Ion Negoiţescu (; also known as Nego; 10 August 1921 – 6 February 1993) was a Romanian literary historian, critic, poet, novelist and
memoir
A memoir (; , ) is any nonfiction narrative writing based on the author's personal memories. The assertions made in the work are thus understood to be factual. While memoir has historically been defined as a subcategory of biography or autob ...
ist, one of the leading members of the
Sibiu Literary Circle The Sibiu Literary Circle () was a literary group created during World War II in Sibiu to promote the modernist liberal ideas of Eugen Lovinescu.
The group was formed around Lucian Blaga and other intellectuals from Cluj, who had settled in Sibiu ...
. A rebellious and eccentric figure, Negoiţescu began his career while still an adolescent, and made himself known as a literary ideologue of the 1940s generation. Moving from a youthful affiliation to the
fascist
Fascism ( ) is a far-right, authoritarian, and ultranationalist political ideology and movement. It is characterized by a dictatorial leader, centralized autocracy, militarism, forcible suppression of opposition, belief in a natural soci ...
Iron Guard
The Iron Guard () was a Romanian militant revolutionary nationalism, revolutionary Clerical fascism, religious fascist Political movement, movement and political party founded in 1927 by Corneliu Zelea Codreanu as the Legion of the Archangel M ...
, which he later came to regret, the author became a disciple of
modernist
Modernism was an early 20th-century movement in literature, visual arts, and music that emphasized experimentation, abstraction, and Subjectivity and objectivity (philosophy), subjective experience. Philosophy, politics, architecture, and soc ...
doyen
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 ...
, and, by 1943, rallied the entire Sibiu Circle to the cause of
anti-fascism
Anti-fascism is a political movement in opposition to fascist ideologies, groups and individuals. Beginning in European countries in the 1920s, it was at its most significant shortly before and during World War II, where the Axis powers were op ...
. He was also one of the few openly
homosexual
Homosexuality is romantic attraction, sexual attraction, or sexual behavior between people of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality is "an enduring pattern of emotional, romantic, and/or sexual attractions" exc ...
intellectuals in Romania to have
come out
Coming out of the closet, often shortened to coming out, is a metaphor used to describe LGBTQ people's self-disclosure of their sexual orientation, romantic orientation, or gender identity.
This is often framed and debated as a privacy issue, ...
before the 1990s—an experience which, like his political commitments, is recorded in his controversial autobiographical writings.
After World War II, Negoiţescu's
anti-communism
Anti-communism is Political movement, political and Ideology, ideological opposition to communism, communist beliefs, groups, and individuals. Organized anti-communism developed after the 1917 October Revolution in Russia, and it reached global ...
,
dissident
A dissident is a person who actively challenges an established political or religious system, doctrine, belief, policy, or institution. In a religious context, the word has been used since the 18th century, and in the political sense since the 2 ...
stance and sexual orientation made him an adversary of the
Romanian communist regime. Marginalized and
censored
Censorship is the suppression of speech, public communication, or other information. This may be done on the basis that such material is considered objectionable, harmful, sensitive, or "inconvenient". Censorship can be conducted by governmen ...
, he spent three years as a
political prisoner
A political prisoner is someone imprisoned for their political activity. The political offense is not always the official reason for the prisoner's detention.
There is no internationally recognized legal definition of the concept, although ...
. Ultimately reinstated during a late 1960s episode of
liberalization
Liberalization or liberalisation (British English) is a broad term that refers to the practice of making laws, systems, or opinions less severe, usually in the sense of eliminating certain government regulations or restrictions. The term is used ...
, he continued to speak out against political restrictions, and came to be closely monitored by the
Securitate
The Department of State Security (), commonly known as the Securitate (, ), was the secret police agency of the Socialist Republic of Romania. It was founded on 30 August 1948 from the '' Siguranța'' with help and direction from the Soviet MG ...
secret police
image:Putin-Stasi-Ausweis.png, 300px, Vladimir Putin's secret police identity card, issued by the East German Stasi while he was working as a Soviet KGB liaison officer from 1985 to 1989. Both organizations used similar forms of repression.
Secre ...
. In 1977, he joined
Paul Goma
Paul Goma (; October 2, 1935 – March 24, 2020) was a Romanian writer, known for his activities as a dissident and leading opponent of the communist regime before 1989. Forced into exile by the communist authorities, he became a political refug ...
and
Ion Vianu
Ion Vianu (15 April 1934 – 20 June 2024) was a Romanian writer and psychiatry, psychiatrist, who lived in Switzerland from 1977. He was the son of literary critic Tudor Vianu and his wife, Elena Vianu, Elena.
Vianu first studied classical phi ...
in a
civil society
Civil society can be understood as the "third sector" of society, distinct from government and business, and including the family and the private sphere.[Nicolae Ceauşescu Nicolae may refer to:
* Nicolae (name), an Aromanian and Romanian name
* ''Nicolae'' (novel), a 1997 novel
See also
*Nicolai (disambiguation)
*Nicolao Nicolao is an Italian given name and a surname. It may refer to the following:
Given name
*Ni ...]
, but was pressured into retracting. Eventually, Negoiţescu
defected
In politics, a defector is a person who gives up allegiance to one state in exchange for allegiance to another, changing sides in a way which is considered illegitimate by the first state. More broadly, defection involves abandoning a person, ca ...
to
West Germany
West Germany was the common English name for the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) from its formation on 23 May 1949 until German reunification, its reunification with East Germany on 3 October 1990. It is sometimes known as the Bonn Republi ...
, where he became a contributor to
Radio Free Europe
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) is a media organization broadcasting news and analyses in 27 languages to 23 countries across Eastern Europe, Central Asia, the Caucasus, and the Middle East. Headquartered in Prague since 1995, RFE/RL ...
and various other anti-communist outlets, as well as editor of literary magazines for the
Romanian diaspora
The Romanian diaspora is the Romanians, ethnically Romanian population outside Romania and Moldova. The concept does not usually include the ethnic Romanians who live as natives in nearby states, chiefly those Romanians who live in Ukraine, Hun ...
communities. He died in
Munich
Munich is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria, Germany. As of 30 November 2024, its population was 1,604,384, making it the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg. Munich is the largest city in Germany that is no ...
.
Ion Negoiţescu's review of
Romanian literature
Romanian literature () is the entirety of literature written by Romanian authors, although the term may also be used to refer to all literature written in the Romanian language or by any authors native to Romania.
Early Romanian literature inc ...
and contributions to literary theory generally stood in contrast to the
nationalist
Nationalism is an idea or movement that holds that the nation should be congruent with the State (polity), state. As a movement, it presupposes the existence and tends to promote the interests of a particular nation,Anthony D. Smith, Smith, A ...
and
national communist recourse to traditionalism or
anti-Europeanism
Anti-Europeanism, Anti-European sentiment, and Europhobia are political terms used in a variety of contexts, implying sentiment or policies in opposition to Europe.
In the context of racial or ethno-nationalist politics, this may refer to the di ...
, and engaged it polemically by advocating the values of
Western culture
Western culture, also known as Western civilization, European civilization, Occidental culture, Western society, or simply the West, refers to the Cultural heritage, internally diverse culture of the Western world. The term "Western" encompas ...
. His diverse work, although scattered and largely incomplete, drew critical praise for its original takes on various subjects, and primarily for its views on the posthumously published writings of
national poet
A national poet or national bard is a poet held by tradition and popular acclaim to represent the identity, beliefs and principles of a particular national culture. The national poet as culture hero is a long-standing symbol, to be distinguished ...
Mihai Eminescu
Mihai Eminescu (; born Mihail Eminovici; 15 January 1850 – 15 June 1889) was a Romanians, Romanian Romanticism, Romantic poet, novelist, and journalist from Moldavia, generally regarded as the most famous and influential Romanian poet. Emin ...
. In tandem, the implications of Negoiţescu's private life and the various aspects of his biography, such as his relationship to exposed Securitate informant
Petru Romoşan and the revelations of his unpublished diary, have remained topics of controversy in the years after his death.
Biography
Early life
Born in
Cluj
Cluj-Napoca ( ; ), or simply Cluj ( , ), is a city in northwestern Romania. It is the second-most populous city in the country and the seat of Cluj County. Geographically, it is roughly equidistant from Bucharest (), Budapest () and Belgrade ( ...
, Negoiţescu was the son of Ioan, a career officer in the
Romanian Land Forces
The Romanian Land Forces () is the army of Romania, and the main component of the Romanian Armed Forces. Since 2007, full professionalization and a major equipment overhaul have transformed the nature of the Land Forces.
The Romanian Land Force ...
, and his wife Lucreţia ''née'' Cotuţiu.
[ Alex. Ştefănescu]
"Ion Negoiţescu"
, in '' Convorbiri Literare'', May 2005 His maternal grandfather, a member of the
Romanian Orthodox
The Romanian Orthodox Church (ROC; , ), or Romanian Patriarchate, is an autocephalous Eastern Orthodox church in full communion with other Eastern Orthodox Christian churches, and one of the nine patriarchates in the Eastern Orthodox Church. S ...
clergy in
Transylvania
Transylvania ( or ; ; or ; Transylvanian Saxon dialect, Transylvanian Saxon: ''Siweberjen'') is a List of historical regions of Central Europe, historical and cultural region in Central Europe, encompassing central Romania. To the east and ...
, had taken part in the ''
Memorandum
A memorandum (: memorandums or memoranda; from the Latin ''memorandum'', "(that) which is to be remembered"), also known as a briefing note, is a Writing, written message that is typically used in a professional setting. Commonly abbreviation, ...
'' movement under
Austro-Hungarian
Austria-Hungary, also referred to as the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Dual Monarchy or the Habsburg Monarchy, was a multi-national constitutional monarchy in Central Europe between 1867 and 1918. A military and diplomatic alliance, it consist ...
rule.
In contrast, Negoiţescu's father came from outside Transylvania, being born to parents from the
Romanian Old Kingdom
The Romanian Old Kingdom ( or just ''Regat''; or ) is a colloquial term referring to the territory covered by the first independent Romanian nation state, which was composed of the Romanian Principalities: Wallachia and Moldavia. The union of the ...
.
[ ]Ioana Pârvulescu
Ioana Pârvulescu (born 1960) is a Romanian writer. She was born in Brașov and studied at the University of Bucharest. She graduated in 1983, and went on to complete a PhD in literature in 1999. She teaches modern literature at the same universit ...
"Rătăcirile elevului Negoiţescu"
, 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 ...
'', Nr. 24/2002[ Ştefăniţă Regman]
"Cerchiştii înainte de coborârea în Infern"
, 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 ...
'', Nr. 23/2007 The future author studied at the Angelescu High School in his native city, and debuted in 1937, when he had
lyric poetry
Modern lyric poetry is a formal type of poetry which expresses personal emotions or feelings, typically spoken in the first person.
The term for both modern lyric poetry and modern song lyrics derives from a form of Ancient Greek literature, t ...
fragments published in the local newspaper ''Naţiunea Română''.
[Adrian Newell-Păun]
"Book Review. From the Library of ACCEPT. ''Straja dragonilor'' by Ion Negoiţescu"
, in the Accept ''Newsletter'', No. 29, March 2000 At age sixteen, Negoiţescu also published his first of several reviews in the student magazine ''Pâlcul'', analyzing the
Symbolist
Symbolism or symbolist may refer to:
*Symbol, any object or sign that represents an idea
Arts
*Artistic symbol, an element of a literary, visual, or other work of art that represents an idea
** Color symbolism, the use of colors within various c ...
poetry of
Mateiu Caragiale
Mateiu Ion Caragiale (; – 17 January 1936), also credited as Matei or Matheiu, or in the antiquated version Mateiŭ,Sorin Antohi"Romania and the Balkans. From Geocultural Bovarism to Ethnic Ontology" in ''Tr@nsit online'', Institut für die Wi ...
.
[ Bogdan Creţu]
"Tînărul Ion Negoiţescu: devenirea unui mare critic (I)"
, in '' Convorbiri Literare'', December 2007 It was as a high school student that he first met poet and thinker
Lucian Blaga
Lucian Blaga (; 9 May 1895 – 6 May 1961) was a Romanians, Romanian philosopher, poet, playwright, poetry translator and novelist. He is considered one of the greatest philosophers and poets of Romania, and a prominent philosopher of the twenti ...
. Reputedly, Blaga saw his adolescent disciple as a genius
[Călinescu & Vianu, p.343] and encouraged him to seek a career in literature.
Negoiţescu took his
Baccalaureate in 1940, and subsequently enlisted at the
Cluj University
Cluj-Napoca ( ; ), or simply Cluj ( , ), is a city in northwestern Romania. It is the second-most populous city in the country and the seat of Cluj County. Geographically, it is roughly equidistant from Bucharest (), Budapest () and Belgrade ( ...
's Letters and Philosophy Department, where he studied under Blaga.
Having discovered his sexual inclination early in life, Negoiţescu claimed to have had his first sexual experiences while still a young boy.
[Adriana Stan, "Iubirea 'prin simţuri' ", in '' Dilemateca'', September 2009] According to his own testimony, he made his
coming out
Coming out of the closet, often shortened to coming out, is a metaphor used to describe LGBTQ people's self-disclosure of their sexual orientation, romantic orientation, or gender identity.
This is often framed and debated as a privacy issue, ...
at around age sixteen, when he wrote about his homosexuality in a test paper which he then handed to his supervising teacher. Reportedly, the paper was graded a ten out of ten, without further commentary from its recipient.
[ Mihai Iancu]
"Gay & Lesbian. Oameni de altădată"
, in '' Time Out Bucharest'', February 1, 2008 Negoiţescu later openly assumed his sexual identity and, in contrast to other gay men of 20th century Romania, did not deny it in front of the
conservative
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy and ideology that seeks to promote and preserve traditional institutions, customs, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civiliza ...
cultural establishment (''see
LGBT rights in Romania
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) people in Romania face legal challenges and discrimination not experienced by non-LGBTQ residents. Attitudes in Romania are generally conservative, with regard to the rights of gay, lesbian, ...
'').
[ ]Mirela Corlăţan Mirela is a Southern and Eastern European feminine given name with a Latin origin, cognate to Mirella.
People
Notable persons with that name include:
*Mirela (singer) (born 1990), Spanish singer
*Mirela Balić (born 1999), Spanish actress
*Mirela ...
