Eugeniu Ștefănescu-Est (also known as Eugen Ștefănescu-Est or Eugeniu Est, born Eugeniu Gh. Ștefănescu; – March 12, 1980) 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 poet, prose writer and visual artist, professionally active as a lawyer. He belonged to the local Symbolist movement from ca. 1900, when he also became an associate and disciple of

Ion Minulescu Ion Minulescu (; 6 January 1881 – 11 April 1944) was a Romanian avant-garde poet, novelist, short story writer, journalist, literary critic, and playwright. Often publishing his works under the pseudonyms I. M. Nirvan and Koh-i-Noor (the latte ...

. Before Worled War I, while he took up jobs as a magistrate, his synaesthesic and extrovert lyrical pieces earned attention, while his cartoons were taken up in magazines such as '' L'Assiette au Beurre'' and '' Furnica''. He abandoned the verse genre by the 1920s, earning attention as the author of fairy tales, and then also trying his hand as a novelist. Eventually losing his eyesight, Ștefănescu-Est spent the last thirty years of his life in anonymity, looked after by his daughter.

Biography

Born in

Craiova Craiova (, also , ), is Romania's 6th Cities in Romania, largest city and capital of Dolj County, and situated near the east bank of the river Jiu River, Jiu in central Oltenia. It is a longstanding political center, and is located at approximatel ...

to composer George Stephănescu and his wife Eufrosina (''née'' Negoescu), he attended high school in

Ploiești Ploiești ( , , ), formerly spelled Ploești, is a city and county seat in Prahova County, Romania. Part of the historical region of Muntenia, it is located north of Bucharest. The area of Ploiești is around , and it borders the Blejoi commu ...

and at

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 ...

's Poenaru and Saint Sava high schools.

Alexandru Piru Alexandru Piru (August 22, 1917 – November 6, 1993) was a Romanian literary critic and historian. Born in Mărgineni, Bacău County,Alex. Ștefănescu"Al. Piru", in ''România Literară'', nr. 10/2002 his parents were Vasile, a notary, and ...

, "Ștefănescu-Est Eugeniu", in Aurel Sasu (ed.), ''Dicționarul biografic al literaturii române'', Vol. II, pp. 674–675. Pitești: Editura Paralela 45, 2004. Călinescu, p. 701 He made his poetry debut with ''Toamna'' ("Autumn") in ''Foaia pentru toți'', in 1897. His work was published by '' Literatorul'', the Symbolist review, but also saw print in the traditionalist ''

Sămănătorul ''Sămănătorul'' or ''Semănătorul'' (, Romanian for "The Sower") was a literary and political magazine published in Romania between 1901 and 1910. Founded by poets Alexandru Vlahuță and George Coșbuc, it is primarily remembered as a tribune ...

''. Completing his secondary education with private tutors, Ștefănescu was reportedly boarding-school colleagues with Minulescu, his future associate and inspiration. He took his baccalaureate, then studied law at

and

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 ...

universities. Around 1903, in France, he debuted as a cartoonist, his work taken up in ''L'Assiette au Beurre'', ''L'Indiscret'', and ''La Chronique Amusante''.Dodo Niță
"Viața și opera doamnei Marga Ștefănescu, o creatoare de benzi desenate centenară"
in ''

Adevărul ''Adevărul'' (; meaning "The Truth", formerly spelled ''Adevĕrul'') is a Romanian daily newspaper, based in Bucharest. Founded in Iași, in 1871, and reestablished in 1888, in Bucharest, it was the main left-wing press venue to be published dur ...

'', May 2, 2013 He obtained a

law degree A law degree is an academic degree conferred for studies in law. Such degrees are generally preparation for legal careers. But while their curricula may be reviewed by legal authority, they do not confer a license themselves. A legal license is gra ...

in 1904, finding his first employment as a clerk at the House of Arts, and, from April 1906, was an assistant judge at Turnu Măgurele. From 1906, as "Est", he began contributing caricatures and cartoons to

George Ranetti George or Gheorghe Ranetti, born George Ranete
entry in the

Furnica''. His identity was ultimately revealed to the public in 1924. His poetic work was featured in Minulescu's Symbolist magazines: '' Revista Celor L'alți'' (on its very last issue, that of April 1908) and ''Insula'', where he was one of the main contributors. It also appeared in ''

Seara Seara is a municipality in the state of Santa Catarina in the South region of Brazil. The Museu Entomológico Fritz Plaumann is located in the town. See also *List of municipalities in Santa Catarina This is a list of the municipalities in th ...

