doina trovare punti in comune, così come scoprire nuove amicizie. Nella capitale incontra, nel 1977, un ingegnere – ne omettiamo l’identità -, con la quale passa molto tempo libero e trascorre vacanze in luoghi rinomati, una relazione tra alti e bassi. Arduo definirla dopo tanti anni, le descrizioni di chi sa non sono probanti. Anche perché la romena in apparenza trova un nuovo compagno, un dj americano che lavora in discoteche famose, dal Maìs al prestigioso Jackie’O. Doina non rinuncia a nulla, assorbe che tutto ciò che passa, non ha o non vuole avere stabilità. Lascia lo statunitense per unirsi a Rodolfo F., altro “animale notturno”, con lunghe serate nei night. Dettagli sfocati, accompagnati da voci incontrollabili. Attorno al Natale del ’78, l’ingegnere riceve una telefonata da Doina, si scambiano gli auguri. Sembra una traccia certa insieme a quella – meno definita – di un viaggio imminente che la donna deve fare. Alla famiglia comunica che andrà in Oriente, a Tokio, perché un italiano – il misterioso Rodolfo? – le ha proposto di partecipare ad una mostra di pittura. Il dato “Giappone” è confermato anche da Sergio, il campione-pittore: sì, mi ha chiamato da Tokio per dirmi che la città era molto interessante e che tutto andava per il meglio. Poi, nelle settimane a seguire, una notizia drammatica. Entrambe le fonti, con qualche discrepanza, sostengono che qualcuno ha comunicato loro l’improvviso decesso della romena. “Ha avuto un terribile incidente stradale, è stata decapitata nello schianto della vettura”, è la tesi. Le indagini dei media nipponici si arenano perché gli “informati” prendono tempo, sono vaghi o pongono condizioni inaccettabili. Ma davvero l’esistenza della giovane romena è stata spazzata via da un incidente? Ed è esistito l’ambiguo Rodolfo, definito da qualcuno “confidente” della polizia? O si tratta di una figura estranea? Oppure è un depistaggio? Più solida - anche probabilmente “aggiustata” - una seconda testimonianza, emersa solo in seguito.

Il disertore americano, un marito «forzato»

Charles Jenkins è un militare americano che è scappato insieme ad altri commilitoni in Corea del Nord. Un transfuga, un disertore. In un libro di memorie rivela di aver incontrato Doina nel 1981 e fornisce dettagli sulla sua vita, alcuni dei quali combaciano con quanto abbiamo scritto, altri paiono versioni di comodo per nascondere verità. Charles aggiunge un’indicazione sul misterioso mister X. La donna ha conosciuto un mercante d’arte – scrive – che le propone una sorta di tournee in Asia. Solo che Doina non ha un passaporto valido e lui le fornisce un documento nord coreano. La loro meta è Hong Kong, ma per arrivarci transitano con un giro tortuoso (e strano) prima da Mosca e poi da Pyongyang. E’ qui che la polizia ferma la romena perché il suo passaporto – le dicono – è falso. Finisce in prigione per spionaggio ed ha solo un modo per redimersi: cooperare. Doina diventa la moglie di un altro soldato statunitense, Joseph Dresnok, scappato nel 1962. Il suo “lavoro” è simile a quello di decine di ragazze sequestrate dai nord coreani, specie nel Sud e in Giappone. Non mancano però “prede” catturate in Medio Oriente e in Europa, tra queste l’ipotesi che vi siano delle italiane e delle olandesi. Una libanese svelerà un particolare. Dopo essere stata un’ospite forzata della Corea del Nord, senza alcuna possibilità di lasciare il paese, le permettono di fare alcuni viaggi – vegliata da 007 – che ha sempre una sola meta: Milano. Una scelta che potrebbe far pensare ad una base sicura nel nord della penisola. Comunque tutto parte di un “meccanismo” che funziona da anni. Il regime utilizza spesso le rapite per addestrare i propri agenti a “usi e costumi” dei rispettivi paesi. Alla romena tocca il ruolo di moglie, lo interpreta fino in fondo. Con Dresnok ha due figli, Ted e James Gabriel. Un rapporto che dura finché la morte non li separerà. Un cancro porta via Doina nel gennaio 1997, all’età di 47 anni. Il marito spirerà nel 2016. L’odissea della pittrice emerge grazie ad un documentario della Bbc dedicato ai disertori americani dove compare Dresnok. Tracciando il suo profilo parla di una moglie dell’Est e di un figlio di nome Gabriel. I familiari di Doina lo vedono e sospettano di aver finalmente trovato la chiave del mistero. Hanno ragione. I fatti successivi confermano tutto. Nel maggio 2016 il “romanzo” si arricchisce di un altro capitolo. Ted e James Gabriel Dresnok rilasciano un’intervista dove difendono la scelta del padre – “ha fatto la cosa giusta” -, invitano gli Usa a cambiare politica verso la Corea del Nord, spiegano come siano riusciti a trovare la loro strada nonostante le origini. Ostentano fierezza e patriottismo. Uno è funzionario del partito, l’altro ufficiale dell’esercito. Due stelle della propaganda di Kim create con una pratica brutale.

