Aurora Cornu (6 December 1931 – 14 March 2021) was a

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

n-born

French French (french: français(e), link=no) may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to France ** French language, which originated in France, and its various dialects and accents ** French people, a nation and ethnic group identified with Franc ...

writer, actress, film director, and translator. Her best known role is that of Aurora in

Éric Rohmer Jean Marie Maurice Schérer or Maurice Henri Joseph Schérer, known as Éric Rohmer (; 21 March 192011 January 2010), was a French film director, film critic, journalist, novelist, screenwriter, and teacher. Rohmer was the last of the post-World ...

's ''

Claire's Knee ''Claire's Knee'' (french: Le Genou de Claire) is a 1970 French drama film directed by Éric Rohmer. It is the fifth movie in the series of the ''Six Moral Tales''. Plot The story happens between 29 June and 29 July, presumably in 1970. Intertit ...

''.

Biography

She was born in

Provița de Jos Provița de Jos is a commune in Prahova County, Muntenia, Romania. It is composed of three villages: Drăgăneasa, Piatra, and Provița de Jos. The commune lies along the Provița River, to the west of the county, on the border with Dâmbovița ...

Prahova County Prahova County () is a county ( județ) of Romania, in the historical region Muntenia, with the capital city at Ploiești. Demographics In 2011, it had a population of 762,886 and the population density was 161/km². It is Romania's third mos ...

. An independent spirit, she ran away three times from home, the last time permanently at the age of 14. She was adopted by an uncle. Her father died in prison after he was arrested for harboring a fugitive general of the defunct

Romanian Royal Army The Romanian Land Forces ( ro, Forțele Terestre Române) is the army of Romania, and the main component of the Romanian Armed Forces. In recent years, full professionalisation and a major equipment overhaul have transformed the nature of the Lan ...

(who was another of her uncles) for 11 years. She graduated from the Mihai Eminescu Literary School 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 ...

, and worked for a while for the poetry section of

Viața Românească ''Viața Românească'' (, "The Romanian Life") is a monthly literary magazine published in Romania. Formerly the platform of the left-wing traditionalist trend known as poporanism, it is now one of the Writers' Union of Romania's main venues. Th ...

while doing translations. Her first husband was

Marin Preda Marin Preda (; 5 August 1922, Siliștea Gumești, Teleorman County, Kingdom of Romania – 16 May 1980, Mogoșoaia, Ilfov County, Socialist Republic of Romania) was a Romanian novelist, post-war writer and director of Cartea Românească publis ...

, to whom she was married between 1955 and 1959 (or 1960). She encouraged him to publish the novel ''

Moromeții ''Moromeţii'' (, "The Moromete Family") is a novel by the Romanian author Marin Preda, one which consecrated him as the most important novelist in the post-World War II Romanian literature. In about a thousand pages, grouped in two parts, redraw ...

'', whose manuscript she had found in a drawer. Her fiancé in the mid-1960s, mathematician

Tudor Ganea Tudor Ganea (October 17, 1922 –August 1971) was a Romanian-American mathematician, known for his work in algebraic topology, especially homotopy theory. Ganea left Communist Romania to settle in the United States in the early 1960s. He taugh ...

, did not succeed in getting her out of Romania, so she saw her chance to

defect A defect is a physical, functional, or aesthetic attribute of a product or service that exhibits that the product or service failed to meet one of the desired specifications. Defect, defects or defected may also refer to: Examples * Angular defec ...

to the

West West or Occident is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from east and is the direction in which the Sunset, Sun sets on the Earth. Etymology The word "west" is a Germanic languages, German ...

while she was at the poetry festival in Knokke-Het Zoute,

Belgium Belgium, ; french: Belgique ; german: Belgien officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to th ...

. She settled down in

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

, where, being destitute,

Pierre Emmanuel Noël Mathieu (3 May 1916, Gan, Pyrénées-Atlantiques – 22 September 1984, Paris) better known under his pseudonym Pierre Emmanuel, was a French poet of Christian inspiration. Biography He was the third member elected to occupy seat 4 of the A ...

's wife paid her rent for several years. In Paris she befriended, among others, Romanian émigrés

Mircea Eliade Mircea Eliade (; – April 22, 1986) was a Romanians, Romanian History of religion, historian of religion, fiction writer, philosopher, and professor at the University of Chicago. He was a leading interpreter of religious experience, who establ ...

Emil Cioran Emil Mihai Cioran (, ; 8 April 1911 – 20 June 1995) was a Romanian philosopher, aphorist and essayist, who published works in both Romanian and French. His work has been noted for its pervasive philosophical pessimism, style, and aphorisms. H ...

, and . Between 1967 and 1978 she was a collaborator of

Monica Lovinescu Monica Lovinescu (; 19 November 1923 – 20 April 2008) was a Romanian essayist, short story writer, literary critic, translator, and journalist, noted for her activities as an opponent of the Romanian Communist regime. She published severa ...

and

Virgil Ierunca Virgil Ierunca (; born Virgil Untaru ; August 16, 1920, Lădești, Vâlcea County – September 28, 2006, Paris) was a Romanian literary critic, journalist and poet. He was married to Monica Lovinescu. Both Ierunca and Lovinescu worked for severa ...

in their literary radio program aired by

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 ...

. While living in France, she married Aurel Cornea, a Romanian-born French television sound engineer, who was held hostage in

Lebanon Lebanon ( , ar, لُبْنَان, translit=lubnān, ), officially the Republic of Lebanon () or the Lebanese Republic, is a country in Western Asia. It is located between Syria to the north and east and Israel to the south, while Cyprus li ...

by the pro-

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...

ian

Shiite Islam Shīʿa Islam or Shīʿīsm is the second-largest branch of Islam. It holds that the Islamic prophet Muhammad designated ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib as his successor (''khalīfa'') and the Imam (spiritual and political leader) after him, most n ...

ic group known as the Revolutionary Justice Organization for ten and a half months in 1986. She paid construction costs for a church located in Cornu,

. Its design was inspired by a

Horia Damian Horia Damian (Bucharest, 27 Feb 1922 - Paris 14 May 2012) was a Romanian painter and sculptor. Biography Damian enrolled at the School of Architecture in Bucharest in 1941. In that same year he made his debut at the Salonul Official de Pictur ...

drawing. In later years, she lived in Paris and

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

. Cornu died in a hospital in Paris on 14 March 2021, at the age of 89.

Books

*''Studenta'' (1954) *''Distanțe'' (1962) * * * *Marin Preda, ''Scrisori către Aurora'' (1998)

Translations

*''Hamlet'', under the pseudonym Ștefan Runcu in:

William Shakespeare William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's nation ...

, ''Romeo și Julieta. Hamlet'', București: Editura pentru Literatură, 1962, .

Filmography

References

External links

*
Interview with Aurora Cornu
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cornu, Aurora 1931 births 2021 deaths People from Prahova County Romanian novelists 20th-century French novelists 21st-century French novelists Romanian translators Romanian film directors Romanian women film directors French film directors French women film directors French film actresses Romanian actresses Romanian expatriates in France Romanian expatriates in the United States Romanian defectors 20th-century translators 20th-century French women writers 21st-century French women writers Deaths from the COVID-19 pandemic in France