The Double Life of Katharine Clark: The Untold Story of the Fearless Journalist Who Risked Her Life for Truth and Justice

by Katharine Gregorio Narrated by Holly Adams

Overview

In 1955, Katharine Clark, the first American woman wire reporter behind the Iron Curtain, saw something none of her male colleagues did. What followed became one of the most unusual adventure stories of the Cold War. While on assignment in Belgrade, Yugoslavia, Clark befriended a man who, by many definitions, was her enemy. But she saw something in Milovan Djilas, a high-ranking Communist leader who dared to question the ideology he helped establish, that made her want to work with him. It became the assignment of her life.



Against the backdrop of protests in Poland and a revolution in Hungary, she risked her life to ensure Djilas's work made it past the watchful eye of the Yugoslavian secret police to the West. She single-handedly was responsible for smuggling his scathing anti-Communism manifesto, The New Class, out of Yugoslavia and into the hands of American publishers.



Meticulously researched and written by Clark's great-niece, Katharine Gregorio, The Double Life of Katharine Clark illuminates a largely untold chapter of the twentieth century. It shows how a strong-willed, fiercely independent woman with an ardent commitment to truth, justice, and freedom put her life on the line to share ideas with the world, ultimately transforming both herself-and history-in the process.

Editorial Reviews

DECEMBER 2022 - AudioFile

Holly Adams narrates this chilling biography of Katharine Clark, the first female American journalist to report from behind the Iron Curtain during the Cold War. Clark’s story is subtitled “The Untold Story of the Fearless Journalist Who Risked Her Life for Truth and Justice.” Adams portrays the strong-willed Clark with a minimum of emotion as she and her husband, Ed, worked tirelessly to help Milovan Djilas, Tito’s former second-in-command, publish his controversial political writings in the West. Adams’s performance grows more intense as events progress, especially the scenes in which Clark smuggles out Djilas’s eye-opening anti-Communism manifesto titled “The New Class.” Adams deftly downplays the intensity of her stately pacing when reading aloud the many letters and reports. M.B.K. © AudioFile 2022, Portland, Maine

Publishers Weekly

01/17/2022

Gregorio debuts with a rousing and rigorously researched biography of her great-aunt Katharine Clark, a foreign correspondent for the International News Service in Eastern Europe during the early years of the Cold War. In 1955, Clark, who was married to Time-Life correspondent Ed Clark, befriended Milovan Djilas, a high-ranking Communist Party official who had been stripped of his posts “and the trappings that went with them” for criticizing the Yugoslav government and calling “for the establishment of a second party to foster freedom of expression.” Clark proposed to help Djilas get a series of articles published in the American press and offered to take dictation, “molding and shaping the words to maximize their impact in English.” (To prevent the secret police from listening in on their exchanges, Clark ran water in her kitchen sink and bathtub and played records loudly; meanwhile, her husband and Djilas’s wife played cards.) Shortly after Djilas was arrested in November 1956, Clark smuggled the second half of his manuscript for The New Class, a critique of communism, out of Yugoslavia and arranged for it and his autobiography, Land Without Justice, to be published in the U.S. Shot through with vivid sketches of 1950s Belgrade, Budapest, and Warsaw; intimate details about Clark’s marriage, and genuine awe for her courage, this is a fitting tribute to a pioneering female journalist. (Mar.)

From the Publisher

"A pen can become more powerful than a weapon is a dominant theme in Katharine Gregorio’s new book... Katharine’s and Milovan’s stories give us hope in matters of truth and justice." — Journalism History

"Clark's story, finally told, reads like an espionage thriller in Gregorio's capable hands—with the added wallop of its being true." — Shelf Awareness

"Katharine Clark was a pathfinder. From a conservative background, she was anything but as she challenged every obstacle that stood in her way—including the Yugoslavian Secret Police. An interesting read well told." — Nina Willner, author of Forty Autumns

"Katharine Clark’s journey reads like thriller fiction, with all the heart-thumping tension and risk that only someone fighting against a powerful and oppressive government could appreciate, all the while battling the misogynistic culture of Depression-era newsrooms. She got her story all right, and we are privileged to hear it." — Major General Mari K. Eder, author of The Girls Who Stepped Out of Line

"This is an excellent and unique book on several levels. It provides an authoritative account of an important Cold War episode, in which one of the most senior Yugoslav party leaders, Milovan Djilas, lost faith in Tito-driven governance and denounced its hypocrisy and oppression. The story of Katharine Clark's willingness to challenge in real time the virtues of Yugoslav-style communism is an example of journalistic bravery. It is a remarkable read!" — Ambassador Paula J. Dobriansky, former Under Secretary of State for Global Affairs

"In this haunting and utterly necessary book that brings to life the print-and-typewriter age of journalism in Eastern Europe in the 1950s, Katharine Gregorio tells the nail-biting story of how Djilas's greatest works were smuggled out of Belgrade to the West. Both timeless and rooted-in-place, it recreates a forgotten chapter of the Cold War." — Robert D. Kaplan, national best-selling author of Balkan Ghosts and In Europe's Shadow

"Gregorio’s story is factual, but it reads like a John le Carré or Alan Furst spy thriller." — The Epoch Times

"A fascinating, true life, and impressively informative journalist memoir that reads with all the suspense and high-tension thrills of a novel." — Midwest Book Review

"Gregorio debuts with a rousing and rigorously researched biography of her great-aunt Katharine Clark.... a fitting tribute to a pioneering female journalist." — Publishers Weekly

Library Journal - Audio

09/01/2022

First-time author Gregorio unearths a family secret about her great-aunt's journalistic work behind the Iron Curtain. She used her degree in history from Dartmouth and her degree in international relations from the London School of Economics and Political Science to write a book about her. Voice actor Holly Adams uses her rich alto voice to take listeners to Yugoslavia under Tito. Gregorio paints a picture of the beauty and horror of living under a Communist dictatorship while trying to catch the next great story. Katharine Clark meets and befriends Milovan Djilas, a former Communist leader once tapped to succeed Tito. Djilas was ousted from the party for criticizing the communist leaders of Yugoslavia, and he had a story to tell. Clark takes on the mission of getting his writings to Western readers. This true story sometimes takes on the excitement of a Cold War spy movie and sometimes runs to the mundanity of two friends sipping cups of tea. Listeners will appreciate Adams's voices that keep the players in this drama straight; she will land them right in the Cold War-era Communist Bloc. VERDICT This is a remarkable true story with a strong female lead.—Laura Trombley

DECEMBER 2022 - AudioFile

Holly Adams narrates this chilling biography of Katharine Clark, the first female American journalist to report from behind the Iron Curtain during the Cold War. Clark’s story is subtitled “The Untold Story of the Fearless Journalist Who Risked Her Life for Truth and Justice.” Adams portrays the strong-willed Clark with a minimum of emotion as she and her husband, Ed, worked tirelessly to help Milovan Djilas, Tito’s former second-in-command, publish his controversial political writings in the West. Adams’s performance grows more intense as events progress, especially the scenes in which Clark smuggles out Djilas’s eye-opening anti-Communism manifesto titled “The New Class.” Adams deftly downplays the intensity of her stately pacing when reading aloud the many letters and reports. M.B.K. © AudioFile 2022, Portland, Maine

Product Details

BN ID:	2940175370172
Publisher:	Tantor Audio
Publication date:	07/12/2022
Edition description:	Unabridged

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