Le coincidenze

Ora torniamo all’uccisione di Kim Jong nam. Le ragazze coinvolte nel delitto hanno sostenuto di essere state reclutate dai nord coreani con la promessa di viaggi e una nuova vita nello spettacolo. Erano convinte – è la loro tesi – di partecipare ad uno show tipo Scherzi a parte. Schema e metodi che ricordano la trappola tesa a Doina, attirata in Oriente con la scusa di una mostra e mai più tornata.

Dimitar Dimov: The Bulgarian Novelist Who Challenged Communist Dogma

Kremena Krumova, “The Bulgarian Novelist Who Challenged Communist Dogma”, Epoch Times, December 12, 2017

For three consecutive days, author Dimitar Dimov was forced to sit and listen to the speeches of 23 of the most respectable critics in Bulgaria, subjecting his newly published novel to destructive, Stalinist-style criticism. Never in the history of Bulgarian literature had an author faced such a panel and then been forced to rework his novel.

The novel “Tyutyun” (“Tobacco” in Bulgarian) was published at the end of 1951 and became an instant hit in the small Eastern European country, though the critics giving speeches labeled it a failure.

After acknowledging his talent as a writer, only a couple of the critics had anything favorable to say about the novel. The others accused Dimov of being influenced by cosmopolitanism, eroticism, and decadent traits of Western literature, instead of embracing socialist realism, the sole acceptable genre at the time. They recommended that the book be modeled after Soviet writers like Valentin Kataev or Alexander Fadeyev; the latter championed Joseph Stalin, calling him “the greatest humanist the world has ever known,” according to “Subsidizing Culture” by James T. Bennett.

“Such interference equaled a literary murder … as idea and message,” said Milena Katosheva, curator of the Dimitar Dimov House Museum, which is affiliated with the National Museum of Bulgarian Literature in the capital of Sofia. “It killed the creative drive of the author, took away his freedom of expression, his freedom of thought. After this, he no longer took up the epic task of depicting the state of Bulgarian society.”

The ‘Tyutyun’ Case: “Tyutyun” tells the story of a big tobacco processing factory in the 1930s and 1940s and the collision of the two major classes: the capitalists (or bourgeoisie, as Marxists put it) on one side and the communists on the other.

But instead of glorifying the workers who were devoted to communist ideas and vilifying the supposedly exploitative capitalists, Dimov focused on the inner worlds of the characters, revealing their emotions, passions, and desires. He created deep, vivid, and realistic characters, who were strongly attracted to each other, ignoring the fact that they belonged to different classes—an unacceptable theme for the communist agenda at the time.

After Sept. 9, 1944, when Bulgaria exited World War II and the communists took power, literature became the regime’s absolute servant. Anything that did not contribute to socialist development was targeted for elimination.

The purpose was to clean out all bourgeois elements and affirm the socialist norm. Writers were excluded from the Association of Bulgarian Writers, lists of forbidden literature were announced, and total censorship of publishing and media, in general, was imposed.

Socialist realism limited writers to the topics of socialist people, their heroism, the socialist party, historical optimism, and socialist humanism,  Katosheva said. All literary works had to describe their characters as belonging to a social class, and only those who embraced communism could be depicted positively, for they were the heroes of the new era.

Subtle but Bold Defiance: Still, Dimov defied the stiff communist dogma. To defend his novel, he wrote a 32-page statement in which he humbly, respectfully, and methodically, refuted all accusations.