"Petru Romoşan, turnătorul lui Horia Bernea şi al lui Ion Negoiţescu"
, in ''Cotidianul
The logo used between 2003 and 2007
''Cotidianul'' (meaning ''The Daily'' in English) is a Romanian-language newspaper published in Bucharest, Romania
Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern E ...
'', July 30, 2009[ Virgil Nemoianu, ''Imperfection and Defeat: The Role of Aesthetic Imagination in Human Society'', ]Central European University Press
Central is an adjective usually referring to being in the center of some place or (mathematical) object.
Central may also refer to:
Directions and generalised locations
* Central Africa, a region in the centre of Africa continent, also known as ...
, Budapest, 2006, p.142. At the time however, the various ways in which the adolescent Negoiţescu disregarded social conventions caused a rift between him and his parents, resulting in the first of his several suicide attempts.
Negoiţescu's subsequent life was marked by successive bouts of
clinical depression
Major depressive disorder (MDD), also known as clinical depression, is a mental disorder characterized by at least two weeks of pervasive low mood, low self-esteem, and loss of interest or pleasure in normally enjoyable activities. Intro ...
and
self-hatred
Self-hatred is a state of personal self-loathing or low self-esteem.
In psychology and psychiatry
The term "self-hatred" is used infrequently by psychologists and psychiatrists, who would usually describe people who hate themselves as "people w ...
.
Fascist episode and the Sibiu Literary Circle
As a high school student before and after the outbreak of World War II, Ion Negoiţescu also became interested in politics, and rallied with the
Iron Guard
The Iron Guard () was a Romanian militant revolutionary nationalism, revolutionary Clerical fascism, religious fascist Political movement, movement and political party founded in 1927 by Corneliu Zelea Codreanu as the Legion of the Archangel M ...
, a revolutionary
fascist
Fascism ( ) is a far-right, authoritarian, and ultranationalist political ideology and movement. It is characterized by a dictatorial leader, centralized autocracy, militarism, forcible suppression of opposition, belief in a natural soci ...
movement which would establish the
National Legionary regime (in existence between 1940 and 1941). As he himself later recalled, he contributed to the group's press and, wearing the green-colored
paramilitary
A paramilitary is a military that is not a part of a country's official or legitimate armed forces. The Oxford English Dictionary traces the use of the term "paramilitary" as far back as 1934.
Overview
Though a paramilitary is, by definiti ...
uniform of the Guardists, took part in National Legionary street parades.
[ Bogdan Creţu]
"Tînărul Ion Negoiţescu: devenirea unui mare critic (II)"
, in '' Convorbiri Literare'', January 2008 This choice intrigued his biographers and reviewers of his work, who generally agree that it clashed with the young man's tolerant nature and
individualism
Individualism is the moral stance, political philosophy, ideology, and social outlook that emphasizes the intrinsic worth of the individual. Individualists promote realizing one's goals and desires, valuing independence and self-reliance, and a ...
.
In autumn 1940, following the
Second Vienna Award
The Second Vienna Award was the second of two territorial disputes that were arbitrated by Nazi Germany and the Kingdom of Italy. On 30 August 1940, they assigned the territory of Northern Transylvania, including all of Maramureș and part of Cri ...
which granted
Northern Transylvania
Northern Transylvania (, ) was the region of the Kingdom of Romania that during World War II, as a consequence of the August 1940 territorial agreement known as the Second Vienna Award, became part of the Kingdom of Hungary (1920-1946), Kingdom ...
to Hungary, Negoiţescu followed the Cluj University's Romanian section as it relocated to the south of the new border, in
Sibiu
Sibiu ( , , , Hungarian: ''Nagyszeben'', , Transylvanian Saxon: ''Härmeschtat'' or ''Hermestatt'') is a city in central Romania, situated in the historical region of Transylvania. Located some north-west of Bucharest, the city straddles th ...
.
As a contributor to the student magazine ''Curţile Dorului'', he met and befriended poet
Radu Stanca.
It was also during that interval that he participated in the establishment of the
Sibiu Literary Circle The Sibiu Literary Circle () was a literary group created during World War II in Sibiu to promote the modernist liberal ideas of Eugen Lovinescu.
The group was formed around Lucian Blaga and other intellectuals from Cluj, who had settled in Sibiu ...
, with other young men who followed Blaga. His colleagues there included Stanca,
Nicolae Balotă Nicolae may refer to:
* Nicolae (name), an Aromanian and Romanian name
* ''Nicolae'' (novel), a 1997 novel
See also
*Nicolai (disambiguation)
*Nicolao Nicolao is an Italian given name and a surname. It may refer to the following:
Given name
*Ni ...
,
Ştefan Augustin Doinaş,
Cornel Regman and
Eugen Todoran.
[ Ion Simuţ]
"De la cerchism la euphorionism"
, 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 ...
'', Nr. 20/2008[ ]Cornel Ungureanu Cornel may refer to:
__NOTOC__ People
* Cornel (given name), a list of people with the given name or nickname
* Cornel Wilde (1915–1989), American actor and director born Kornél Lajos Weisz
* Eric Cornel (born 1996), Canadian hockey player
* Corn ...
''Ion D. Sîrbu - inedit: Alt roman epistolar''
at th
Memoria Digital Library
retrieved October 8, 2009 They were joined by
Victor Iancu,
Ovidiu Cotruş,
Ioanichie Olteanu,
Ion Dezideriu Sîrbu,
Deliu Petroiu,
Eta Boeriu
Eta Boeriu (born Margarita Caranica; February 23, 1923 in Turda – November 13, 1984 in Cluj-Napoca) was a Romanian poet, literary critic and translator. Involved in the Sibiu Literary Circle (which disbanded in 1945),Petru Poantă, ''Cercul ...
and
Ovidiu Drimba.
At the time, Negoiţescu was also acquainted with linguist
Ştefan Bezdechi and philosopher
Petre Ţuţea Petre is a surname and given name derived from Peter. Notable persons with that name include:
People with the given name Petre
* Charles Petre Eyre (1817–1902), English Roman Catholic prelate
* Ion Petre Stoican (circa 1930–1990), Romanian vi ...
.
By that point in his life, Negoiţescu made himself known as the ideologue of his generation, expanding his cultural horizon and familiarizing himself with the
Classics
Classics, also classical studies or Ancient Greek and Roman studies, is the study of classical antiquity. In the Western world, ''classics'' traditionally refers to the study of Ancient Greek literature, Ancient Greek and Roman literature and ...
, with
German philosophy
German philosophy, meaning philosophy in the German language or philosophy by German people, in its diversity, is fundamental for both the analytic and continental traditions. It covers figures such as Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, Immanuel Kant, ...
, and with the main works of
Romanticism
Romanticism (also known as the Romantic movement or Romantic era) was an artistic and intellectual movement that originated in Europe towards the end of the 18th century. The purpose of the movement was to advocate for the importance of subjec ...
, while dedicating his efforts to promoting the work of isolated young authors such as Stanca and
Mircea Streinul.
He had slowly moved into the
anti-fascist
Anti-fascism is a political movement in opposition to fascist ideologies, groups and individuals. Beginning in European countries in the 1920s, it was at its most significant shortly before and during World War II, where the Axis powers were op ...
camp, objecting to both the Iron Guard and its partner-rival, the
authoritarian
Authoritarianism is a political system characterized by the rejection of political plurality, the use of strong central power to preserve the political ''status quo'', and reductions in democracy, separation of powers, civil liberties, and ...
general and newly appointed ''
Conducător''
Ion Antonescu
Ion Antonescu (; ; – 1 June 1946) was a Romanian military officer and Mareșal (Romania), marshal who presided over two successive Romania during World War II, wartime dictatorships as Prime Minister of Romania, Prime Minister and ''Conduc� ...
.
In 1941, he published ''Povestea tristă a lui Ramon Ocg'' ("The Sad Story of Ramon Ocg"), a lengthy
prose poem
Prose poetry is poetry written in prose form instead of verse form while otherwise deferring to poetic devices to make meaning.
Characteristics
Prose poetry is written as prose, without the line breaks associated with poetry. However, it make ...
which he presented as a novel.
That same year, in autumn, he traveled to the capital city of
Bucharest
Bucharest ( , ; ) is the capital and largest city of Romania. The metropolis stands on the River Dâmbovița (river), Dâmbovița in south-eastern Romania. Its population is officially estimated at 1.76 million residents within a greater Buc ...
, visiting
modernist
Modernism was an early 20th-century movement in literature, visual arts, and music that emphasized experimentation, abstraction, and Subjectivity and objectivity (philosophy), subjective experience. Philosophy, politics, architecture, and soc ...
critic and theorist
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 ...
, the doyen of a literary circle known as ''
Sburătorul
''Sburătorul'' was a Romanian modernist literary magazine and literary society, established in Bucharest in April 1919. Led by Eugen Lovinescu, the circle was instrumental in developing new trends and styles in Romanian literature, ranging f ...
''. Negoiţescu, who had just purchased himself the new critical synthesis newly published by Lovinescu's rival
George Călinescu
George Călinescu (; 19 June 1899 – 12 March 1965) 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 most important Romani ...
, commented on its strengths and weaknesses with his host.
[ Andrei Terian]
"Păcatele tinereţilor"
in ''Ziarul Financiar
''Ziarul Financiar'' is a daily financial newspaper published in Bucharest, Romania. Aside from business information, it features sections focusing on careers and properties, as well as a special Sunday newspaper. ''Ziarul Financiar'' also publish ...
'', December 12, 2008 The meeting left an impression on Lovinescu, whose diary for that day reads: "I have the feeling he is 'different', he is an 'exceptional' young man, who is set to have a singular destiny."
Anti-fascism and ''Euphorion'' projects
On 13 March 1943, at a time when Romania had rallied with
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German Reich, German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a Totalit ...
and the
Axis Powers
The Axis powers, originally called the Rome–Berlin Axis and also Rome–Berlin–Tokyo Axis, was the military coalition which initiated World War II and fought against the Allies of World War II, Allies. Its principal members were Nazi Ge ...
, he defied Antonescu's regime by affiliating the entire Circle with Lovinescu, himself marginalized for supporting
liberal democracy
Liberal democracy, also called Western-style democracy, or substantive democracy, is a form of government that combines the organization of a democracy with ideas of liberalism, liberal political philosophy. Common elements within a liberal dem ...
and for rejecting the application of ideological
censorship
Censorship is the suppression of speech, public communication, or other information. This may be done on the basis that such material is considered objectionable, harmful, sensitive, or "inconvenient". Censorship can be conducted by governmen ...
.
Signed with the pseudonym ''Damian Silvestru'' and drafted by Negoiţescu, the letter stating this position was published by novelist
Liviu Rebreanu
Liviu Rebreanu (; November 27, 1885 – September 1, 1944) was a Romanian novelist, playwright, short story writer, and journalist.
Life
Born in Felsőilosva (now Târlișua, Bistrița-Năsăud County, Transylvania), then part of the King ...
's magazine ''
Viaţa''.
The Sibiu writers' statement ridiculed the officially encouraged traditionalist and
nationalist
Nationalism is an idea or movement that holds that the nation should be congruent with the State (polity), state. As a movement, it presupposes the existence and tends to promote the interests of a particular nation,Anthony D. Smith, Smith, A ...
literature, whose
bucolic
The pastoral genre of literature, art, or music depicts an idealised form of the shepherd's lifestyle – herding livestock around open areas of land according to the seasons and the changing availability of water and pasture. The target aud ...
and anti-modernist themes it called ''păşunism'' (from ''păşune'', "pasture"), while accusing its proponents of having replaced aesthetic appraisal with extreme dogmatism.
These judgments scandalized the
far right
Far-right politics, often termed right-wing extremism, encompasses a range of ideologies that are marked by ultraconservatism, authoritarianism, ultranationalism, and Nativism (politics), nativism. This political spectrum situates itself on ...
press, who successfully identified their actual source, calling on the Antonescu government to impose severe punishment: the fascist venue ''Ţara'' notably stated that the young men "should have
patriotism
Patriotism is the feeling of love, devotion, and a sense of attachment to one's country or state. This attachment can be a combination of different feelings for things such as the language of one's homeland, and its ethnic, cultural, politic ...
inscribed with a whip on their
sternums".
Among the accusations launched by the fascist and
antisemitic
Antisemitism or Jew-hatred is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who harbours it is called an antisemite. Whether antisemitism is considered a form of racism depends on the school of thought. Antisemi ...
venues, Negoiţescu found himself explicitly described as a "
Bolshevik
The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin, were a radical Faction (political), faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) which split with the Mensheviks at the 2nd Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, ...
", "traitor" and "hireling of the
Jew
Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, religion, and community are highly inte ...
s".
[ Ştefăniţă Regman]
"Negoiţescu ameninţat cu evacuarea"
, 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 ...
'', Nr. 6/2008 In contrast with such reactions, Lovinescu found himself positively impressed by the group' gesture, and sent the Sibiu writers a letter which acknowledged them as his disciples.
His sympathetic portrait of Negoiţescu, published later in the year by ''
Timpul'' newspaper, further publicized this special connection.
The piece was nevertheless received with noted reserve by Negoiţescu's own friends and colleagues, who did not necessarily share the two theorists' confidence in each other's ideologies.
In early 1945, some months after the
King's Coup deposed Antonescu and aligned Romania with the
Allies
An alliance is a relationship among people, groups, or states that have joined together for mutual benefit or to achieve some common purpose, whether or not an explicit agreement has been worked out among them. Members of an alliance are calle ...
, Ion Negoiţescu also became editor of the newly founded ''Revista Cercului Literar'', a review published by, and named after, the Sibiu group.
Alongside members of the Circle, the main contributors included the movement's mentor Blaga and various other established Romanian writers.
Negoiţescu's own works of that year included the study ''Viitorul literaturii române?'' ("The Future of Romanian Literature?"), in which he expressed a belief that
urbanization
Urbanization (or urbanisation in British English) is the population shift from Rural area, rural to urban areas, the corresponding decrease in the proportion of people living in rural areas, and the ways in which societies adapt to this change. ...
and urban-themed modernist literature had rendered its traditionalist competitor, with its rural subjects, at the same time obsolete and objectionable.
By 1945 however, the Sibiu group was breaking up, largely owing to the decline of cultural activity, as well as to the recovery of Northern Transylvania (since the young writers were able to consider returning to their respective homes).
In 1946, Negoiţescu attempted to create a new venue for the Sibiu authors, named ''Euphorion'' and based in newly reincorporated Cluj, but had little success in obtaining support.