'', the Symbolist-friendly newspaper, and in

Tristan Tzara Tristan Tzara (; ; born Samuel or Samy Rosenstock, also known as S. Samyro; – 25 December 1963) was a Romanian and French avant-garde poet, essayist and performance artist. Also active as a journalist, playwright, literary and art critic, comp ...

's '' Simbolul''.Cernat, p. 49 For a while, he attended the salon hosted by

Alexandru Bogdan-Pitești Alexandru Bogdan-Pitești (; born Alexandru Bogdan, also known as Ion Doican, Ion Duican and Al. Dodan; June 13, 1870 – May 12, 1922) was a Romanian Symbolism (arts), Symbolist poet, essayist, and art and literary critic, who was also known as ...

, the controversial arts patron. In parallel, from 1908, Ștefănescu was judge in training at Ciolăneștii din Deal, Teleorman County, and on the

Ștorobăneasa Ștorobăneasa is a commune in the southern part of Teleorman County, Muntenia, Romania, on the left side of the Teleorman River. The commune has 3,101 inhabitants and a surface of within the built-up area. It is composed of two villages, Beiu and ...

–

Bârca Bârca is a commune in Dolj County, Oltenia, Romania with a population of 4,500 people. It is composed of a single village, Bârca. Natives *Marin Ceaușu Marin Ceaușu (15 August 1891–21 August 1954) was a Romanian brigadier-general durin ...

circuit; he was a lawyer in

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 ...

from 1910. After a brief marriage to an unknown woman from Ciolăneștii din Deal, he wed a Virginia Malcoci Petrescu in September 1911. His first book also appeared that year, as ''Poeme'' ("Poems"). In interwar

Greater Romania The term Greater Romania ( ro, România Mare) usually refers to the borders of the Kingdom of Romania in the interwar period, achieved after the Great Union. It also refers to a pan-nationalist idea. As a concept, its main goal is the creation ...

, Ștefănescu resumed his practice, transferring to the Ilfov County bar association in April 1923. He became a widower that year, after which he lived in informal relationships with various women;Călinescu, p. 1016 his two children from his late wife, Margareta and Miron, were adopted by a maternal aunt who lived in Bucharest. With his work included in 1920s anthologies by

Perpessicius Perpessicius (; pen name of Dumitru S. Panaitescu, also known as Panait Șt. Dumitru, D. P. Perpessicius and Panaitescu-Perpessicius; October 22, 1891 – March 29, 1971) was a Romanian literary historian and critic, poet, essayist and fiction wri ...

and

Ion Pillat Ion Pillat (31 March 1891 – 17 April 1945) was a distinguished Romanian poet. He is best known for his volume ''Pe Argeș în sus'' (''Upstream on the Argeș'') and ''Poeme într-un vers'' (''One-line poems''). His maternal grandfather wa ...

Barbu Cioculescu Barbu may refer to: People * Barbu (name), a list of people with the name and surname ''Barbu'' * Alejandro Barbudo Lorenzo, nicknamed ''Barbu'', Spanish footballer Places * Barbu, Iran, a village in the Bushehr Province of Iran * Barbu, Norway, ...

"Firul vremii în concertul vocilor"
in ''

România Literară ''România Literară'' is a cultural and literary magazine from Romania. In its original edition, it was founded on 1 January 1855 by Vasile Alecsandri and published in Iași until 3 December 1855, when it was suppressed. The new series appeared on ...

'', Nr. 6/2001 his second book of verse, the 1925 ''Imperii efemere'' ("Ephemeral Empires"); another book, ''Armonii lascive'' ("Lascivious Harmonies"), was announced but never appeared. He became a bailiff at the courthouses in Buzău (May 1931), Brașov (November 1933) and Alba Iulia (April 1934), by then focusing on writing prose. His modern fairy tales, inspired by

Romanian folklore The folklore of Romania is the collection of traditions of the Romanians. A feature of Romanian culture is the special relationship between folklore and the learned culture, determined by two factors. First, the rural character of the Romanian ...