What’s more, he questioned his critics and offered a freer, reformist vision of socialist realism: “Why should I–who has gathered materials, thought of the plot and the characters from all possible angles, … , spent sleepless nights and typed on the machine when others were resting–be necessarily wrong regarding some character or a situation, which critic X or writer Y cannot apprehend?

“Why should I–who has fought for months with my characters–understand my characters less, while critic X or Y understand them better under the pretext that I am subjective, and they are objective?

“If I have demonstrated in ‘Tyutyun’ that I have grasped the historical development of the events, that I am loyal to our people and that I serve its socialist ideals, then I have the freedom to follow my way, my personal initiative and inclinations.”

Even though Dimov managed to subtly confront the critics in an elegant way, he still had to rework his novel.

“I had no way of not obeying,” Dimov confessed to his second wife, Lena Levcheva, according to the Bulgarian weekly 168 Chasa (168 Hours).

“I did it to save the sole thing I have–writing.”

 “I cannot forget the pain with which he said these words,” confessed Levcheva, in turn. “It was like a Biblical story. Dimov himself mounted on the crucifix, so that his child, ‘Tyutyun,’ could live. Its killing was otherwise imminent. The victory didn’t bring him satisfaction. On the contrary: It doomed him to a double-faced life.”

“Comparing his statements with those by the critics, you can see the huge gap between him and them intellectually and morally,” his daughter, playwright Teodora Dimova, said in an interview with Faktor.bg. “He kept his presence of mind, even though this novel cost him his life. In the consequent 15 years, he wrote only three plays although he was in his prime for a writer. He died at 56 years old from a sudden, massive, unsalvageable stroke.”

Paralyzing Terror:  Dimov had two strikes against him. First, he was born into a bourgeois family connected to the czar: Both his biological father and his mother’s second husband were officers for the czar. Secondly, he was an intellectual. He specialized in histology and became a professor in the anatomy, embryology, and histology of vertebrates.

After 1944 when people from the previous elite society, including intellectuals, disappeared without a trace, the climate for these people was nerve-wracking. Already a bit hesitant, and a nervous person, Dimov was totally unprepared to face the fierce and combative atmosphere of the early Stalinist era.

“In the literary life of the 1950s, resisting the party was unthinkable,” said Plamen Dojnov, associate professor and chair of the department of New Bulgarian Studies at New Bulgarian University, and one of the most prominent researchers on the “Tyutyun” case.

“It was more about in-fighting in the literary field, where each was trying to win the party as his ally,” he said.

If Dimov had rejected the recommendation to rework “Tyutyun,” it would have brought him a lot of trouble, isolation, or cost his life.

“The waves of terror and fear between 1944 and 1950 were so shocking that the free will of the writers was simply paralyzed, and hardly anyone was capable of making a calm and rational deliberation before expressing any kind of disagreement,” he said.

The Communist Overseer:  Unlike similar cases in the Soviet Union, where Stalin was informed about “problematic” literature and casually intervened, with “Tyutyun,” the incumbent state and party leader Valko Chervenkov closely followed Dimov’s work on the book, right up until its second edition was published in 1954.

“What was unique in the Bulgarian case was the central role of Chervenkov, who was the main ‘constructor’ [overseer] of the book as well as of the scandal it provoked,” Dojnov noted.

Chervenkov supported “Tyutyun” under certain conditions. He wrote a personal letter to Dimov, congratulating him on the novel and calling it a “great joy for our literature,” but still insisted on his reworking it.

In another letter from 1952, addressed to Christo Radevski, the chair of the Association of Bulgarian Writers, Chervenkov writes: “I don’t know what comrade Dimov is doing–is he reworking ‘Tyutyun’? I would like someone to give him the message that he would do best if he reworks the novel, taking into consideration everything precious included in the statements–oral and written–connected to the discussions and review of the novel. I think that comrade Dimov will do very right if he publishes the second reworked edition of the book not only in Bulgarian, but also the translations in other languages to be based on this second reworked edition.”

“Chervenkov ‘saved’ Dimov, but also sacrificed the first, reformist version of the novel,” Dojnov said. “He played the ‘producer and guarantor’ roles in the reworking, taking the book back to where it was trying to escape from, thus depriving it of its identity.”