According to Sîrbu, who was at the time detached as a commissioned sergeant in the
Romanian Army
The Romanian Land Forces () is the army of Romania, and the main component of the Romanian Armed Forces. Since 2007, full professionalization and a major equipment overhaul have transformed the nature of the Land Forces.
The Romanian Land Forc ...
, his colleagues had been attracted into cooperation with the increasingly powerful
Romanian Communist Party
The Romanian Communist Party ( ; PCR) was a communist party in Romania. The successor to the pro-Bolshevik wing of the Socialist Party of Romania, it gave an ideological endorsement to a communist revolution that would replace the social system ...
, but only as a means to preserve their livelihood.
Negoiţescu had earlier published the second of his books, ''Despre mască şi mişcare'' ("On the Mask and the Movement").
In 1947, one year after his graduation,
Romania's official publishing house,
Editura Fundaţiilor Regale, granted him its Young Writers prize for the manuscript volume ''Poeţi români'' ("Romanian Poets").
With credentials signed by Blaga and French academic Henri Jacquier, and sponsored by the
Romanian oil company Titan-Călan-Nădrag, Negoiţescu was again in Bucharest, where he and Stanca both hoped to receive
scholarship
A scholarship is a form of Student financial aid, financial aid awarded to students for further education. Generally, scholarships are awarded based on a set of criteria such as academic merit, Multiculturalism, diversity and inclusion, athleti ...
s from the
Institut de France
The ; ) is a French learned society, grouping five , including the . It was established in 1795 at the direction of the National Convention. Located on the Quai de Conti in the 6th arrondissement of Paris, the institute manages approximately ...
.
He was involved in cultural networking: in permanent correspondence with his former Sibiu colleagues, he also established contacts with novelist
Dinu Nicodin, and befriended Lovinescu's daughter
Monica (later a self-exiled critic and journalist).
In this context, Negoiţescu was made a member of the board granting awards in the memory of Eugen Lovinescu (and named after the theorist), his influence helping in granting such distinctions to Doinaş and Stanca.
However, the correspondence of this period also shows aggravated tensions between Circle members such as Doinaş and ''
Sburătorul
''Sburătorul'' was a Romanian modernist literary magazine and literary society, established in Bucharest in April 1919. Led by Eugen Lovinescu, the circle was instrumental in developing new trends and styles in Romanian literature, ranging f ...
'' affiliates like
Felix Aderca
Felix Aderca (; born Froim-Zelig ''Froim-ZeilicAderca; March 13, 1891 – December 12, 1962), , in '' Realitatea Evreiască'', Nr. 280-281 (1080-1081), August–September 2007 Boris Marian, , in '' Realitatea Evreiască'', Nr. 292-293 (1092-109 ...
and
Vladimir Streinu
Nicolae Iordache (May 23, 1902 in Teiu, Argeș – November 26, 1970 in Bucharest), known by his pseudonym Vladimir Streinu, was a Romania
Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern a ...
(who were both among the Lovinescu Award trustees).
In June of the same year, somewhat intimidated by the experience, Negoiţescu returned to his home region, where, in August, he received news that his paper of
Paul Valéry
Ambroise Paul Toussaint Jules Valéry (; 30 October 1871 – 20 July 1945) was a French poet, essayist, and philosopher.
In addition to his poetry and fiction (drama and dialogues), his interests included aphorisms on art, history, letters, m ...
's poetic style had been rejected by the Institut examiners.
Communist censorship and imprisonment
Negoiţescu's career fluctuated after the 1947–1948 establishment of a
local communist regime, when he became exposed to political persecution. Initially, he was employed as a librarian by the
Romanian Academy
The Romanian Academy ( ) is a cultural forum founded in Bucharest, Romania, in 1866. It covers the scientific, artistic and literary domains. The academy has 181 active members who are elected for life.
According to its bylaws, the academy's ma ...
's Cluj section (1950–1952).
He was in tandem working on a critical analysis of
Mihai Eminescu
Mihai Eminescu (; born Mihail Eminovici; 15 January 1850 – 15 June 1889) was a Romanians, Romanian Romanticism, Romantic poet, novelist, and journalist from Moldavia, generally regarded as the most famous and influential Romanian poet. Emin ...
's work, ''Poezia lui Eminescu'' ("Eminescu's Poetry"), completed around 1953 but rejected by the new
censorship apparatus.
[ Mircea Iorgulescu]
"Moment revoluţionar în eminescologie"
, in ''Revista 22
''Revista 22'' (''22 Magazine'') is a Romanian weekly magazine, issued by the Group for Social Dialogue and focused mainly on politics and culture.
History and profile
''Revista 22'' was started in 1990. The first edition of the magazine was prin ...
'', Nr. 649, August 2002 He had befriended the younger journalist and author
Constantin Țoiu, who divided his time between writing for communist-aligned journals such as ''
Gazeta Literară Gazeta may refer to:
Newspapers Albanian language
* Gazeta 55, daily newspaper
* Gazeta Express, a Kosovo newspaper published in Pristina
* Gazeta Rilindja Demokratike, daily newspaper
* Gazeta Shqip, daily newspaper
* Gazeta Sot, a daily newsp ...
'' and frequenting marginalized figures; reportedly, it was a consequence of this ambivalence that ''Gazeta Literară'' editor
Paul Georgescu
Paul Georgescu (; November 7, 1923 – October 15, 1989) was a Romanian literary critic, journalist, fiction writer and Communism, communist political figure. Remembered as both a main participant in the imposition of Socialist Realism in its Soc ...
effectively terminated Ţoiu's employment.
[ Ioana Macrea-Toma]
"Constantin Țoiu și poetica amintirilor"
, in ''Apostrof ''Apostrof'' (Romanian for "Apostrophe") is a monthly literary magazine published in Cluj-Napoca, Romania under the Romanian Writers' Union patronage. It was founded in 1990 by Babeș-Bolyai University professor Marta Petreu, who is also its edit ...
'', Nr. 10/2005, republished by the Romanian Cultural Institute
The Romanian Cultural Institute (, ICR), headquartered in Bucharest, was established in 2004 on the older institutional framework provided by the Romanian Cultural Foundation and before 1989 by the Institute for the Cultural Relations Abroad. ...
's
România Culturală
''
Despite his political dossier and the officially endorsed repression of homosexuality, Negoițescu had by then been made notorious for his successive amorous relationships with men from all walks of life, and rumors spread that he was also briefly involved with local celebrities.
His heterosexual friend Nicolae Balotă also recalled running into Negoițescu at a 1955 party of "
Uranians", where writer
Mihai Rădulescu and classical pianist
Alexandru Demetriad were in attendance, and where Balotă was allegedly the only straight man.
Negoiţescu's cultural opposition also touched his friendships: in 1954, he played a part in rescuing ''Caietul albastru'' ("The Blue Notebook"), a
samizdat
Samizdat (, , ) was a form of dissident activity across the Eastern Bloc in which individuals reproduced censored and underground makeshift publications, often by hand, and passed the documents from reader to reader. The practice of manual rep ...
work by Balotă, which the latter had discarded in
Gara de Nord while pursued by agents of the
Securitate
The Department of State Security (), commonly known as the Securitate (, ), was the secret police agency of the Socialist Republic of Romania. It was founded on 30 August 1948 from the '' Siguranța'' with help and direction from the Soviet MG ...
secret police. In 1955, he was also present at the burial of writer
Hortensia Papadat-Bengescu
Hortensia Papadat-Bengescu (; 8 December 1876 – 5 March 1955 in Bucharest) was a novelist of the Romanian interwar period.
Life
Hortensia Bengescu was born in Ivești, Galați, Ivești, Galați County, on 8 December 1876. She was the daughter o ...
, who had been one of the leading ''Sburătorul'' figures before being marginalized by communism: in Negoițescu's own definition, she had been led to her grave "almost a pauper".
[ Sanda Cordoş]
"Un tăcut semn de întrebare"
, in ''Apostrof ''Apostrof'' (Romanian for "Apostrophe") is a monthly literary magazine published in Cluj-Napoca, Romania under the Romanian Writers' Union patronage. It was founded in 1990 by Babeș-Bolyai University professor Marta Petreu, who is also its edit ...
'', Nr. 2/2006 (republished b
''România Culturală''
) Also then, just prior to being arrested, Sîrbu made an attempt to group his former university colleagues around his magazine ''Teatru''.
His publishing activity at times adapted itself to the exterior requirements of
Romanian Socialist Realism and the communist ideology, such as in a 1957 article for ''Teatru'', where he reviewed Papadat-Bengescu's play ''Batrînul'' ("The Old Man") exclusively as a
progressive social critique of "
bourgeois
The bourgeoisie ( , ) are a class of business owners, merchants and wealthy people, in general, which emerged in the Late Middle Ages, originally as a "middle class" between the peasantry and Aristocracy (class), aristocracy. They are tradition ...
" society.
Beginning 1958, the clash between Negoițescu and the Socialist Realist cultural mainstream reached new proportions: the Communist Party-controlled media, including ''
Scînteia
''Scînteia'' ( Romanian for "The Spark") was the name of two newspapers edited by Communist groups at different intervals in Romanian history. The title is a homage to the Russian language paper '' Iskra''. It was known as ''Scânteia'' until ...
'' daily, singled him out for having adopted "
aestheticism
Aestheticism (also known as the aesthetic movement) was an art movement in the late 19th century that valued the appearance of literature, music, fonts and the arts over their functions. According to Aestheticism, art should be produced to b ...
".
In this context, his adversary Paul Georgescu wrote about Negoiţescu's earlier "
reactionary
In politics, a reactionary is a person who favors a return to a previous state of society which they believe possessed positive characteristics absent from contemporary.''The New Fontana Dictionary of Modern Thought'' Third Edition, (1999) p. 729. ...
" stance, and claimed that the author was still failing to adopt "the judicious attitude".
Similar condemnation was expressed by other ''Gazeta Literară'' contributors:
Savin Bratu (who alleged that Negoițescu was one of those who circulated "names, works and ideas that we find foreign");
Mihai Gafița (who held Negoițescu and his colleague
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 ...
responsible for preserving "bourgeois ideology", while urging "the editorial staffs of literary reviews, the publishing houses
ndthe
Marxist
Marxism is a political philosophy and method of socioeconomic analysis. It uses a dialectical and materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to analyse class relations, social conflic ...
critics" to react against this phenomenon); as well as
Mihail Petroveanu (according to whom the trend represented by Negoiţescu signified "the penetration of modernist, apolitical or profoundly retrograde, traditionalist tendencies" coupled with "the infiltrations of
liberal objectivism in union with precious, inaccessible language").
In particular, such voices condemned the critic's praise of banned authors, among them Lovinescu, Blaga, Mateiu Caragiale,
Ion Barbu, and
Titu Maiorescu
Titu Liviu Maiorescu (; 15 February 1840 – 18 June 1917) was a Romanian literary critic and politician, founder of the ''Junimea'' Society. As a literary critic, he was instrumental in the development of Culture of Romania, Romanian culture in ...
.
The same year, Negoițescu was excluded from the
Writers' Union Writers' Union may refer to the following organizations:
Statewide unions
* Writers Union of Armenia
* Azerbaijani Writers Union
* Writers' Union of Canada
* Chinese Writers Union
* Estonian Writers' Union
* Hungarian Writers' Union
* Iraqi Writer ...
, and had his right of signature officially withdrawn (meaning that his name could no longer be seen in print).
Eventually, in 1961, he became a
political prisoner
A political prisoner is someone imprisoned for their political activity. The political offense is not always the official reason for the prisoner's detention.
There is no internationally recognized legal definition of the concept, although ...
at
Jilava penitentiary,
and was eventually released through a 1964 amnesty.
Reportedly, the reasons for Negoițescu's sentencing were his participation in "hostile discussions" dealing with literary topics
and his ambition of circulating an anthology of Romanian poetry that included banned authors.
However, the actual arrest, concluding a major purge of the intellectual field, is also seen by some as a late ramification in the
show trial
A show trial is a public trial in which the guilt (law), guilt or innocence of the defendant has already been determined. The purpose of holding a show trial is to present both accusation and verdict to the public, serving as an example and a d ...
targeting intellectuals
Dinu Pillat and
Constantin Noica
Constantin Noica (; – 4 December 1987) was a Romanian philosopher, essayist and poet. His preoccupations were throughout all philosophy, from epistemology, philosophy of culture, axiology and philosophic anthropology to ontology and logics ...
. During his interrogation, Negoițescu made a point of not implicating his friend Țoiu, by claiming that the activities he had been indicted of were pursued despite Țoiu's better advice.
As he later recalled, his body of published works was kept as evidence of his hostility to the official line, while a court decision led to the
expropriation
Nationalization (nationalisation in British English)
is the process of transforming privately owned assets into public assets by bringing them under the public ownership of a national government or state. Nationalization contrasts with p ...
of his personal items (including his large collection of books, which was assigned to
Editura pentru literatură publishers).
Alerted by Doinaş, the critic's mother had destroyed all manuscripts he kept in his Cluj home, including his childhood diary (which reportedly opened with the words "I want to be a writer").
Negoițescu himself recalled that, while in penitentiary, he contemplated suicide for a second time: "I wanted to 'pull one' on my torturers and destroy the object of their sadistic pleasure".
According to one account, he had tried to poison himself with meat he had allowed to fester, being unaware that boiled food could not breed deadly bacteria.
Liberalization years and return to literature
Following his release, Negoiţescu was allowed to seek employment in his field, and, moving to Bucharest, became an editor for ''
Luceafărul'' (1965–1967).
It was at this stage that he met and befriended fellow critic
Matei Călinescu
Matei Alexe Călinescu (June 15, 1934 – June 24, 2009) was a Romanian literary critic and professor of comparative literature at Indiana University Bloomington, Indiana University, in Bloomington, Indiana.
Biography
Călinescu was born in ...
, who later recounted how, as an employee of ''Gazeta Literară'', he had attempted to find Negoiţescu a full writing job. Negoiţescu's new domicile, a basement room on Bucharest's Ana Ipătescu Boulevard, was a meeting spot for members of the Sibiu Circle and for young literary figures (Călinescu,
Virgil Nemoianu,
Toma Pavel). During the
liberalization
Liberalization or liberalisation (British English) is a broad term that refers to the practice of making laws, systems, or opinions less severe, usually in the sense of eliminating certain government regulations or restrictions. The term is used ...
episode which coincided with the start of
Nicolae Ceauşescu Nicolae may refer to:
* Nicolae (name), an Aromanian and Romanian name
* ''Nicolae'' (novel), a 1997 novel
See also
*Nicolai (disambiguation)
*Nicolao Nicolao is an Italian given name and a surname. It may refer to the following:
Given name
*Ni ...
