Petru Dumitriu (; 8 May 1924 – 6 April 2002) 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 novelist who wrote both in Romanian and in French.

Biography

Dumitriu was born in

Baziaș Socol ( ro, Socol, sr, Сокол/Sokol, or Соколовац/Sokolovac, hu, Nérasolymos) is a commune in Caraș-Severin County, Romania (in the ''Clisura Dunării'' area of Banat). In 2011, the population of the commune numbered 1,873 people ...

, in the

Banat Banat (, ; hu, Bánság; sr, Банат, Banat) is a geographical and historical region that straddles Central and Eastern Europe and which is currently divided among three countries: the eastern part lies in western Romania (the counties of T ...

region of Romania. His father was a Romanian army officer and his mother was Hungarian and spoke to her husband and son mostly in French, so that French was Petru Dumitriu's second language from childhood. After school in Romania, Dumitriu studied philosophy at the

University of Munich The Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich (simply University of Munich or LMU; german: Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München) is a public research university in Munich, Germany. It is Germany's List of universities in Germany, sixth-oldest u ...

with a Humboldt scholarship, but his studies were interrupted in 1944 when Romania changed sides in the Second World War. After becoming a member of the

Romanian Writers' Union The Writers' Union of Romania (), founded in March 1949, is a professional association of writers in Romania. It also has a subsidiary in Chișinău, Republic of Moldova. The Writers' Union of Romania was created by the communist regime by taking ...

committee in 1950, he became editor-in-chief at

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 ...

in 1953. In 1960, Dumitriu fled from Romania to

West Berlin West Berlin (german: Berlin (West) or , ) was a political enclave which comprised the western part of Berlin during the years of the Cold War. Although West Berlin was de jure not part of West Germany, lacked any sovereignty, and was under mi ...

, moved to

Frankfurt am Main Frankfurt, officially Frankfurt am Main (; Hessian: , "Frank ford on the Main"), is the most populous city in the German state of Hesse. Its 791,000 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located on its na ...

and later to

Bad Godesberg Bad Godesberg ( ksh, Bad Jodesbersch) is a borough ('' Stadtbezirk'') of Bonn, southern North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. From 1949 to 1999, while Bonn was the capital of West Germany, most foreign embassies were in Bad Godesberg. Some buildings ar ...

, Germany, afinally settling in

Metz Metz ( , , lat, Divodurum Mediomatricorum, then ) is a city in northeast France located at the confluence of the Moselle and the Seille rivers. Metz is the prefecture of the Moselle department and the seat of the parliament of the Grand E ...

, France. He did not return to Romania until 1996. He was married twice: with

Henriette Yvonne Stahl Henriette Yvonne Stahl (January 9, 1900 – May 25/26, 1984) was a Romanian novelist, short story writer and translator. Biography Born in Sankt Avold, Alsace-Lorraine, in the German Empire (now Saint-Avold in the Moselle department of Fran ...

, a French-born Romanian writer 24 years his senior, in 1956 (they divorced after about one week), and the same year with Irina Medrea (divorced in 1988). He had two daughters: Irene (born 1959) and Helene (born 1961)

Works

Partial list of publications: * ''Bijuterii de familie'', ESPLA, 1949; English translation by Edward Hyams, ''Family Jewels'', Collins, 1961 * ''Drum fără pulbere'' (Road without dust), ESPLA, 1951 * ''Cronică de la câmpie'' (Chronicle of the plain), ESPLA, 1955 * ''Pasărea furtunii'' (Storm Bird), ESPLA, 1957 * ''Cronica de familie'' (Family Chronicle), ESPLA, 1957 (chapter filmed as ''

An Unforgettable Summer ''An Unforgettable Summer'' (french: Un été inoubliable; ro, O vară de neuitat) is a 1994 drama film directed and produced by Lucian Pintilie. A Romanian- French co-production based on a chapter from a novel by Petru Dumitriu, it stars Kristi ...

'') * ''Incognito'',

Seuil Seuil () is a commune in the Ardennes department in northern France. Population See also *Communes of the Ardennes department The following is a list of the 449 communes of the Ardennes department of France. The communes cooperate ...

, 1962; English translation by Norman Denny, Collins, 1964 * ''L'Extreme Occident'' (The Far West), Seuil, 1964 * ''Le sourire sarde'' (The Sardinian Smile), Seuil, 1967 * ''L'homme aux yeux gris'' (The man with grey eyes), Seuil, 1968 * ''Rendez-vous au jugement dernier'', Seuil, 1961; English translation by Richard Howard, ''Meeting at the last judgment'', Pantheon, 1962 * ''Au dieu inconnu. Confessio'' (To the unknown god. Confession), Seuil, 1979 (ESPLA: ''Editura de Stat pentru Literatură si Arta'', omanianState Publishing House for Literature and Art, Bucharest)

References

Romanian male novelists 1924 births 2002 deaths Romanian people of Hungarian descent Romanian defectors Romanian expatriates in Germany Romanian expatriates in France Romanian writers in French People from Caraș-Severin County 20th-century Romanian novelists {{Romania-bio-stub