After the three-day criticism session, an unsigned article appeared in the communist mouthpiece newspaper Rabotnichesko Delo [Workers’ Deed] called “On the Novel ‘Tyutyun’ and Its Unfortunate Critics.” Later, it became clear that the initiator and final editor of the article was Chervenkov himself. A month later, the fiercest critics of “Tyutyun” were expelled from their leadership positions.

“Chervenkov wanted to affirm his authority as the ultimate judge on all issues related to culture,” Dojnov explained. “In this case, he logically took the side of the Association of Bulgarian Writers, to give a lesson to the presumptuous critics’ circle which was losing its previous privileged position.

“The top communist leader wanted to show that the mandate to manage literature was given to the Association by him, and nobody should ever think of ignoring this authority,” Dojnov said.

Left without a choice, Dimov added 250 pages to the original book, inventing new communist characters and new scenes showing the heroism and sacrifice of communist fighters.

The second, reworked, “Tyutyun” was published in early 1954, after the explicit approval of critics, who were part of the Association of Bulgarian Writers and were assigned and guided personally by Valko Chervenkov.

In 1955, a third edition of the novel appeared, with minor corrections made by Dimov. The critics remained silent. In 1962, the novel was made into a film by the prominent director Nikola Korabov.

The original version of the novel reappeared in 1992, three years after the fall of communism in Bulgaria, which took place on Nov. 10, 1989 (a day after the fall of the Berlin Wall). Today, “Tyutyun” is one of the most beloved Bulgarian novels, and it’s been translated into more than 30 languages.

Sergei Paradjanov

Elif Batuman, “Sergei Paradjanov: film-maker of outrageous imagination”,  The Guardian 13/03/2010 

Sergei Paradjanov made some of the most beautiful films ever seen, writes Elif Batuman. His reward was to be sent to the gulag for 'surrealist tendencies'

Between his abandonment of socialist realism in 1964 and his death from lung cancer in 1990, Sergei Paradjanov made four of the weirdest and most beautiful movies ever seen. An ethnic Armenian, Paradjanov was born in Soviet Georgia in 1924. His mother was "very artistic": she "used to adorn herself with Christmas tree decorations and curtains and join her friends on the roof to enact legends". In 1947, Paradjanov spent a brief stint in a Georgian prison for committing "homosexual acts" (which were illegal under Soviet law) – with, of all people, a KGB officer. He later disavowed the seven films he shot in the 1950s and early 1960s. In 1962, he saw Tarkovsky's Ivan's Childhood and completely changed his artistic method, which had previously been quite normal.

The first film in Paradjanov's mature style, Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors (1964), brought him instant fame and notoriety. Filmed in the Ukrainian Carpathians, in a regional dialect that couldn't be understood by most Russians (Paradjanov refused to have it dubbed), Shadows tells the story of the doomed love of Ivan and Marichka, children from feuding families. Marichka drowns relatively early in the film, and critics have justly celebrated its representation of lost childhood love, brutal slayings and various Ukrainian folk ceremonies. To me, however, the most moving and surprising aspect of the film is the depiction of Ivan's second marriage.

After Marichka's death, Ivan lapses into grief and madness – this part of the film is shot in black and white – before finding himself attracted to the comely Palagna. (They share an erotically charged moment when she is holding a horse's hoof for him to hammer on a shoe.) The two are united in a bizarre ceremony which involves blindfolds and a wooden yoke. They seem happy at first, but Ivan grows distant and brooding, and Palagna is unable to conceive a child. One gorgeously composed scene shows the couple at the dinner table: both are facing the camera, and a calf is sitting under the table, looking cramped and miserable. Every unhappy family is unhappy after its own fashion – but how recognisable and universal Paradjanov renders this highly particular unhappiness! Both the spouses, it turns out, are dabbling in sorcery: Ivan has taken to inviting the spirits of the maimed and drowned into their home, hoping that he may be visited by Marichka; Palagna, meanwhile, wanders naked in a forest, exhorting the dark forces to bring them a child. In a mind-blowing convergence of literal and symbolic narratives, Palagna starts cheating on Ivan with the local sorcerer. Then the marriage really hits the rocks.

