Irene Falcón
Irene Falcón Rodríguez | |
|---|---|
 Irene Falcón flanked by Vicente Uribe and Planelles at a PCE meeting in Moscow, 1940 | |
| Born | Irene Levi Rodríguez 1907 Madrid, Spain |
| Died | 1999 |
| Nationality | Spanish |
| Occupation | Journalist |
Irene Falcón Rodríguez (1907–99) was a Spanish Communist activist. For many years she was the assistant of Dolores Ibárruri, leader of the Spanish Communist Party. After the Spanish Civil War she was forced into exile in Moscow and Beijing. She returned to Spain after the return to democracy in 1977.
Early years
Irene Levi Rodríguez was born in Madrid in 1907.[1] Her father was Siegried Levy Herzberg, a middle-class Polish Jew. She attended the German School in Madrid, and learned several languages. She worked as a journalist, and as a librarian for Santiago Ramón y Cajal (1852–1934), a biologist who won the Nobel Prize.[2] Irene married César Falcón, a revolutionary from Peru, in 1925 and moved with him to London, England. Their son Mayo was born there in May 1926 but was not registered at the Spanish consulate due to concerns with the dictatorship of Miguel Primo de Rivera.[3]
For a few years the couple lived in London, where Irene Falcón was the correspondent for La Voz (The Voice), a Spanish newspaper.[2] Irene and César returned to Spain when Primo de Rivera fell early in 1930. Irene edited a collection of books on women, the best feminist literature of the time, including work by Doris Langley Moore, Vera Inber and Dora Russell, wife of Bertrand Russell, whom Irene had met in London.[3]
Communist activist
In 1933 Irene and César Falcón joined the Spanish Communist Party (PCE: Partido Comunista España).[2] They lost their jobs with the newspapers, and lived in poverty in a slum in Madrid. They joined a theater group, Teatro Proletario, and in the summer of 1933 visited Moscow with the group.[3] The Spanish Committee of Women against War and Fascism, affiliated with the World Committee Against War and Fascism, was created with a committee controlled by the PCE.[4] In August 1934 the Spanish committee sent a delegation to the World Congress of Women against War and Fascism in Paris. Dolores Ibárruri led the group, which included two Republicans and two Communists, Encarnación Fuyola and Irene Falcón. The Spanish committee was dissolved in October 1934 during the repression that followed the Asturian miners' strike.[4]
Irene worked as the Moscow correspondent for Mundo Obrero (Worker's World), the PCE newsaper. She returned to Spain in 1937 during the Spanish Civil War (1936–39), where she became the aide of Dolores Ibárruri, the leader of the PCE.[2] Irene Falcón collaborated with Pasionaria (Ibárruri) for more than fifty years.[1] She used the pseudonym "Toboso". Early in March 1939 she helped arrange the evacuation of senior party members from Spain. Ibárruri left for Oran on 6 March 1939.[5] Falcón accompanied Ibárruri into exile in the Soviet Union. There she worked for the underground Radio Pirenaica.[2]
During World War II (1939–45) Irene and César Falcón were separated, and after the war César returned to Peru.[3] Their marriage broke down because César Falcón could not remain faithful.[2] After the Prague show trial of 1952 eleven Czechoslovakian Communists were executed, including Falcón's former lover Bedřich Geminder, head of the Czech Communist Party's central committee's Department of International Relations.[2] Although her relationship with Geminder had ended in 1945 Falcón was thrown out of the party and lost her job. Ibárruri managed to get her another job, working discretely to avoid herself getting into trouble.[6] Falcón obtained work with Radio Beijing. In 1977 she returned to Madrid. Irene Falcón died in 1999.[2]
Works
- Trotski et le trotskisme. Textes et documents. Paris: Bureau d'éditions, 31, boulevard Magenta. 1937. p. 96.
{{cite book}}: Unknown parameter|authors=ignored (help) - Irene Falcón ; con la colab. de Manuel Jiménez y Jesús Montero (1996). Asalto a los cielos : mi vida junto a Pasionaria. p. 455.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
References
- ^ a b Díaz Arenas 1997, p. 147.
- ^ a b c d e f g h Salvadó 2013, p. 128.
- ^ a b c d Zurbano Melero 2010.
- ^ a b Alba 1983, p. 166.
- ^ Dimitrov 2008, p. 103.
- ^ Herrmann 2010, p. 29.
Sources
- Alba, Víctor (1983-01-01). The Communist Party in Spain. Transaction Publishers. ISBN 978-1-4128-1999-2. Retrieved 2015-03-07.
{{cite book}}: Invalid|ref=harv(help) - Díaz Arenas, Angel (1997-01-01). Quién es quién en la obra narrativa de Manuel Vázquez Montalbán. Edition Reichenberger. ISBN 978-3-930700-53-0. Retrieved 2015-03-19.
{{cite book}}: Invalid|ref=harv(help) - Dimitrov, Georgi (2008-10-01). The Diary of Georgi Dimitrov, 1933-1949. Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-13385-1. Retrieved 2015-03-19.
{{cite book}}: Invalid|ref=harv(help) - Herrmann, Gina (2010). Written in Red: The Communist Memoir in Spain. University of Illinois Press. ISBN 978-0-252-03469-5. Retrieved 2015-03-19.
{{cite book}}: Invalid|ref=harv(help) - Salvadó, Francisco J. Romero (2013). Historical Dictionary of the Spanish Civil War. Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 978-0-8108-5784-1. Retrieved 2015-03-19.
{{cite book}}: Invalid|ref=harv(help) - Zurbano Melero, José Gabriel (2010-11-22). "César e Irene Falcón: un matrimonio con compromiso". Ciudad futura. Retrieved 2015-03-19.
{{cite web}}: Invalid|ref=harv(help)
