This book offers a detailed analysis of the construction, reception, and eventual decline of the cult of the Hungarian Communist Party Secretary, Matyas Rakosi, one of the most striking examples of orchestrated adulation in the Soviet bloc. While his cult never approached the magnitude of that of Stalin, Rakosi's ambition to outshine the other "best disciples" and become the best of the best was manifest in his diligence in promoting a Soviet-type ritual system in Hungary. The main argument of The Invisible Shining is that the cult of personality is not just a curious aspect of communist dictatorship, it is an essential element of it. The monograph is primarily concerned with techniques and methods of cult construction, as well as the role various institutions played in the creation of mythical representations of political figures. While engaging with a wider international literature on Stalinist cults, the author uses the case of Rakosi to explore how personality cults are created, how such cults are perceived, and how they are eventually unmade. The book addresses the success-generally questionable-of such projects, as well as their uncomfortable legacies.
Rezensionen / Stimmen
"Apor is most helpful and pertinent regarding the cult's idiosyncratic elements. He is keen to redress the tendency to assume that 'the constructed personae of mini-Stalins in the Soviet bloc were merely clones of Stalin's mythical image'. The spread of leader cults across communist Europe was not just the production of facsimiles. Rather, Apor's analysis of the specifically Hungarian elements of Rakosi's cult, in connection with the overall communist project of recasting national history, is an invaluable contribution to our understanding of what made this regime distinctive. What Apor has concretely given us in The Invisible Shining is an invaluable investigation and analysis, assiduously compiled, of how Rakosi's leader cult was constructed and imposed in Hungary. This was a grandiose utopian project served by most mundane and fallible means. Apor's study will be a sturdy platform for anyone subsequently taking up the study of this brief but fateful cult and regime." * Hungarian Cultural Studies * "Balazs Apor's book is a very welcome addition to the growing field of research on leader cults in communist countries. The author does not limit himself to analyzing the Rakosi cult in Stalinist Hungary, but also opens up a heuristic dialog with scholarship on the Stalin cult, the Sovietization of Central and Eastern Europe, and nationalism. The result is a well-written, clearly structured, and original monograph that sheds light on the way the periphery of the postwar Soviet sphere of influence functioned and how a crucial feature of Stalinist political culture - the party leader cult, which emerged across the communist world - expanded beyond the Soviet Union."
Link to review:
https://www.recensio.net/rezensionen/zeitschriften/jahrbucher-fur-geschichte-osteuropas/jgo-e-reviews-2020/3/issue.pdf -- Alexey Tikhomirov * Jahrbuecher fuer Geschichte Osteuropas *
Sprache
Verlagsort
Zielgruppe
Produkt-Hinweis
Fadenheftung
Gewebe-Einband
Maße
Höhe: 235 mm
Breite: 157 mm
Dicke: 27 mm
Gewicht
ISBN-13
978-963-386-192-9 (9789633861929)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Klassifikation
Balazs Apor is lecturer in European Studies at the Trinity College Dublin.
Abbreviations
Acknowledgments
Introduction
The Stalinist Leader Cult: Origins, Interpretations and Functions
The Stalinist Leader Cult in Postwar Eastern Europe
The Stalinist Leader Cult in Hungary
A Note on Terminology
PART I. The Construction Of The Cult
1 The Chronology of Cult Construction (1925-1953
Rakosi and the Hungarian Communists: The Road to Power
Cultic Traditions and Modern Personality Cults in Hungary
The "Hero of the Comintern": The Origins of the Rakosi Cult
The Cult in the Party (1945-1947)
The Legitimization Offensive (1948-1949
The Full-Blown Cult (1949-1953
2 The Institutions and Agents of Cult Construction
Institutions of Cult-Building
The Agents of the Cult
Rakosi and the Rakosi Cult
3 "The Biography is a Very Serious Issue": The Role of Biographies in Constructing the Rakosi Cult
Biographies and Stalinist Political Culture
The Biographies of Rakosi
The Official Biography
The Biographical Narrative
Behind the Constructed Facade
4 "He Was Created by a Thousand Years": Nationalism and the Leader Cult
Nationalism and Communism
Stalin, the Mini-Stalins, and National Traditions
Rakosi, the Ultimate Freedom Fighter
5 "Comrade Rakosi Lives with Us": The Visual and the Spatial Aspects of the Rakosi Cult
Rakosi, the "Sacred Center"
Visualizing the Leader
The Spatial Allocation of Rakosi's Images
Signposts of Progress: Renamings
PART II. Responses To The Cult's Expansion
6 "Love for Comrade Rakosi Has Become Deeper": The Communicative Influence of the Cult
Popular Opinion and the Stalinist "Source Lens
The Popularity of the Leader
The Elections of 1949
The "Rakosi Constitution
"For Rakosi, thanks; for Rajk, the gallows
"Even the Air Changes": Narratives of Rakosi's Words
"Comrade Rakosi, Listen to My Problems as If You Were My Father": Letters to the Leader
7 "Death to Uncle Rakosi!" Negative Perceptions of the Cult
Critiques and Iconoclasts
Jokes and Political Rumors
8 Ignorance is Bliss: Popular Indifference and the Shortcomings of Communist Propaganda
The Cult's Audience
The Cult's Agents
The Rakosi Cult: Circulation and Responses
PART III. The Dismantling of the Cult
9 The "New Course" and the Decay of the Rakosi Cult, 1953-1956
The Death of Stalin and the Rakosi Cult
Cult Criticism in 1953-1956
10 The Collapse of the Rakosi Cult
The Twentieth Congress and the "Secret Speech"
"We Were Surprised by the Twentieth Congress": The Effects of the "Secret Speech" on the Rakosi Cult
"It Hurts to See Comrade Rakosi Leave Like This": Rakosi's Abdication and the Uprising of 1956
"We Should Not Let Even the Illusion of the Personality Cult Appear": Denouncing the Cult in the Kadar Era
From Politics to History
The "Withering Away" of the Rakosi Cult
Conclusion
Bibliography
Index