's communist rule, a relaxation of censorship signified that he was again allowed to publish, producing the volumes ''Scriitori moderni'' ("Modern Writers", 1966)
and ''Poezia lui Eminescu'' (1967).
After 1965, he and other Sibiu Circle members were reunited around two new venues: the Transylvanian-based magazine ''
Familia'' and ''
Secolul 20'', a cultural periodical edited by Doinaş.
By then, Negoiţescu was working on his synthesis of Romanian literary history. Its summary version was first published in 1968 by ''Familia'', and instantly made its author the center of attention from several milieus. Having decided not to treat his subjects in the conventional
Marxist-Leninist manner encouraged by the authorities, he stirred polemic passions on the literary scene and became a target for surveillance by the authorities.
Negoiţescu's text, which linked Romanian literary history with the development of urban culture,
also intrigued the cultural establishment because it seemed to leave out completely all works produced before 1800.
Also in 1968, Negoiţescu moved on from ''Luceafărul'' to ''
Viaţa Românească'', where he was also granted an editorial staff office (a position he kept until 1971).
That same year, he was allowed to travel beyond the
Iron Curtain
The Iron Curtain was the political and physical boundary dividing Europe into two separate areas from the end of World War II in 1945 until the end of the Cold War in 1991. On the east side of the Iron Curtain were countries connected to the So ...
, but, as he himself recalled, the communist press at home had used the occasion to call him a "defector", "traitor" and "fascist".
While in France, Negoiţescu visited
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 ...
, who was by then noted as a literary reviewer for the
Romanian diaspora
The Romanian diaspora is the Romanians, ethnically Romanian population outside Romania and Moldova. The concept does not usually include the ethnic Romanians who live as natives in nearby states, chiefly those Romanians who live in Ukraine, Hun ...
and
anti-communist
Anti-communism is political and ideological opposition to communist beliefs, groups, and individuals. Organized anti-communism developed after the 1917 October Revolution in Russia, and it reached global dimensions during the Cold War, when th ...
spokeswoman. Upon his return, Negoiţescu admitted to Romanian officials that the object of this meeting was to reestablish the Eugen Lovinescu Award, which Monica Lovinescu had considered delegating to a panel of young critics living inside Romania (Matei Călinescu, Virgil Nemoianu,
Nicolae Manolescu
Nicolae Manolescu (; 27 November 1939 – 23 March 2024) was a Romanian literary critic. Elected a corresponding member of the Romanian Academy in 1997, he was upgraded to titular member in 2013.
Life and career
Manolescu was born in Râmnicu ...
,
Eugen Simion
Eugen Simion (25 May 1933 – 18 October 2022) was a Romanian literary critic and historian, editor, essayist and academic.
Born in Chiojdeanca, Prahova County, the son of two farmers, Simion completed his secondary education at the Saints Pe ...
,
Mihai Ungheanu and
Ileana Vrancea); according to his account, the Communist Party structures prevented him from even suggesting this offer to the cultural official
Paul Niculescu-Mizil.
Later, when he wanted to revisit France and honor the personal invitation of writer
Jacques Borel, the communist apparatus denied him a new passport.
In early 1969, Negoiţescu, newly readmitted into the Writers' Union, was assigned an apartment on Bucharest's
Calea Victoriei
Calea Victoriei (''Victory Avenue'') is a major avenue in central Bucharest. Situated in Sector 1, and having a length of , it leads from (which runs parallel to the Dâmbovița River) to the north and then northwest up to Piața Victoriei, w ...
.
In December of the same year, the authorities threatened to confiscate the Negoiţescu's citing a juridical rationale he viewed as untenable, and, as a result, he initiated a formal gesture of protest.
Despite the rising negative reactions against his work, Negoiţescu continued to publish essays and
monograph
A monograph is generally a long-form work on one (usually scholarly) subject, or one aspect of a subject, typically created by a single author or artist (or, sometimes, by two or more authors). Traditionally it is in written form and published a ...
s: ''Însemnări critice'' ("Critical Records", 1970), ''E. Lovinescu'' (1970),
("
Aladdin
Aladdin ( ; , , ATU 561, 'Aladdin') is a Middle-Eastern folk tale. It is one of the best-known tales associated with '' One Thousand and One Nights'' (often known in English as ''The Arabian Nights''), despite not being part of the original ...
's Lamp", 1971), ("
Engrams", 1975), ''Analize şi sinteze'' ("Analyses and Syntheses", 1976).
These books occasionally transgressed the limits imposed by communist leaders, and sparked several of his more or less severe clashes with censorship. In one incident of 1971, the entire circulation of ''Lampa lui Aladin'' was confiscated and destroyed by the regime's representatives.
Such measures caused Negoiţescu distress, and led him to attempt killing himself a third time, on August 23, 1974 (the 1944 Coup's 30th anniversary, and Romania's national holiday during communism).
[Călinescu & Vianu, p.406-407] According to his friend, psychiatrist
Ion Vianu
Ion Vianu (15 April 1934 – 20 June 2024) was a Romanian writer and psychiatry, psychiatrist, who lived in Switzerland from 1977. He was the son of literary critic Tudor Vianu and his wife, Elena Vianu, Elena.
Vianu first studied classical phi ...
, Negoiţescu was hospitalized in the
Bucharest Emergency Hospital for a long period, after having swallowed a large quantity of
hypnotic
A hypnotic (from Ancient Greek, Greek ''Hypnos'', sleep), also known as a somnifacient or soporific, and commonly known as sleeping pills, are a class of psychoactive drugs whose primary function is to sleep induction, induce sleep and to trea ...
s.
In parallel with these events in his life and career, he published several works of poetry: ''Sabasios'' (1968), ''Poemele lui Balduin de Tyaormin'' ("Poems by Baldwin of Tyaormin", 1969), ''Moartea unui contabil'' ("Death of an Accountant", 1972), ''Viaţa particulară'' ("Private Life", 1977).
Goma movement and defection
A seminal event in the writer's life and career occurred in 1977, when he openly rallied with
dissident
A dissident is a person who actively challenges an established political or religious system, doctrine, belief, policy, or institution. In a religious context, the word has been used since the 18th century, and in the political sense since the 2 ...
politics. That year, inspired by the ''
Charter 77
Charter 77 (''Charta 77'' in Czech language, Czech and Slovak language, Slovak) was an informal civic initiative in the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic from 1976 to 1992, named after the document Charter 77 from January 1977. Founding members ...
'' movement in
Communist Czechoslovakia
The Czechoslovak Socialist Republic, (Czech and Slovak: ''Československá socialistická republika'', ČSSR) known from 1948 to 1960 as the Czechoslovak Republic (''Československá republika)'', Fourth Czechoslovak Republic, or simply Czech ...
, Romanian novelist
Paul Goma
Paul Goma (; October 2, 1935 – March 24, 2020) was a Romanian writer, known for his activities as a dissident and leading opponent of the communist regime before 1989. Forced into exile by the communist authorities, he became a political refug ...
drafted a collective petition critical of Ceauşescu's cultural and social policies in the post-
July Theses
The July Theses () was a speech delivered by Nicolae Ceaușescu to the executive committee of the Romanian Communist Party (PCR) on 6 July 1971.
The July Theses, officially named ''Propuneri de măsuri pentru îmbunătățirea activității po ...
era.
Tom Gallagher
C. Thomas Gallagher III (born February 3, 1944) is an American politician, financier, and insurance agent from the state of Florida and a member of the Republican Party. Gallagher holds the distinction of having served more years as an elected ...
, ''Outcast Europe: The Balkans, 1789–1989. From the Ottomans to Milošević'', Routledge
Routledge ( ) is a British multinational corporation, multinational publisher. It was founded in 1836 by George Routledge, and specialises in providing academic books, academic journals, journals and online resources in the fields of the humanit ...
, London, 2001, p.153. While Goma was being subjected to an inquiry by the Securitate, Negoiţescu signed an
open letter
An open letter is a Letter (message), letter that is intended to be read by a wide audience, or a letter intended for an individual, but that is nonetheless widely distributed intentionally.
Open letters usually take the form of a letter (mess ...
displaying his solidarity with the initiative, and openly rallied with various other forms of protest.
[ ]Ovidiu Şimonca
Ovidiu (, historical name: ''Canara'', ) is a town situated a few kilometres north of Constanța in Constanța County, Northern Dobruja, Romania. Ovidiu is quite small, with a population of 13,968 as of 2021, and many wealthy inhabitants of Consta ...
" 'E foarte greu să-ţi asumi duplicitatea'. Interviu cu Gelu Ionescu"
in ''Observator Cultural
''Observator Cultural'' (meaning "The Cultural Observer" in English) is a weekly literary magazine based in Bucharest, Romania
Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern and Southeast ...
'', Nr. 326, June 2006 The document in question further antagonized the regime when it was broadcast by the diaspora section of
Radio Free Europe
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) is a media organization broadcasting news and analyses in 27 languages to 23 countries across Eastern Europe, Central Asia, the Caucasus, and the Middle East. Headquartered in Prague since 1995, RFE/RL ...
, an anti-communist and
West German
West Germany was the common English name for the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) from its formation on 23 May 1949 until its reunification with East Germany on 3 October 1990. It is sometimes known as the Bonn Republic after its capital c ...
-based corporation.
[Călinescu & Vianu, p.361]
Himself arrested shortly afterward, Negoiţescu was made subject to a humiliating and violent interrogation, at the end of which he again contemplated suicide.
He was also threatened with prosecution on grounds of breaking
Article 200
Article 200 (''Articolul 200'' in Romanian) was a section of the Penal Code of Romania that criminalised homosexual relationships. It was introduced in 1968, under the communist regime, during the rule Nicolae Ceaușescu, and remained in force unti ...
, a penal code section which criminalized homosexual relationships.
The Securitate men were by then interested in the homosexual relationship between Negoiţescu and young poet
Petru Romoşan, who was also taken into custody at the time, and whom various commentators of the incidents have since identified as the person secretly furnishing information on the critic's personal life.
[ Ştefan Agopian, Ioan T. Morar]
"Petre, Petre, pentru ce ne tromboneşti?!"
in ''Academia Caţavencu
An academy ( Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of tertiary education. The name traces back to Plato's school of philosophy, founded approximately 386 BC at Akademia, a sanctuary of Athena, th ...
'', August 12, 2009[ Răzvan Mihai Vintilescu]
"Scandalul Romoşan: 'Am fost o ţintă a Securităţii' "
, in ''Cotidianul
The logo used between 2003 and 2007
''Cotidianul'' (meaning ''The Daily'' in English) is a Romanian-language newspaper published in Bucharest, Romania
Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern E ...
'', August 5, 2009 Several other men were detained as suspects, largely on charges of having had intercourse with Negoiţescu. The group, which Romoşan himself argues included some 30 people,
notably included poet
Marian Dopcea, at the time a student at the
University of Bucharest
The University of Bucharest (UB) () is a public university, public research university in Bucharest, Romania. It was founded in its current form on by a decree of Prince Alexandru Ioan Cuza to convert the former Princely Academy of Bucharest, P ...
.
[ Dan C. Mihăilescu, "Din contextele unui verb securistic: a colabora (II)", in '' Idei în Dialog'', September 2009] The implications of Negoiţescu's arrest also made him the target of interest in the
Western world
The Western world, also known as the West, primarily refers to various nations and state (polity), states in Western Europe, Northern America, and Australasia; with some debate as to whether those in Eastern Europe and Latin America also const ...
governments, representatives of which followed the case with concern.
At the same time, the communist regime was forcefully expelling Goma and Ion Vianu, the latter of whom had joined the public protest by calling attention to the use of
involuntary commitment
Involuntary commitment, civil commitment, or involuntary hospitalization/hospitalisation, or informally in Britain sectioning, being sectioned, commitment, or being committed, is a legal process through which an individual who is deemed by a qual ...
as a political weapon.
As a means of avoiding this penalty, Negoiţescu agreed to draft and sign ''Despre patriotism'' ("On Patriotism"), an essay retracting his statements and expressing regret for his action.
According to writer
Ştefan Agopian, Negoiţescu himself was forced by the regime to accept a
marriage of convenience
A marriage of convenience is a marriage contracted for reasons other than that of love and commitment. Instead, such a marriage is entered into for personal gain, or some other sort of strategic purpose, such as a political marriage. Cases whe ...
, while Romoşan's punitive incarceration became notorious in the literary milieu.
Still allowed to travel into
Western Europe
Western Europe is the western region of Europe. The region's extent varies depending on context.
The concept of "the West" appeared in Europe in juxtaposition to "the East" and originally applied to the Western half of the ancient Mediterranean ...
, he attended a 1979 poetry festival in Belgium, after which he became the recipient of several
scholarship
A scholarship is a form of Student financial aid, financial aid awarded to students for further education. Generally, scholarships are awarded based on a set of criteria such as academic merit, Multiculturalism, diversity and inclusion, athleti ...
s and invitations.
He published two other Romanian books: his correspondence with Radu Stanca, as ''Un roman epistolar'' ("A Novel in Letters"), in 1978,
and the collected essays volume ''Alte însemnări critice'' ("Some Other Critical Records") in 1980.
However, Ion Negoiţescu spent the early 1980s abroad, and, from 1982 to 1983, lived in
Cologne
Cologne ( ; ; ) is the largest city of the States of Germany, German state of North Rhine-Westphalia and the List of cities in Germany by population, fourth-most populous city of Germany with nearly 1.1 million inhabitants in the city pr ...
, West Germany, and lectured in Romanian literature at the
University of Münster
The University of Münster (, until 2023 , WWU) is a public research university located in the city of Münster, North Rhine-Westphalia in Germany.
With more than 43,000 students and over 120 fields of study in 15 departments, it is Germany's ...
.
During his brief returns to Romania, he was a target for attacks in the
national communist press, led at the time by writer
Eugen Barbu and his ''
Săptămîna'' magazine.
In 1983, Negoiţescu decided to formalize his defection, settling in
Munich
Munich is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria, Germany. As of 30 November 2024, its population was 1,604,384, making it the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg. Munich is the largest city in Germany that is no ...
.