, appeared in 1929 as ''Păunașul Codrilor'' ("Little Peacock of the Forest"). He resigned from the magistracy in September 1934, but continued to write in the folkloric genre, with collections that had Romanian, Arab or Indian themes: ''Povestea lui Buceag Împărat'' ("The Tale of Emperor Steppe", 1937), ''Povestea lui Mitu Sucitu'' ("The Tale of Contorted Mitu", 1939), ''Abdalah și frumoasa Azad'' ("Abdalah and Fair Azad", 1939). The series was completed with ''Zastra fachirul'' ("Zahra the Fakir", 1939). His novels, published during World War II, were ''Spre o nouă viață'' ("Toward a New Life", 1941), ''Școala dragostei'' ("The school of Love", 1943), and ''Femei moderne'' ("Modern Women", 1944). By then his daughter Margareta, or Marga, was also earning notoriety as a visual artist: after working for ''

Straja Țării ''Straja Țării'' (Romanian - roughly, ''The Sentinel of the Motherland''; also known as ''Străjeria'' - translatable as ''The Sentinel'') was a youth organization in the Kingdom of Romania, created in 1935 by King Carol II to counter the growing ...

'', she illustrated books by Mihail Drumeș and the literary newspaper ''Ziarul Copiilor'' (which she also edited in 1947). In 1949, under the communist regime, Ștefănescu-Est unsuccessfully attempted to publish the novella ''Țara mea frumoasă'' ("My beautiful Land") and the fairy tale ''Făt-Frumos din agrișe'' ("''

Făt-Frumos Făt-Frumos (from Romanian ''făt'': son, infant; ''frumos'': handsome) is a knight hero in Romanian folklore, usually present in fairy tales. Akin to Prince Charming, he possesses such essential attributes as courage, purity, justness, physica ...

'' of the Gooseberries"). Completely forgotten by 1950, he had also lost his eyesight. The family was repressed under the new laws: Marga's husband, who had served in the Honor Guard at the

Royal Palace This is a list of royal palaces, sorted by continent. Africa * Abdin Palace, Cairo * Al-Gawhara Palace, Cairo * Koubbeh Palace, Cairo * Tahra Palace, Cairo * Menelik Palace * Jubilee Palace * Guenete Leul Palace * Imperial Palace- Massa ...

, was imprisoned. Giving up on publishing, Marga moved to

Galați Galați (, , ; also known by other alternative names) is the capital city of Galați County in the historical region of Western Moldavia, in eastern Romania. Galați is a port town on the Danube River. It has been the only port for the most par ...

, where she taught

technical drawing Technical drawing, drafting or drawing, is the act and Academic discipline, discipline of composing Plan (drawing), drawings that Visual communication, visually communicate how something functions or is constructed. Technical drawing is essent ...

at the Faculty of Land Development. She took her father with her and provided for him. In 1968, an anthology listed the poet as deceased, but Ștefănescu gave an interview in 1977 at his Galați home—according to critic

, this was a " Ionescian" situation. He died in Galați just before turning 99, making him "the dean of Romanian poetry, age-wise". Rediscovered and republished after the

Romanian Revolution of 1989 The Romanian Revolution ( ro, Revoluția Română), also known as the Christmas Revolution ( ro, Revoluția de Crăciun), was a period of violent civil unrest in Romania during December 1989 as a part of the Revolutions of 1989 that occurred i ...

, Marga Ștefănescu, remarried Ciurdăreanu, turned 100 in March 2013.

Literary work

In 1927, the modernist reviewer

Eugen Lovinescu Eugen Lovinescu (; 31 October 1881 – 16 July 1943) was a Romanian modernist literary historian, literary critic, academic, and novelist, who in 1919 established the ''Sburătorul'' literary club. He was the father of Monica Lovinescu, and the u ...

suggested that Ștefănescu-Est was primarily a disciple of

, copying Minulescu's "technique and verbalization". The Symbolist poet-critic

N. Davidescu Nicolae Davidescu (; October 24, 1888 – June 12, 1954) was a Romanian symbolist poet and novelist. Works Poetry * 1910: ''La fântâna Castaliei'' ("At Castalia's Well") - parnassianist poems * 1916: ''Inscripţii'' ("Engravings") - infl ...

