GRAPEVINE

By DAVID ELLIS

Robert Maxwell sailed into the turbulent New York City newspaper world with his eleventh-hour purchase of the ailing Daily News. But News editors beware! The British media magnate has shown some rather peculiar proclivities as a publisher. His Pergamon Press, soon to be sold to a Dutch firm, produced a World Leaders series that seemed to specialize in official or groveling accounts of dictators. All have since been discredited and relegated to history's scrap heap. Among the titles:

Nicolae Ceausescu: Builder of Modern Romania and International Statesman, 1983. In an introduction, Maxwell grilled the strongman (who was executed in the 1989 uprising): "What has, in your opinion, made you so popular with the Romanians?"

Erich Honecker: From My Life, 1981. His vital role in the construction of the Berlin Wall is proudly recounted by the ousted East German party leader, who was whisked off to the Soviet Union last month to receive "medical treatment" -- and to evade a life sentence for allegedly ordering border guards to shoot East Germans trying to escape his regime.

Janos Kadar: Selected Speeches and Interviews, 1985. A mind-numbing collection from Hungary's collaborationist leader, who was removed as party leader in 1988.

Wojciech Jaruzelski: Prime Minister of Poland, 1985. A laudatory portrait of the father of martial law, who so impressed Maxwell during a 1985 meeting in Warsaw that the publisher declared in a radio interview that the Solidarity problem was "solved."

Todor Zhivkov: Statesman and Builder of New Bulgaria, 1982. One year after this admiring biography was published, Zhivkov, now under house arrest for corruption and stealing state funds, awarded Maxwell the Order of Stara Planina for "the strengthening of peace between peoples."

With reporting by Sidney Urquhart