He became a contributor to Radio Free Europe, as well as to
Deutsche Welle
(; "German Wave"), commonly shortened to DW (), is a German state-funded television network, state-owned international broadcaster funded by the Federal Government of Germany. The service is available in 32 languages. DW's satellite tele ...
,
[ Adina Diniţoiu]
"Ion Negoiţescu - vocea şi textul"
in ''Observator Cultural
''Observator Cultural'' (meaning "The Cultural Observer" in English) is a weekly literary magazine based in Bucharest, Romania
Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern and Southeast ...
'', Nr. 26/2000 BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...
and several diaspora magazines.
He was editor of two literary magazines, ''Caietul de Literatură''
and the
Bad Ditzenbach
Bad Ditzenbach ( Swabian: ''Ditzebach'') is a municipality in the district of Göppingen in Baden-Württemberg in southern Germany.
History
The townships of Ditzenbach, , and were, until German mediatization in 1806, possessions of the House of ...
-based ''Dialog'',
as well as Radio Free Europe programmer.
Enlisting the collaboration of various exiled co-nationals, ''Dialog'' published Negoiţescu's articles on authors in and outside Romania (among them Agopian,
Bedros Horasangian,
Mircea Nedelciu
Mircea Nedelciu (; November 12, 1950 – July 12, 1999) was a Romanian short-story writer, novelist, essayist and literary critic, one of the leading exponents of the ''Optzeciști'' generation in Literature of Romania, Romanian letters. The auth ...
,
Radu Petrescu
Radu Marian Petrescu (born 12 November 1982) is a Romanian football referee who officiates in the Liga I. He has been a FIFA referee since 2012, and is ranked as a UEFA first category referee.
Refereeing career
In 2007, Petrescu began officiati ...
and
Dumitru Ţepeneag). Together with other Romanian acquaintances who had been expelled from or fled Romania (Călinescu, Nemoianu, Raicu and Vianu among them), he was also a member of the editorial college for ''Agora'', a United States-based magazine founded by poet and dissident
Dorin Tudoran
Dorin Tudoran (born June 30, 1945) is a Romanian poet, essayist, journalist, and dissident. A resident of the United States since 1985, he has authored more than fifteen books of poetry, essays, and interviews.
Biography
Early life
Born in T ...
with support from the
National Endowment for Democracy
The National Endowment for Democracy (NED) is a quasi-autonomous non-governmental organization in the United States founded in 1983 with the stated aim of advancing democracy worldwide and counter communism, communist influence abroad, by prom ...
.
Final years and death
Recognition of Negoiţescu's contribution in Romania was restored by the
1989 Revolution. As early as 1990,
Editura Dacia published his ''În cunoştinţă de cauză'' ("With Full Knowledge"), grouping his anti-communist essays written abroad.
[Albu, p.87-88][ Mircea Martin]
"Cultura română între comunism şi naţionalism (VII)"
, in ''Revista 22
''Revista 22'' (''22 Magazine'') is a Romanian weekly magazine, issued by the Group for Social Dialogue and focused mainly on politics and culture.
History and profile
''Revista 22'' was started in 1990. The first edition of the magazine was prin ...
'', Nr. 692, June 2003 The literary synthesis he had announced in 1968 was eventually published by
Editura Minerva
Editura Minerva is one of the largest publishing houses in Romania. Located in Bucharest, it is known, among other things, for publishing classic Romanian literature, children's books, and scientific books.
The company was founded in Bucharest in ...
in 1991.
Titled ''Istoria literaturii române'' ("The History of Romanian Literature"), it was still incomplete, and only covered the 1800–1945 period.
Based in
reunified Germany after 1989, Negoiţescu was writing his volume of memoirs, which he believed would be regarded as his masterpiece, and on which he worked intensely.
He maintained contact with the Romanian literary scene, and was notably interviewed by his younger colleague
Marta Petreu.
During one such encounter, he confessed his fear of dying before completing work on ''Straja dragonilor''.
Hospitalized for a long interval,
the Romanian writer died in Munich at age 71.
His body was cremated, and his ashes taken back to Romania, where they buried at a cemetery in central Cluj.
He had managed to complete only two chapters of his intended memoirs, published later by Petreu and
Ion Vartic
An ion () is an atom or molecule with a net electrical charge. The charge of an electron is considered to be negative by convention and this charge is equal and opposite to the charge of a proton, which is considered to be positive by convent ...
as ''Straja dragonilor'' ("Guarding the Dragons", ''
Biblioteca Apostrof'', 1994).
[Manea, p.168] Three other writings saw print in the period immediately after his death: the postscript to ''Istoria...'', titled ''Scriitori contemporani'' ("Contemporary Writers");
the diary and memoir ''Ora oglinzilor'' ("The Hour of Mirrors", 1997);
[ Florin Rogojan]
"Reflectari identitare în pictura şi literatura Ştefan Luchian şi Ion Negoiţescu"
, in ''Caietele Echinox'', Vol. 2, 2002, at the Babeş-Bolyai University'
Center for Imagination Studies
and his collected letters to critic
Sami Damian, titled ''Dialoguri după tăcere'' ("Dialogues after Silence", 1998).
His work as an anthologist, dating back to the 1950s, also saw print under Regman's direction: ''De la Dosoftei la Ştefan Aug. Doinaş'' ("From
Dosoftei to Ştefan Aug
stinDoinaş", Editura Dacia, 1997).
Literary contributions
Style and context
Owing to the political persecutions he was subject to for much of his life, Ion Negoiţescu's literary career mostly resulted in scattered and incomplete works. Literary historian
Alex. Ştefănescu compares the overall effect to "a room searched by the Securitate and left a mess."
Noting the same defining characteristic of incompleteness, literary critic
Bogdan Creţu mentions Negoiţescu's inconsistency as an alternative cause: "he was a man of great projects which, as a rule, he did not manage to complete."
Despite finding fault in this tendency, Creţu rates the author as "the most talented" among the Sibiu Circle critics, and "one of the most gifted critics we have ever had."
The value of his contribution was linked by various commentators with Negoiţescu's approach to literature and, in particular, his personal appreciation of beauty. Such distinctive traits were first discussed by Lovinescu in his 1943 article. Comparing Negoiţescu to both Eminescu and
Percy Bysshe Shelley
Percy Bysshe Shelley ( ; 4 August 1792 – 8 July 1822) was an English writer who is considered one of the major English Romantic poets. A radical in his poetry as well as in his political and social views, Shelley did not achieve fame durin ...
, the ''Sburătorul'' theorist insisted on discussing his young disciple's appearance as an exterior sign of literary finesse: "A fine, feminine,
androgynous
Androgyny is the possession of both masculine and feminine characteristics. Androgyny may be expressed with regard to biological sex or gender expression.
When ''androgyny'' refers to mixed biological sex characteristics in humans, it often r ...
; delicacy, shyness, quickly alarmed by some sort of bashfulness betrayed by discreet shades of
carmine
Carmine ()also called cochineal (when it is extracted from the Cochineal, cochineal insect), cochineal extract, crimson Lake pigment, lake, or carmine lake is a pigment of a bright-red color obtained from the aluminium coordination complex, compl ...
. And over all this appearance, a mask of reverie".
Creţu sees Negoiţescu's career as being consumed by "
romantic gestures or enthusiastic drives, hardly tempered by the prodigious culture of this oversensitive, never matured,
dandy
A dandy is a man who places particular importance upon physical appearance and personal grooming, refined language and leisurely hobbies. A dandy could be a self-made man both in person and ''persona'', who emulated the aristocratic style of l ...
."
Referring to their collaboration in the Sibiu Circle during the late 1940s, Balotă however noted that Negoiţescu was an outspoken critic of those who valued beauty over message, being as such in line with the group's "ambiguous
aestheticism
Aestheticism (also known as the aesthetic movement) was an art movement in the late 19th century that valued the appearance of literature, music, fonts and the arts over their functions. According to Aestheticism, art should be produced to b ...
". According to Alex. Ştefănescu, Negoiţescu, a "solitary and misunderstood" figure, approached his mission more as an "
accursed poet" than a researcher, and found in literature "a drug" to "inject in his veins".
In Ştefănescu's view, this fundamental trait, like Negoiţescu's homosexuality, was incompatible with both the "forceful brutishness" of communism and the "prude" nature of Romanian society.
Novelist and critic
Norman Manea referred to "the exemplary nature of
egoiţescu'scase", as evidence that, contrary to popular opinion, the quality of one's literature "does not arrive from the ethic to the aesthetic, but the other way around." In his assessment, Negoiţescu was "a minority member, not just an erotic one, but a chosen person, personifying the burning conditioning, truly intrinsic,
..between freedom and beauty, not just between liberty and morality".
[Manea, p.167] Similarly,
Matei Călinescu
Matei Alexe Călinescu (June 15, 1934 – June 24, 2009) was a Romanian literary critic and professor of comparative literature at Indiana University Bloomington, Indiana University, in Bloomington, Indiana.
Biography
Călinescu was born in ...
recalled being "fascinated" by "his vigorous '
decadent
Decadence was a late-19th-century movement emphasizing the need for sensationalism, egocentricity, and bizarre, artificial, perverse, and exotic sensations and experiences. By extension, it may refer to a decline in art, literature, science, ...
' aestheticism which was however paradoxically doubled by a major moral intransigence in matters of art and artistic truth".
He believed Negoiţescu's artistic vision to feature "a hidden moral edge", one occasionally turning back "on himself", and making Negoiţescu "one of the major ethical figures in
Romanian culture
The culture of Romania is an umbrella term used to encapsulate the ideas, customs and social behaviours of the people of Romania that developed due to the country's distinct geopolitical history and evolution. It is theorized that Romanians an ...
." A similar verdict was provided by
Ion Vianu
Ion Vianu (15 April 1934 – 20 June 2024) was a Romanian writer and psychiatry, psychiatrist, who lived in Switzerland from 1977. He was the son of literary critic Tudor Vianu and his wife, Elena Vianu, Elena.
Vianu first studied classical phi ...
: "his proud demeanor, the rigorous aestheticism he professed were the expression of an extreme exigence, as expanded on the artistic level as it was on the moral one."
[Călinescu & Vianu, p.406] Such aspects prompted Bogdan Creţu to suggest that Negoiţescu's work was primarily characterized by a "critical consciousness", made possible by his "specific
ndtragic
histrionism": "although it caused him great distress during his lifetime
.. it compelled him to become, no matter what the risks, consistent with himself; that is to say honest, enthusiastic, genuine."
As negative consequences of Negoiţescu's aestheticism, Ştefănescu cites his "excess of solemnity" and the "excessive shyness" of his critical essays, as well as a lack of determination and a tendency toward "
autosuggestion
Autosuggestion is a psychological technique related to the placebo effect, developed by pharmacist Émile Coué at the beginning of the 20th century. It is a form of self-induced suggestion in which individuals guide their own thoughts, feelings ...
".
Likewise, writer
Andrei Terian saw Negoiţescu as lacking a critic's "literary head", being instead an "avid consumer of art" with "an immense sensual appetite".
In reference to the issue of critic versus artist, Ştefănescu argues: "He would provide contradictory verdicts. He would most often allow himself to be guided by the will to experience a moment of aesthetic beatitude. Whenever he lacked literary
heroin
Heroin, also known as diacetylmorphine and diamorphine among other names, is a morphinan opioid substance synthesized from the Opium, dried latex of the Papaver somniferum, opium poppy; it is mainly used as a recreational drug for its eupho ...
, he would settle for a weak text
.. He loved depths so much that he invented them."
He and other commentators assess that Negoiţescu's self-avowed love for literature and books as objects was almost physical in nature.
Early works and ''Euphorion'' ideals
A substantial and precocious element of Negoiţescu's critical work was constituted by his focus on
Mateiu Caragiale
Mateiu Ion Caragiale (; – 17 January 1936), also credited as Matei or Matheiu, or in the antiquated version Mateiŭ,Sorin Antohi"Romania and the Balkans. From Geocultural Bovarism to Ethnic Ontology" in ''Tr@nsit online'', Institut für die Wi ...
. Bogdan Creţu, who notes the enthusiastic reception Negoiţescu granted to Caragiale's poetic work in his very first published essay, believes there is an intrinsic connection between the two figures at the level of aestheticism.
According to Ion Vianu, the "beautiful, pale and distant" Negoiţescu brought to mind Aubrey de Vere, the "morbid aristocrat" in Caragiale's novella ''Remember''. Negoiţescu's lifelong appreciation of Caragiale's work, specifically his claim that ''
Craii de Curtea-Veche'' novel was a masterpiece formed around a "secret architecture", was contested by literary critic and
Anglicist
English studies (or simply, English) is an academic discipline taught in primary, secondary, and post-secondary education in English-speaking countries. This is not to be confused with English taught as a foreign language, which is a dis ...
Mircea Mihăieş. Mihăieş described ''Craii...'' a sample of "pretentious
kitsch
''Kitsch'' ( ; loanword from German) is a term applied to art and design that is perceived as Naivety, naïve imitation, overly eccentric, gratuitous or of banal Taste (sociology), taste.
The modern avant-garde traditionally opposed kitsch ...
", and accused his various colleagues of having artificially increased Caragiale's cultural rating.
By 1945, Creţu argues, Negoiţescu had reached his creative maturity, primarily by perfecting the "
deconstruction
In philosophy, deconstruction is a loosely-defined set of approaches to understand the relationship between text and meaning. The concept of deconstruction was introduced by the philosopher Jacques Derrida, who described it as a turn away from ...
" of texts making the object of his reviews.
In particular, Creţu sees as outstanding the young critic's verdicts on George Călinescu's novel ''
Enigma Otiliei
Enigma may refer to:
*Riddle, someone or something that is mysterious or puzzling
Biology
*ENIGMA, a class of gene in the LIM domain
Computing and technology
* Enigma (company), a New York–based data-technology startup
*Enigma machine, a famil ...
'' (where Negoiţescu had identified, probably ahead of all other commentators, a level of
parody
A parody is a creative work designed to imitate, comment on, and/or mock its subject by means of satire, satirical or irony, ironic imitation. Often its subject is an Originality, original work or some aspect of it (theme/content, author, style, e ...
running underneath the formal borrowings from
Honoré de Balzac
Honoré de Balzac ( , more commonly ; ; born Honoré Balzac; 20 May 1799 – 18 August 1850) was a French novelist and playwright. The novel sequence ''La Comédie humaine'', which presents a panorama of post-Napoleonic French life, is ...