, and later also the scholar Tudor Vianu, described Ștefănescu-Est as belonging to a "

Wallachia Wallachia or Walachia (; ro, Țara Românească, lit=The Romanian Land' or 'The Romanian Country, ; archaic: ', Romanian Cyrillic alphabet: ) is a historical and geographical region of Romania. It is situated north of the Lower Danube and so ...

n", rhetorical and "extrovert", school of Romanian Symbolism; by contrast, the Moldavians, from

Ștefan Petică Ștefan Petică (; January 20, 1877 – October 17, 1904) was a Romanian Symbolist poet, prose writer, playwright, journalist and socialist activist. Born in the countryside of Tecuci, he early displayed a voracious appetite for literature an ...

to Benjamin Fondane, were pensive, melancholy, and "introvert". Rating his poems in '' Simbolul'', researcher

Paul Cernat Paul Cernat (born August 5, 1972 in Bucharest) is a Romanian essayist and literary critic. He has a Ph.D. summa cum laude in philology. Cernat has been a member of the Writers' Union of Romania since 2009. As of 2013, he is lecturer of Romanian li ...

finds that they fit in with generically "Symbolist,

Secession Secession is the withdrawal of a group from a larger entity, especially a political entity, but also from any organization, union or military alliance. Some of the most famous and significant secessions have been: the former Soviet republics le ...

and

Art Nouveau Art Nouveau (; ) is an international style of art, architecture, and applied art, especially the decorative arts. The style is known by different names in different languages: in German, in Italian, in Catalan, and also known as the Modern ...

cliches". However, according to the literary critic and historian

George Călinescu George Călinescu (; 19 June 1899, Bucharest – 12 March 1965, Otopeni) was a Romanian literary critic, historian, novelist, academician and journalist, and a writer of classicist and humanist tendencies. He is currently considered one of the mos ...

, "Est" struck an peculiar note in the Symbolist movement, his poetry being "thematically Symbolist", but lacking "spleen". Heavily inspired by the early Symbolism of Alexandru Macedonski, synaesthesic, it held "enchanting explosion of ..of treasures", "exotic and rare vegetation", "lands of

camellia ''Camellia'' (pronounced or ) is a genus of flowering plants in the family Theaceae. They are found in eastern and southern Asia, from the Himalayas east to Japan and Indonesia. There are more than 220 described species, with some controversy ...

s, blue gardens and green lakes", "tea glasses hatcontain magic".Călinescu, p. 700 Davidescu also claims that Ștefănescu-Est had introduced to the poetic language a "hitherto unknown ..palette" of synaesthesic terms and feelings.Lovinescu, p. 311 A "pastel" of his described the harmonies of sunset: The fairy tales, Călinescu notes, have a "great sense of the fantastic and polychrome, without cultivated slip-ups, ndvery graceful." He reserves praise for stories such as ''Ineluș-învârteluș'', where the eponymous hero breaks spell and kisses a fairy, after which he is pursued "over hills and fields" by vine props that have come alive.Călinescu, pp. 700–701

Notes

References

*Anca Andreescu, ''Între jurnalistică și literatură. Confrințele Bibliotecii Astra Nr. 139/2011''. Sibiu:

ASTRA Astra may refer to: People * Astra (name) Places * Astra, Chubut, a village in Argentina * Astra (Isauria), a town of ancient Isauria, now in Turkey * Astra, one suggested name for a hypothetical fifth planet that became the asteroid belt Ent ...

, 2011. *

, ''Istoria literaturii române de la origini pînă în prezent''. Bucharest: Editura Minerva, 1986. *

, ''Avangarda românească și complexul periferiei: primul val''. Bucharest:

Cartea Românească Cartea Românească ("The Romanian Book") is a publishing house in Bucharest, Romania, founded in 1919. Disestablished by the Communist Romania, communist regime in 1948, it was restored under later communism, in 1970, when it functioned as the off ...

, 2007. *

, ''Istoria literaturii române contemporane, II. Evoluția poeziei lirice''. Bucharest: Editura Ancona, 1927. {{DEFAULTSORT:Stefanescu-Est, Eugeniu 1881 births 1980 deaths People from Craiova University of Bucharest alumni 20th-century Romanian male writers 19th-century Romanian poets 20th-century Romanian poets Romanian male poets Symbolist poets 20th-century Romanian novelists Symbolist novelists 20th-century short story writers Romanian male short story writers Romanian short story writers Romanian children's writers Romanian fantasy writers 20th-century Romanian painters Romanian caricaturists Romanian cartoonists 20th-century Romanian judges Blind people from Romania Blind writers