Vlad Georgescu (October 20, 1937–November 13, 1988), was a

Romania Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Moldova to the east, and ...

n historian and the director of the Romanian-language department of

Radio Free Europe Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) is a United States government funded organization that broadcasts and reports news, information, and analysis to countries in Eastern Europe, Central Asia, Caucasus, and the Middle East where it says tha ...

between 1983 and 1988.

Biography

Born in

Bucharest Bucharest ( , ; ro, București ) is the capital and largest city of Romania, as well as its cultural, industrial, and financial centre. It is located in the southeast of the country, on the banks of the Dâmbovița River, less than north of ...

, Georgescu studied history at the

University of Bucharest The University of Bucharest ( ro, Universitatea din București), commonly known after its abbreviation UB in Romania, is a public university founded in its current form on by a decree of Prince Alexandru Ioan Cuza to convert the former Princel ...

, and worked at the Romanian-Russian Museum until it was closed down in 1963, when he was transferred to the ''Institute of Southeastern European Studies'' in Bucharest. He got a PhD in history from the University of Bucharest in 1970 and published works on 18th and 19th century Romanian history. Georgescu taught in 1967 and 1968 at the

University of California, Los Angeles The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California S ...

and in 1973 at

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

."Vlad Georgescu of Rumania Is Dead at 51"
''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

'' November 15, 1988 In 1977, Georgescu was jailed for two months for disputing the role of the Communist Party in history in the manuscript of a book which he had sent abroad. Two years later he left the country, becoming a fellow at the

Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars The Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars (or Wilson Center) is a quasi-government entity and think tank which conducts research to inform public policy. Located in the Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center in Wash ...

in Washington, D.C. and teaching at the

University of Maryland The University of Maryland, College Park (University of Maryland, UMD, or simply Maryland) is a public land-grant research university in College Park, Maryland. Founded in 1856, UMD is the flagship institution of the University System of M ...

and at

Rutgers University Rutgers University (; RU), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a public land-grant research university consisting of four campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's College, and was ...

. Georgescu then returned to Europe and worked for the ''

''. In 1987, a week after Georgescu announced that he would broadcast fragments from

Ion Mihai Pacepa Ion Mihai Pacepa (; 28 October 1928 – 14 February 2021) was a Romanian two-star general in the Securitate, the secret police of the Socialist Republic of Romania, who defected to the United States in July 1978 following President Jimmy Carter' ...

's '' Red Horizons'', he received a warning from a

Securitate The Securitate (, Romanian for ''security'') was the popular term for the Departamentul Securității Statului (Department of State Security), the secret police agency of the Socialist Republic of Romania. Previously, before the communist regime ...

general that he would not live more than a year if he went on to broadcast it. Georgescu ignored the warning and went ahead and broadcast it. A year after that, he died of a

brain tumor A brain tumor occurs when abnormal cells form within the brain. There are two main types of tumors: malignant tumors and benign (non-cancerous) tumors. These can be further classified as primary tumors, which start within the brain, and seconda ...

at the age of 51. In 2007, ''

Cotidianul The logo used between 2003 and 2007 ''Cotidianul'' (meaning ''The Daily'' in English) is a Romanian language newspaper published in Bucharest, Romania. History and profile Founded by Ion Raţiu, ''Cotidianul'' was first published on 10 May ...

'' published informative notes sent by

Constantin Bălăceanu-Stolnici Constantin Bălăceanu-Stolnici (6 July 1923 – 20 August 2023) was a Romanian neurologist. Biography Constantin Bălăceanu-Stolnici was born in Bucharest, the descendant of an old boyar family. He studied at the Ion C. Brătianu High School ...

to the Securitate, which included a sketch of Georgescu's

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and Ha ...

apartment, drawn after a visit to his place, which might have helped in his possible assassination. He was married to Mary, with whom he had a son, Tudor.

Bibliography

*''Din corespondenţa diplomatică a Ţării Romîneşti'', Muzeul Romîno-Rus, București, 1962, 268 p. *''Political Ideas and the Enlightenment in the Romanian Principalities (1750–1831)'', Boulder (East European Quarterly), New York (Columbia University Press), 1971 *''Ideile politice şi iluminismul în principatele române (1750–1831)'', Editura Academiei RSR, București, 1972 *''Politică şi istorie: cazul comuniştilor români 1944–1977'', editura Jon Dumitru (colecţia ''Clio fără mască''), München, 1981 (reprinted in Romania after 1990 by Editura Humanitas), 158 p. *''Istoria românilor de la origini pînă în zilele noastre'', München, 1984, 394 p. (ed. a III-a, Editura Humanitas, București, 1992) *''Istoria ideilor politice româneşti'', editura Jon Dumitru (colecţia ''Clio fără mască''), München, 1987 *''Romania anilor '80'', editura Jon Dumitru (colecţia ''Clio fără mască''), München, 1994, 254 p.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Georgescu, Vlad 1937 births 1988 deaths Writers from Bucharest Romanian dissidents 20th-century Romanian historians Romanian journalists Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty people University of Bucharest alumni Romanian anti-communists 20th-century journalists