) and on the poems of
George Bacovia
George Bacovia (; the pen name of Gheorghe Vasiliu ; – 22 May 1957) was a Romanian symbolist poet. While he initially belonged to the local Symbolist movement, launched as a poet by Alexandru Macedonski with the poem and poetry collection (" ...
(compared by Negoiţescu to the overall artistic standards of the
local Symbolist circles, with which Bacovia had been formally affiliated).
Written in parallel, ''Povestea tristă a lui Ramon Ocg'', described by Ştefănescu as marking Negoiţescu's brief affiliation with
Surrealism
Surrealism is an art movement, art and cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists aimed to allow the unconscious mind to express itself, often resulting in the depiction of illogical or dreamlike s ...
,
romanticizes the life of Mexican film star
Ramón Novarro, with emphasis on Navarro's homosexuality.
In Bogdan Creţu's definition, the book shows Negoiţescu's commitment to anti-fascism, and especially his use of
satire
Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of exposin ...
against "the fascist ideology, with all its abuses."
Creţu also notes that the printing of ''Povestea tristă...'' was financed with money Negoiţescu had made by selling his leather boots, part of a Guardist's
paramilitary
A paramilitary is a military that is not a part of a country's official or legitimate armed forces. The Oxford English Dictionary traces the use of the term "paramilitary" as far back as 1934.
Overview
Though a paramilitary is, by definiti ...
attire.
''Euphorion'', Negoiţescu's failed project for a literary magazine, was also his stated attempt at producing a
modernist
Modernism was an early 20th-century movement in literature, visual arts, and music that emphasized experimentation, abstraction, and Subjectivity and objectivity (philosophy), subjective experience. Philosophy, politics, architecture, and soc ...
literary manifesto. Placing his references in
German Romanticism
German Romanticism () was the dominant intellectual movement of German-speaking countries in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, influencing philosophy, aesthetics, literature, and criticism. Compared to English Romanticism, the German vari ...
and
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Johann Wolfgang (von) Goethe (28 August 1749 – 22 March 1832) was a German polymath who is widely regarded as the most influential writer in the German language. His work has had a wide-ranging influence on Western literature, literary, Polit ...
's ''
Faust
Faust ( , ) is the protagonist of a classic German folklore, German legend based on the historical Johann Georg Faust (). The erudite Faust is highly successful yet dissatisfied with his life, which leads him to make a deal with the Devil at a ...
'', the critic found the tragic figure of Euphorion (in ''
Faust: Part Two'') as an ideal image of "all things new on a spiritual level".
The core idea, occasionally paraphrased as ''Euphorionism'', was defined by Negoiţescu himself in terms of an
Apollonian and Dionysian
The Apollonian and the Dionysian are philosophical and literary concepts represented by a duality between the figures of Apollo and Dionysus from Greek mythology. Its popularization is widely attributed to the work '' The Birth of Tragedy'' by Fr ...
opposition, with a preference for the former term, and in combination with "modern Faustianism, that is to say dynamism, imprudent haste."
Seeing in Euphorion a victim of preference for the chaotically modern elements of his own dual nature, and indicating that Goethe had initially intended to give his character a happier and more balanced existence, the theorist stated: "I shall propose as a goal that initial Euphorion
.. All contemporary Romantic decadence, the signs of crisis and disaster, such as
Naturalism and Surrealism etc., are consequences of that tear within Euphorion's being. We ought to propose the Goethian restoration."
Literary historian
Ion Simuţ, who theorizes a separation between the Circle's ideology and Negoiţescu's own ''Euphorionism'', also notes that, having earlier used Eugen Lovinescu to emancipate himself from Blaga and traditionalism, the young critic and all those who agreed, weary of seeming too detached from their roots, were invoking Goethe as "an antidote to Lovinescianism, that is to say against sheltering oneself in aesthetics."
Simuţ writes that, unlike the Circle's ideological tenets, the newer program was "ambiguous, idealistic, likely to be approximated, not clearly defined of made concrete".
Overall, Negoiţescu's subsequent work of the time was divided between the influences of Lovinescu and George Călinescu: commenting on this verdict and paraphrasing a statement made by
Ştefan Augustin Doinaş, Terian argued that the two mentors had become (respectively) "the cherished maestro" and "the hated maestro" to Negoiţescu.
Also according to Terian, this stance echoed Lovinescu's own ambiguous pronouncements about his rival Călinescu's work.
Identifying ''Viitorul literaturii române?'' as a watershed moment, at which Negoiţescu found himself disagreeing with both his mentors' core beliefs: on one hand, Călinescu's argument that Romanian literature rested on a peasant culture; on the other, Lovinescu's conclusion that Romania's cultural tendencies did not suggest any stylistic traits that were not also spread among similar civilizations.
''Poezia lui Eminescu'' and ''Istoria literaturii române''
Seen by Alex. Ştefănescu as both Negoiţescu's only complete work and "a sort of critical poem",
''Poezia lui Eminescu'' became one of the most celebrated writings of its author's entire career. Literary historian and columnist
Mircea Iorgulescu described the work as a "crucial moment in Eminescian exegesis", equaled only by George Călinescu's 1932 study ''Viaţa lui Mihai Eminescu'' ("The Life of Mihai Eminescu") and
Ilina Gregori's 2002 ''Studii literare'' ("Literary Studies").
Iorgulescu argues that, although structured as "a meager pamphlet of a little more than two hundred pages", the book "radically changed the understanding of Eminescu and his poetry".
Overall, the text neglected Eminescu's anthumous poetry and focused on poems only published after the subject's death. It discussed their somber sleep-related imagery, in particular the presence of
androgynous
Androgyny is the possession of both masculine and feminine characteristics. Androgyny may be expressed with regard to biological sex or gender expression.
When ''androgyny'' refers to mixed biological sex characteristics in humans, it often r ...
angels, their recurring references to darkness, and their various allusions to the temptation of sin.
[ Sami Damian, "Cine a fost Eminescu?", in '' Idei în Dialog'', November 2008] These themes, commonly ignored by Negoiţescu's critical predecessors, were argued to have revealed in Eminescu a "
Plutonian Plutonian may refer to:
*Plutonian, of or relating to the astronomical object Pluto
*The Plutonian, a character in ''Irredeemable''
*A mineral from Pluto (as well as a species) on the TV series "Rick and Morty
''Rick and Morty'' is an Americ ...
" artist.
Ştefănescu believes that Negoiţescu had intended to elude that part of Eminescu's work that had become widely accessible to a "motley" public, and instead focused the remaining secrets.
The result of such studies, Ştefănescu proposes, has "the flickering—and blinding—unity of
magnesium
Magnesium is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol Mg and atomic number 12. It is a shiny gray metal having a low density, low melting point and high chemical reactivity. Like the other alkaline earth metals (group 2 ...
flames", its intensity evoking "a maddening experience, leaving the experimenter to reemerge with his hair all white."
In Ştefănescu's view, the passion felt by the exegete is the
homoerotic
Homoeroticism is sexual attraction between members of the same sex, including both male–male and female–female attraction. The concept differs from the concept of homosexuality: it refers specifically to the desire itself, which can be tempor ...
equivalent of a physical affair. He writes: "Nobody, not even
Veronica Micle, has loved
minescuas intensely and as tragically as Ion Negoiţescu."
This dissenting and highly personal view clashed with both critical orthodoxy and other contemporary reevaluations of Eminescu. Negoiţescu's text clashed with the conclusions drawn by Matei Călinescu's in his 1964 book on Eminescu's late poetry (which had mainly focused on the relative impact of
Schopenhauerian aesthetics). Negoiţescu's concentration on Eminescu's posthumous pieces was intensely disputed in later years by literary historian
Nicolae Manolescu
Nicolae Manolescu (; 27 November 1939 – 23 March 2024) was a Romanian literary critic. Elected a corresponding member of the Romanian Academy in 1997, he was upgraded to titular member in 2013.
Life and career
Manolescu was born in Râmnicu ...
, who regarded this approach as exclusivist.
[ ]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 l ...
"Istoria critică şi capriciile memoriei canonice (II)"
, in ''Cuvântul
''Cuvântul'' (, meaning "The Word") was a daily newspaper, published by philosopher Nae Ionescu in Bucharest, Romania, from 1926 to 1934, and again in 1938. It was primarily noted for progressively adopting a far-right and fascist agenda, an ...
'', Nr. 382
''Istoria literaturii române'' is seen by Ştefănescu as "not just unfinished, but also never started": Negoiţescu had only published what was supposed to be its middle part (planning to discuss post-1800 literature in an addenda to a second volume, alongside 20th century works).
Written earlier, was cited by the same critic as an example of Negoiţescu's inconsistency and lack of structure, given that it dealt with "authors who are unlinked to each other": Doinaş,
Dan Botta,
Mircea Ciobanu,
Florin Gabrea,
Mircea Ivănescu
Mircea Ivănescu (; March 26, 1931 – July 21, 2011) was a Romanian poet, writer and translator, and a forerunner of Romanian postmodernism, which was characteristic of the 1980s. His translations from global literature into Romanian include Jame ...
,
Marin Mincu,
Virgil Nemoianu,
Toma Pavel,
Sebastian Reichmann,
Sorin Titel,
Daniel Turcea and
Tudor Vasiliu.
Ştefănescu added: "Ion Negoiţescu had the negligence to promise that he would write a history of literature and then, up to the end of his life, felt himself harassed by the interrogative expectation of those around him, as if in the presence of hungry wolf mouths. He sought justifications for delaying work
..and ultimately fashioned, out of scattered texts (some of exceptional value as essays), something that resembles a history of literature".
Himself a literary historian,
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 l ...
deemed Negoiţescu's writing a "rough sketch", also noting that it follows the subjective and "
impressionistic
Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by visible brush strokes, open Composition (visual arts), composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage ...
" tradition of mainstream Romanian literary criticism.
[ ]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 l ...
"Istoria critică şi capriciile memoriei canonice (I)"
, in ''Cuvântul
''Cuvântul'' (, meaning "The Word") was a daily newspaper, published by philosopher Nae Ionescu in Bucharest, Romania, from 1926 to 1934, and again in 1938. It was primarily noted for progressively adopting a far-right and fascist agenda, an ...
'', Nr. 381 This trend, Cernat believes, linked Negoiţescu to the
interwar
In the history of the 20th century, the interwar period, also known as the interbellum (), lasted from 11 November 1918 to 1 September 1939 (20 years, 9 months, 21 days) – from the end of World War I (WWI) to the beginning of World War II ( ...
authors of critical syntheses (George Călinescu and Eugen Lovinescu), as well as with his junior Manolescu.
In this definition, the approach, which Cernat found debatable, rests on its partisans' belief that criticism "does not represent a 'science', but a form of creation in the vicinity of art, which does not reject rigor and erudition".
Cernat contends that the application of an "impressionistic" approach in Negoiţescu's 1967 book produced "extravagant" results.
A similar point of view is held by Andrei Terian. He calls the work a "semi-failure", and, rejecting the notion that such problems were practical, arising from Negoiţescu's lack of access to the primary sources, finds ''Istoria...'' as symptomatic for its author's inconsistencies.
In support of this interpretation, Terian cites Negoiţescu's decision to grant the lesser-known novelist
Dinu Nicodin a prominent entry in the book.
One of the main purposes of ''Istoria literaturii române'', as stated by Negoiţescu's preface to his work, was to uncover the connections between the specificity of
Romanian culture
The culture of Romania is an umbrella term used to encapsulate the ideas, customs and social behaviours of the people of Romania that developed due to the country's distinct geopolitical history and evolution. It is theorized that Romanians an ...
("what we Romanians are and how we stand our ground when confronting history") and the wider
European
European, or Europeans, may refer to:
In general
* ''European'', an adjective referring to something of, from, or related to Europe
** Ethnic groups in Europe
** Demographics of Europe
** European cuisine, the cuisines of Europe and other West ...
or
Western context.
[Albu, p.90] The final version was also a statement against the tenets of
national communism
National communism is a term describing various forms in which Marxism–Leninism and socialism has been adopted and/or implemented by leaders in different countries using aspects of nationalism or national identity to form a policy independent ...
, asserting Negoiţescu's belief that Romanian literature did not precede the birth of modern literature, and that it had developed as an "imitation of
Western literature
Western literature, also known as European literature, is the literature written in the context of Western culture in the languages of Europe, and is shaped by the periods in which they were conceived, with each period containing prominent weste ...
".
Negoiţescu therefore acknowledged that such a project could only be brought to its completion outside Romania, in a land touched by "the dawn of liberty".
Although incomplete, the book opened various new paths in critical commentary. It investigated the early history of Romania's
erotic literature
Erotic literature comprises fictional and factual stories and accounts of eros (concept), eros (passionate, romantic or sexual relationships) intended to arouse similar feelings in readers. This contrasts erotica, which focuses more specifically ...
, and included a hypothesis that the erotic poems of
Costache Conachi
Costache Conachi (; b. September 14/25, 1778, Munteni, Țigănești, Tecuci County, Moldavia – d. February 4/16, 1849, Munteni, Țigănești, Tecuci County, Moldavia, actually Galați County, Romania) was a Romanian boyar, politician, poet and w ...
imitated ''Ode à Priape'', a work by the
Frenchman
French people () are a nation primarily located in Western Europe that share a common French culture, history, and language, identified with the country of France.
The French people, especially the native speakers of langues d'oïl from nort ...
Alexis Piron
Alexis Piron (9 July 1689 – 21 January 1773) was a French epigrammatist and dramatist.
Life
Alexis Piron was born in Dijon, where his father, Aimé Piron, was an apothecary. Piron senior wrote verse in the Burgundian language. Alexis began ...
. The postscript ''Scriitori contemporani'' was designed to complete his global analysis of Romanian literature, and gave ample coverage to the
Romanian diaspora
The Romanian diaspora is the Romanians, ethnically Romanian population outside Romania and Moldova. The concept does not usually include the ethnic Romanians who live as natives in nearby states, chiefly those Romanians who live in Ukraine, Hun ...
authors (although, critic Mihaela Albu notes, it failed to include authors from the regions of
Bessarabia
Bessarabia () is a historical region in Eastern Europe, bounded by the Dniester river on the east and the Prut river on the west. About two thirds of Bessarabia lies within modern-day Moldova, with the Budjak region covering the southern coa ...
and
Northern Bukovina
Bukovina or ; ; ; ; , ; see also other languages. is a historical region at the crossroads of Central and Eastern Europe. It is located on the northern slopes of the central Eastern Carpathians and the adjoining plains, today divided betwe ...
