She was articulate and well-educated. Her husband, Mikhail Gorbachev, once indicated in an interview with a Western journalist that he discussed all issues with her. Following official protocol, she always walked behind her husband on official visits but nonetheless was almost as well-known and admired abroad as he was. In the Soviet Union, her visibility was less appreciated. In Soviet custom it had been considered inappropriate for the wives of political leaders to play a prominent role. There was little or no tradition of "first lady," which was perhaps seen as a Western affectation. At a time of hardship in the U.S.S.R., her clothes and glamour sometimes occasioned negative sentiment at home.
Raisa Maximovna Gorbachev, née Titorenko, was born on January 5, 1932, in Rubtsovsk, a town in Siberia. Her father was a railroad engineer who, when she was only three, was imprisoned for four years for criticizing collectivized agriculture. A grandfather had been executed under Stalin. She professed to be Russian by nationality, although her father's surname is Ukrainian. Within the U.S.S.R. at the time there were unsubstantiated, even conflicting, rumors about her nationality and family connections. The U.S.S.R. had well over 100 nationalities, and intermarriage among people of different ethnic backgrounds was fairly common.
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