Shadows has the most legible storyline of all Paradjanov's films. He followed it with The Color of Pomegranates (1969), a 90-minute, Armenian-language meditation on the life of the 18th-century poet-troubadour Sayat Nova. The film consists of a series of dreamlike tableaux, designed to "recreate the poet's inner world". Particularly astounding are the courtship "scenes" in which the poet and his lover are both played by the lithe, unearthly Sofiko Chiaureli: a trick that renders visual and literal the union of the poet-lover and the beloved-God in eastern mystical poetry. The only "narrative" is provided by the successive replacement of a small boy with a youth, a monk and an old man: it's like an illustration of the riddle of the sphinx.

Though Paradjanov was eight years older than Tarkovsky, he described the younger film-maker as his "teacher and mentor", and Pomegranates clearly invites comparison with Tarkovsky's Andrei Rublev (1966), based on the life of the great 14th-century Russian monk and icon painter.

In Andrei Rublev, nearly 200 minutes of black-and-white narrative are followed by a meditative colour slideshow of Rublev's icons. Pomegranates is a hallucinatory mash-up of these two types of material: a life story told in brilliantly coloured and animated Persian miniatures. The actors, dressed in outlandishly detailed handmade costumes, move as if by some strange clockwork, performing repetitive stylised gestures, tossing a golden ball in the air or gesturing enigmatically with some symbolic-looking object: a seashell, a candle, a rifle. Paradjanov himself compared Pomegranates to a "Persian jewellery case": "On the outside, its beauty fills the eyes; you see the fine miniatures. Then you open it, and inside you see still more Persian accessories." An accurate description: every last article and action in the film seems precisely placed, exquisitely detailed and designed to serve a particular purpose in some unknown ritual.

The Color of Pomegranates was the last film Paradjanov would make for 15 years. In 1973, after indictments for art trafficking, currency fraud, "incitements to suicide" and surrealist tendencies, the director was sentenced to five years in a maximum-security gulag, where his duties included sewing sacks. An indomitable spirit, he became an expert at making dolls from leftover sackcloth. He made a doll of Tutankhamen and another of his friend Lilya Brik. Through the offices of Brik, Tarkovsky and other powerful friends, Paradjanov was released one year early, in 1977. He wasn't allowed to work, and lived in utter destitution in Tbilisi. At one point, Tarkovsky gave him a ring to pawn, but Paradjanov decided to keep it as a souvenir of their friendship.

In the early years of the thaw, Paradjanov finally returned to the studio and made his last two movies: The Legend of Suram Fortress (1984) and Ashik Kerib (1988). Suram Fortress, shot in Georgia, is a Poe-like patriotic yarn involving an accident-prone fortress in Tbilisi that is destined to remain standing only when a young hero has been buried alive in its walls. The fortress also apparently has to have a giant cart full of eggs dumped into the foundation and crushed with a sledgehammer – a peculiarly disturbing and indelible image.

Based on Mikhail Lermontov's retelling of a Turkic folktale, Ashik Kerib is the story of a troubadour obliged to spend 1,001 days wandering the land, in order to make enough money to marry his beloved. The hero is played by Yuri Mgoyan, a picturesque 22-year-old Kurdish "hooligan" and car thief recruited by Paradjanov for his "plasticity". (In one behind-the-scenes clip, Paradjanov demonstrates this plastic quality by wrapping a blanket around the young man's head and declaring: "A complete metamorphosis! He's a pharaoh!") These last two films somehow manage to seem at once naive and sophisticated, with the hyper-realism of a puppet show. Mastiffs rest their great weary heads on their paws, as evil henchmen force a slave to toss pomegranates for them to impale on their sabers. A gigantic flock of running sheep, filmed from overhead, shifts into strange formations. Endless rites and rituals unfold to unheard-of music.

Ashik Kerib is the only one of Paradzhanov's films to have a happy ending. The lovers are reunited and a white dove alights on a movie camera, representing Tarkovsky, to whose memory the film was dedicated. But to me, the outrageousness of Paradjanov's imagination is best encapsulated by the final scene of The Color of Pomegranates, in which death comes to the poet in the form of a shower of live chickens. Dressed in white, the troubadour lies on the floor, surrounded by candles; the chickens, who seem to be upset about something, fall on to him from a great height, dispensing a flurry of white feathers and extinguishing the candles. It's not the way you would expect a national poet, or anyone really, to depart this world – but Paradjanov makes it look inevitable.