). Elaborating on his assessment of "impressionist" criticism, Cernat insisted on Negoiţescu's habit of structuring the chapters around only select parts of an author's contribution, the results of which, he believed, were uneven in scientific value.
''Straja dragonilor'' and ''Ora oglinzilor''
Negoiţescu's main memoir, ''Straja dragonilor'', has drawn attention for its frank depiction of precocious sexuality in general and homosexual experimentation in particular. Researcher Michaela Mudure argues that, by openly defining masculinity in non-heterosexual terms, the text is one of the "few and notable" exceptions within the "
androcentric" literature of
Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe is a subregion of the Europe, European continent. As a largely ambiguous term, it has a wide range of geopolitical, geographical, ethnic, cultural and socio-economic connotations. Its eastern boundary is marked by the Ural Mountain ...
an cultures. According to Alex. Ştefănescu's assessment of the book: "It is for the first time that a Romanian author analyzes himself with a soberness taken to its last consequences, with even a sort of cruelty, producing confessions that others would not produce even under torture."
A similar verdict is suggested by literary critic Adriana Stan: "The calm of extracting moral senses lacks
n Negoiţescu and his authenticist challenge to 'say it all' almost precipitates itself into an
exhibitionism
Exhibitionism is the act of exposing in a public or semi-public context one's intimate parts – for example, the breasts, genitals or buttocks. As used in psychology and psychiatry, it is substantially different. It refers to an uncontrolla ...
of a
masochistic and anti-erotic nature."
This type of "insensitivity" is likened by Ştefănescu with that of "a cadaver on a dissection table", or "a statue that we can examine from all sides".
The critic finds the work more daring than any possible analogy in local letters. He compares it to
Miron Radu Paraschivescu __NOTOC__
Miron Radu Paraschivescu (; 2 October 1911 – 17 February 1971) was a Romanian poet, essayist, journalist, and translator.
Born in Zimnicea, Teleorman County, he went to high school in Ploiești, after which he studied fine arts, first ...
's ''Jurnalul unui cobai'' ("The Diary of a Guinea Pig"), which is however "unforgiving" only with its author's acquaintances; to
Livius Ciocârlie's diaries, which nevertheless "remain with the limits of literary decency"; to
Mircea Cărtărescu
Mircea Cărtărescu (; born 1 June 1956) is a Romanian novelist, poet, short-story writer, literary critic, and essayist.
Biography
Born in Bucharest in 1956, he attended Cantemir Vodă National College during the early 1970s. During his sc ...
's ''Travesti'' novel, which discusses
transsexualism
A transsexual person is someone who experiences a gender identity that is inconsistent with their assigned sex, and desires to permanently transition to the sex or gender with which they identify, usually seeking medical assistance (incl ...
in metaphors that make it "less shocking."
The same overall comparison was made by critic
Ioana Pârvulescu
Ioana Pârvulescu (born 1960) is a Romanian writer. She was born in Brașov and studied at the University of Bucharest. She graduated in 1983, and went on to complete a PhD in literature in 1999. She teaches modern literature at the same universit ...
, who found ''Straja dragonilor'' to evade the tradition of Romanian autobiographical literature, in that it was freed from "the obsession of the image", without courting the reader's sympathy.
She adds: "Approaching death is a guarantee for a sincerity of the best quality. The only danger that stalks among the pages is that of time running out, and this provides
..chaotic impatience and hastening, like the agglomeration of the last sand grains inside the neck of an
hourglass
An hourglass (or sandglass, sand timer, or sand clock) is a device used to measure the passage of time. It comprises two glass bulbs connected vertically by a narrow neck that allows a regulated flow of a substance (historically sand) from the ...
."
The episodes in Negoiţescu's book portray the boy as a seeker of promiscuous sexual experiences, who enjoys the advances of grownup males (such as his father's
orderly
In healthcare, an orderly (also known as a ward assistant, nurse assistant or healthcare assistant) is a hospital attendant whose job consists of assisting medical and nursing staff with various nursing and medical interventions. These duties a ...
), but also experiments with girls his own age.
In one narrative sequence, the author recounts how, finding himself inside a dark cinema, he satisfied his urges by fondling the genitalia of an unknown man sitting next to him, thus taking a gamble with public condemnation of a homosexual acts.
Such experiences, Stan proposes, reveal the protagonist-narrator to have been "
hedonistic
Hedonism is a family of philosophical views that prioritize pleasure. Psychological hedonism is the theory that all human behavior is motivated by the desire to maximize pleasure and minimize pain. As a form of egoism, it suggests that peopl ...
", "Dionysian" and "
histrionic", characterized by an unwillingness in taking critical distance from "the object of his contemplation", and displaying "a psychology of the excess".
Alex. Ştefănescu agrees with Negoiţescu's own belief in the book's narrative qualities, arguing that ''Straja dragonilor'' is, after ''Poezia lui Eminescu'', "the best of all that this feverish and uneven author has ever written".
The same commentator commends the volume it for displaying a form of sincerity that was ultimately "conquered through culture and the experience of writing", resulting in "another level" of a memoir.
He writes: "All is beautiful in Ion Negoiţescu's autobiography, even that which is ugly.
..A reader who is purely spurred on by a prosaic curiosity will find himself disappointed and will abandon it (like the sexually obsessed will abandon a book by
Freud
Sigmund Freud ( ; ; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for evaluating and treating pathologies seen as originating from conflicts in t ...
)."
In Pârvulescu's view: "Although they break all sorts of taboos,
..Negoiţescu's memoirs are so well written that they never veer into vulgarity or obscenity."
Likewise, Adriana Stan esteemed the book "singular in our literature" and its author's "capital work".
Also according to Ştefănescu, readers who follow the account of young Negoiţescu's spontaneous sexual act at the cinema will sympathize with the protagonist, and even "breathe a sigh of relief" to note that his advances were not rejected.
The same reviewer finds another outstanding quality of the book in "the vast depiction of emotional states", which he believes comparable to sections of
Marcel Proust
Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust ( ; ; 10 July 1871 – 18 November 1922) was a French novelist, literary critic, and essayist who wrote the novel (in French – translated in English as ''Remembrance of Things Past'' and more r ...
's ''
Remembrance of Things Past
''In Search of Lost Time'' (), first translated into English as ''Remembrance of Things Past'', and sometimes referred to in French as ''La Recherche'' (''The Search''), is a novel in seven volumes by French author Marcel Proust. This early twen ...
''. In one such fragment, he argues, Negoiţescu presents him child self as "a strange
Pygmalion", helping his own mother get dressed for a ball and obsessing over every detail in her appearance.
The "Proustian" nature is also highlighted by Stan, who argues: "the recollection performed by the grownup ego has therefore too little in common with a regular, constructed and directed writer's diary."
Additionally, Pârvulescu sees an essential quality of the book in its depiction of
Transylvania
Transylvania ( or ; ; or ; Transylvanian Saxon dialect, Transylvanian Saxon: ''Siweberjen'') is a List of historical regions of Central Europe, historical and cultural region in Central Europe, encompassing central Romania. To the east and ...
as both a prolongation of
Austria-Hungary
Austria-Hungary, also referred to as the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Dual Monarchy or the Habsburg Monarchy, was a multi-national constitutional monarchy in Central Europe#Before World War I, Central Europe between 1867 and 1918. A military ...
's "decadent greatness" and an area of
Balkan
The Balkans ( , ), corresponding partially with the Balkan Peninsula, is a geographical area in southeastern Europe with various geographical and historical definitions. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch throug ...
and
Levant
The Levant ( ) is the subregion that borders the Eastern Mediterranean, Eastern Mediterranean sea to the west, and forms the core of West Asia and the political term, Middle East, ''Middle East''. In its narrowest sense, which is in use toda ...
ine echoes, "the
Ischler cookies on the same table as the ''
qatayef
Qatayef or qata'if ( ) is an Arab cuisine, Arabic dessert. It is a type of sweet dumpling filled with cream or nuts, or a filled folded pancake with a thickness similar to a Scottish crumpet.
Etymology
The Arabic word ''qaṭaːyif'' () is der ...
''."
A section of ''Straja dragonilor'' is based strictly on an inventory of Negoiţescu's genealogy, with insight into his family history. The segment is however deemed "boring" by Ştefănescu, who notes that the names mentioned "do not mean anything to us", but nevertheless acknowledges the "chill" they evoke: "the writer, alerted by the premonition of death, wishes to save
..all things that he can remember about his forefathers."
''Straja dragonilor'' also includes first-hand detail on Negoiţescu's fascist episode, including the circumstances of his several contributions to the Iron Guardist press and the joy he experienced in late 1940, when the movement managed to assassinate historian and politician
Nicolae Iorga
Nicolae Iorga (17 January 1871 – 27 November 1940) was a historian, politician, literary critic, memoirist, Albanologist, poet and playwright. Co-founder (in 1910) of the Democratic Nationalist Party (PND), he served as a member of Parliament ...
.
The interval is explained by the memoirist as being related to his
identity crisis
In psychology, identity crisis is a stage in Erik Erikson's theory of personality development. This stage happens during adolescence. It is a period of deep reflection and examination of various perspectives on oneself.
The Erikson's stages of ps ...
: "I was being driven by a terrible vital demon, an unprecedented impulse for affirmation, an acute
individualism
Individualism is the moral stance, political philosophy, ideology, and social outlook that emphasizes the intrinsic worth of the individual. Individualists promote realizing one's goals and desires, valuing independence and self-reliance, and a ...
, maybe even an instinctual tendency for domination, all later curbed by my homosexuality, which imposed timidity on me, and eventually by the rigors of history".
Despite this particular frankness, Bogdan Creţu suggests, the book effectively minimized Negoiţescu's involvement with the fascist causes, by making them seem less relevant to his biography than they actually were.
Negoiţescu's other late contribution to the memoir genre was ''Ora oglinzilor'', which groups and rearranges fragments of a diary covering his life between the ages of 16 and 30, as well as
autofiction
Autofiction is, in literary criticism, a form of fictionalized autobiography. Definition
In autofiction, an author may decide to recount their life in the Third-person narrative, third person, to modify significant details and characters, use in ...
al pieces (as diaries of fictional characters named Paul and Damian) and
intertextual homages to French modernist author
André Gide
André Paul Guillaume Gide (; 22 November 1869 – 19 February 1951) was a French writer and author whose writings spanned a wide variety of styles and topics. He was awarded the 1947 Nobel Prize in Literature. Gide's career ranged from his begi ...
.
According to philologist Florin Rogojan, the full text "restores Negoiţescu's image as a personality about to be born, reflecting him in his own subjectivity of a being who places all his stakes on creativity."
In Rogojan's view, the key element in the volume is its author's confessed ability to "divide himself between the observer and the observed": "I have acquired something that all the people on this Earth ought to be envying.
..I am at once the modeler and the sheer matter I am modeling."
The book records the young author's own hierarchy of his personal projects, based on the manner in which they could impact on the outside world—from "my most important work so far", the diary, to planned (but never written) novels which were meant to celebrate his creative maturity.
Rogojan views the introduction of fictionalized elements as a basis for stating the "cruel truths" about Negoiţescu's life (the moral problems posed by his own homosexuality or the fear of losing artistic inspiration).
Civil society activism and political thought
General characteristics
According to literary historian
Mircea Martin, Ion Negoiţescu and his Sibiu Circle colleagues represented a larger faction of intellectuals who, once empowered by 1960s
liberalization
Liberalization or liberalisation (British English) is a broad term that refers to the practice of making laws, systems, or opinions less severe, usually in the sense of eliminating certain government regulations or restrictions. The term is used ...
and the prospect for resuming historical debates, voiced their support for
Europeanism
European values are the norms and values that Europeans are said to have in common, and which transcend national or state identities. In addition to helping promote European integration, this doctrine also provides the basis for analyses that cha ...
and
cosmopolitanism
Cosmopolitanism is the idea that all human beings are members of a single community. Its adherents are known as cosmopolitan or cosmopolite. Cosmopolitanism is both prescriptive and aspirational, believing humans can and should be " world citizen ...
. In Martin's definition, the diverse group includes others who "had passed through communist prisons" (
Adrian Marino,
Ovidiu Cotruş,
Alexandru Paleologu), alongside the disillusioned or reformed
Romanian Communist Party
The Romanian Communist Party ( ; PCR) was a communist party in Romania. The successor to the pro-Bolshevik wing of the Socialist Party of Romania, it gave an ideological endorsement to a communist revolution that would replace the social system ...
militants (
Savin Bratu,
Vera Călin,
Paul Cornea,
Ovid Crohmălniceanu,
Paul Georgescu
Paul Georgescu (; November 7, 1923 – October 15, 1989) was a Romanian literary critic, journalist, fiction writer and Communism, communist political figure. Remembered as both a main participant in the imposition of Socialist Realism in its Soc ...
,
Silvian Iosifescu) and a significant number of the younger writers who were only then making their debut.
[ Mircea Martin]
"Cultura română între comunism şi naţionalism (II)"
, in ''Revista 22
''Revista 22'' (''22 Magazine'') is a Romanian weekly magazine, issued by the Group for Social Dialogue and focused mainly on politics and culture.
History and profile
''Revista 22'' was started in 1990. The first edition of the magazine was prin ...
'', Nr. 660, October 2002 This community, he noted, was primarily reacting against the
ethnic nationalist and
protochronist ideologies promoted, within the limits defined by the communist regime, by such figures as
Paul Anghel,
Eugen Barbu,
Edgar Papu,
Mihai Ungheanu or
Dan Zamfirescu.
Similarly, Norman Manea placed Negoiţescu's public profile in relation with the aesthetic ideals of his work: "The indestructible attachment toward beauty and aesthetics has fortified the otherwise sober and frail being of the writer through times of Iron Guardist exultation, as well as through times of communist disarray and persecution.
..The ugliness, barbarity, vulgarity and stupidity into which the great
totalitarian
Totalitarianism is a political system and a form of government that prohibits opposition from political parties, disregards and outlaws the political claims of individual and group opposition to the state, and completely controls the public sph ...
setup quickly crumbles have proved themselves
..rejected by Beauty." Matei Călinescu mentioned his older friend's "internally proud awareness of his own genius", as manifested against such definitions of genius as were being favored by "communist cultural parochialism". Contrasting Negoiţescu's "aestheticism", "individualism" and "quasi-
anarchism
Anarchism is a political philosophy and Political movement, movement that seeks to abolish all institutions that perpetuate authority, coercion, or Social hierarchy, hierarchy, primarily targeting the state (polity), state and capitalism. A ...
" with the "gray, stiff and fear-impregnated everyday of communism", Călinescu also noted: "Nego's daily heroism was that of being himself, no matter what the consequences of this social preservation of his identity and the refusal to hide it." Such views, Ion Vianu adds, transformed Negoiţescu into "the perfect, exemplary victim of communism".
1940s transition
Before becoming a disciple of Lovinescu, the adolescent Negoiţescu viewed nationalism as a neutral quality, and even rated works he reviewed in accordance with their
patriotic
Patriotism is the feeling of love, devotion, and a sense of attachment to one's country or state. This attachment can be a combination of different feelings for things such as the language of one's homeland, and its ethnic, cultural, politic ...
discourse.
His articles of the time produced comparisons between the defunct Iron Guard founder
Corneliu Zelea Codreanu
Corneliu Zelea Codreanu (; 13 September 1899 – 30 November 1938), born Corneliu Zelinski and commonly known as Corneliu Codreanu, was a far-right Romanian politician, the founder and charismatic leader of the Iron Guard or ''The Legion of ...
and
Christ
Jesus ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, and many other names and titles, was a 1st-century Jewish preacher and religious leader. He is the Jesus in Christianity, central figure of Christianity, the M ...
, or state claims that the movement had symbolic roots in ancient history, with the
Dacians
The Dacians (; ; ) were the ancient Indo-European inhabitants of the cultural region of Dacia, located in the area near the Carpathian Mountains and west of the Black Sea. They are often considered a subgroup of the Thracians. This area include ...
and
Thracians
The Thracians (; ; ) were an Indo-European languages, Indo-European speaking people who inhabited large parts of Southeast Europe in ancient history.. "The Thracians were an Indo-European people who occupied the area that today is shared betwee ...
.
After the
National Legionary State
The National Legionary State () was a Totalitarianism, totalitarian Fascism, fascist regime which governed Kingdom of Romania, Romania for five months, from 14 September 1940 until its official dissolution on 14 February 1941. The regime was led ...
was replaced with
Ion Antonescu
Ion Antonescu (; ; – 1 June 1946) was a Romanian military officer and Mareșal (Romania), marshal who presided over two successive Romania during World War II, wartime dictatorships as Prime Minister of Romania, Prime Minister and ''Conduc� ...
's regime, the critic expressed his support for the country's alliance with
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German Reich, German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a Totalit ...
, for
Operation Barbarossa
Operation Barbarossa was the invasion of the Soviet Union by Nazi Germany and several of its European Axis allies starting on Sunday, 22 June 1941, during World War II. More than 3.8 million Axis troops invaded the western Soviet Union along ...
and war on the
Eastern Front, describing the promise of a "great future".
Manea stresses that, in later decades, the transformed Negoiţescu was able to use his youthful affiliation to fascism ("the traps set by exultation") as insight into other forms of political experimentation: "The experience of gregarious jubilation
reparedthe easily charmed novice to accumulate mistrust of the multitude". This critical distance, Manea argues, also helped the grownup writer identify the perils of communist-era "exultation and stupidity", and in particular of "complicity with the bloated and filthy Power".
[Manea, p.169] The "emotional genesis of Negoiţescu's ideas and thought" is also seen by Adriana Stan as a possible explanation for "the Iron Guardist episode", which she dismisses as "a conjectural accident of an adolescent too candid and cosmopolitan to nurture the symptoms of profound intolerance."
The Sibiu Circle's advocacy of Lovinescu's program attested the rejection of
far right
Far-right politics, often termed right-wing extremism, encompasses a range of ideologies that are marked by ultraconservatism, authoritarianism, ultranationalism, and Nativism (politics), nativism. This political spectrum situates itself on ...
ideals. While acknowledging that the political context of the
Second Vienna Award
The Second Vienna Award was the second of two territorial disputes that were arbitrated by Nazi Germany and the Kingdom of Italy. On 30 August 1940, they assigned the territory of Northern Transylvania, including all of Maramureș and part of Cri ...
had made "national sentiment" more precious to Transylvanians than ever before, the text cautioned against a revival of nationalist exclusiveness in the literary field, and rested the fault for ''păşunism'' with the early 20th century ''
Sămănătorul
''Sămănătorul'' or ''Semănătorul'' (, Romanian language, Romanian for "The Sower") was a Literary magazine, literary and Political journalism, political magazine published in Romania between 1901 and 1910. Founded by poets Alexandru Vlahuță ...
'' review.
Negoiţescu had designed a portion of the letter as a lampoon targeting "neo-''Sămănătorists''", whom he portrayed as
demagogues camouflaged in modernist trappings: "Burning with the fever of exultation when they yell out the word 'culture' at each and any street corner, all the headmasters of patriotism, or morals and of poetry, in love with the 'holy soil' only because they view it from the comfortable armchairs of the city they still curse, the ''păşunists'' imagine themselves day and night at the plow horns".
In a 1969 letter protesting against marginalization by communists, the author himself argued: "In what concerns the politically unfavorable atmosphere that has been created around my name, it seems curious to me that those who support it will not bear in mind that, in 1943, I was the author of the Sibiu Literary Circle's Manifesto, through which we protested against fascist ideology."
He also insisted that his anti-fascist credentials were being recognized by several works of literary history published in the late 1960s.
Commenting on the nature of his 1943 letter, Bogdan Creţu nevertheless rated it as an updated version of Lovinescu's lifelong principles, rather than a manifesto of artistic difference.
Also according to Creţu, the young critic's affiliations meant that he was not "obtusely disregarding" traditionalist literature in its entirety, noting that Negoiţescu was lenient when it came to poems by traditionalists such as
George Coşbuc,
Octavian Goga
Octavian Goga (; 1 April 1881 – 7 May 1938) was a Romanian far-right politician, poet, playwright, journalist, and translator.
Biography
Early life
Octavian Goga was born on 1 April 1881 in the village of Rășinari, on the northern sl ...
and
Aron Cotruş
Aron may refer to:
*Aron (name), name origin, variants, people
Fictional characters
*Aron (comics), from the Marvel Universe comic ''Aron! HyperSpace Boy!''
*Aron (Pokémon), in the ''Pokémon'' franchise
* Aron Trask, from John Steinbeck's nove ...
.
At the end of his post-fascist transition, Negoiţescu is even alleged to have rallied with Communist Party-led organizations. Discussing this rumor in his 1946 correspondence with
Deliu Petroiu,
Ion Dezideriu Sîrbu speculated about the possibility that his friends were merely seeking to survive in a new society facing
communization
Communization theory (or communisation theory in British English) refers to a tendency on the ultra-left that understands communism as a process that, in a social revolution, immediately begins to replace all capitalist social relations with ...
: "A certain political indifferentism gives an absurd hue to all hopes for the best. The red dies are cast.
..The boys have affiliated with the communists. That is to say Nego, Regman and Doinaş. They were promised a weekly magazine, funds etc. Nego even hopes for a visa and a passport to France."
Sîrbu expressed a belief that the Sibiu Circle cell could form "an honest island in this chaos of asserted and legalized ignorance", and stated that, in case this was not possible, he would join them in planning an escape, through
Arad County
Arad County () is an administrative division ( județ) of Romania roughly translated into county in the western part of the country on the border with Hungary, mostly in the region of Crișana and few villages in Banat. The administrative cente ...
, to a
Western Allied-controlled territory.
Opposition to communism
Commentators have often contrasted Negoiţescu's public support for
Paul Goma
Paul Goma (; October 2, 1935 – March 24, 2020) was a Romanian writer, known for his activities as a dissident and leading opponent of the communist regime before 1989. Forced into exile by the communist authorities, he became a political refug ...
's movement and the risk this implied with the perceived lack of solidarity, intimidation or indifference displayed by the cultural establishment of the late 1970s. Discussing the context for the incident, British historian and political analyst
Tom Gallagher
C. Thomas Gallagher III (born February 3, 1944) is an American politician, financier, and insurance agent from the state of Florida and a member of the Republican Party. Gallagher holds the distinction of having served more years as an elected ...
assessed: "Privileges and carefully modulated intimidation encouraged intellectuals to stay quiet and sometimes even police their professions on behalf of the regime."
A similar argument, presented by
Dorin Tudoran
Dorin Tudoran (born June 30, 1945) is a Romanian poet, essayist, journalist, and dissident. A resident of the United States since 1985, he has authored more than fifteen books of poetry, essays, and interviews.
Biography
Early life
Born in T ...
, was paraphrased by
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 ...
: the two authors singled out Negoiţescu and Vianu as examples of "solidarity" among Romanian intellectuals, in contrast to the generic pattern of "solitude".
[ Monica Lovinesco, "La Résistance des écrivains roumains—solitaire ou solidaire?", in ''L'Autre Europe, 17-18-19. 1988'', L'Age d'Homme, Paris, 1987, p.248] The scarcity of such common initiatives, Monica Lovinescu concluded, clashed with the representative
civil society
Civil society can be understood as the "third sector" of society, distinct from government and business, and including the family and the private sphere.[Eastern Bloc
The Eastern Bloc, also known as the Communist Bloc (Combloc), the Socialist Bloc, the Workers Bloc, and the Soviet Bloc, was an unofficial coalition of communist states of Central and Eastern Europe, Asia, Africa, and Latin America that were a ...]
countries (the
Workers' Defense Committee
The Workers' Defense Committee ( , KOR) was a Polish civil society group that was established to give aid to prisoners and their families after the June 1976 protests and ensuing government crackdown. It was a precursor and inspiration for efforts ...
among them).
According to critic and literary historian
Gelu Ionescu (himself a member of the Radio Free Europe staff), Negoiţescu, Goma and Vianu were the only figures of their day to question "the legitimacy of the system", a situation which he believed was rooted in "the character of Romanians", particularly their "fear".
Himself an author and dissident,
Virgil Tănase reflected back on the period: "Corrupted and sagged by a too lengthy and complacent convenience
.. Romanian writers viewed Paul Goma's effort with mistrust. A letter from Ion Negoiţescu and the support of
Nicolae Breban
Nicolae Breban (; born 1 February 1934) is a Romanian novelist and essayist of partial Germans, German descent.
Biography
Breban was born in Baia Mare, Maramureș County, Transylvania, Socialist Republic of Romania, the son of Vasile Breban, a ...
, that is desperately little..." While political scientist
Vladimir Tismăneanu
Vladimir Tismăneanu (; born July 4, 1951) is a Romanian American political scientist, political analyst, sociologist, and professor at the University of Maryland, College Park. A specialist in political systems and comparative politics, he is d ...
attributes to Goma and Negoiţescu's "
quixotic stances, all the more heroic since
heycould not count on solidarity or support from colleagues", the status of a singular reaction against the local prolongation of
Stalinism
Stalinism (, ) is the Totalitarianism, totalitarian means of governing and Marxism–Leninism, Marxist–Leninist policies implemented in the Soviet Union (USSR) from History of the Soviet Union (1927–1953), 1927 to 1953 by dictator Jose ...
, Matei Călinescu's account partly connects this issue with Negoiţescu having "miscalculated the reaction of his friends" by believing his gesture would be reciprocated.
In his ''Scriitori contemporani'', Negoiţescu himself compared the attitudes of local intellectuals with those in other communist countries, assessing that Romanians were weaker to react against their regime's demands, and arguing that, when faced with political pressures, Romanian institutions were "the first to yield".
Various commentators have also argued that Negoiţescu's retraction was both the result of pressures and ultimately inconsequential. Gelu Ionescu thus notes that the text on patriotism was circumstantial and not, like some by his fellow writers, "a homage to
Nicolae Ceauşescu Nicolae may refer to:
* Nicolae (name), an Aromanian and Romanian name
* ''Nicolae'' (novel), a 1997 novel
See also
*Nicolai (disambiguation)
*Nicolao Nicolao is an Italian given name and a surname. It may refer to the following:
Given name
*Ni ...
."
Călinescu also noted (emphasis in the original): "the bad things
egocaused by giving in reflected ''only'' on himself (he never signed any deal with the devil; he never, and in no way, implicated anyone else into anything) and
..these bad things were not irreparable."
Other causes
A significant portion of Negoiţescu's political writings provided a critical retrospective on interwar far right and its appeal among intellectuals of the ''
Trăirist'' group of philosophers, academics and writers:
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 aphorism ...
,
Mircea Eliade
Mircea Eliade (; – April 22, 1986) was a Romanian History of religion, historian of religion, fiction writer, philosopher, and professor at the University of Chicago. One of the most influential scholars of religion of the 20th century and in ...
,
Nae Ionescu
Nae Ionescu (, born Nicolae C. Ionescu; – 15 March 1940) was a Romanian philosopher, logician, mathematician, professor, and journalist.
Life
Born in Brăila, Ionescu studied Letters at the University of Bucharest until 1912. Upon graduati ...
,
Constantin Noica
Constantin Noica (; – 4 December 1987) was a Romanian philosopher, essayist and poet. His preoccupations were throughout all philosophy, from epistemology, philosophy of culture, axiology and philosophic anthropology to ontology and logics ...
,
Petre Ţuţea Petre is a surname and given name derived from Peter. Notable persons with that name include:
People with the given name Petre
* Charles Petre Eyre (1817–1902), English Roman Catholic prelate
* Ion Petre Stoican (circa 1930–1990), Romanian vi ...
,
Mircea Vulcănescu and others. His ''Straja dragonilor'' included reflected on the attraction exercised by the Iron Guard and Codreanu on educated young men of the period, despite the fact that Codreanu's own political manifestos were at an "embarrassing level".
He linked this phenomenon to the generation's reaction against
rationalism
In philosophy, rationalism is the Epistemology, epistemological view that "regards reason as the chief source and test of knowledge" or "the position that reason has precedence over other ways of acquiring knowledge", often in contrast to ot ...
and to its preference for
charisma
() is a personal quality of magnetic charm, persuasion, or appeal.
In the fields of sociology and political science, psychology, and management, the term ''charismatic'' describes a type of leadership.
In Christian theology, the term ''chari ...
, explained by him as "a disease that was roaming the world at the time and one that could be better explained by theoretical means such as
crowd psychology
Crowd psychology (or mob psychology) is a subfield of social psychology which examines how the psychology of a group of people differs from the psychology of any one person within the group. The study of crowd psychology looks into the actions ...
."
In his interpretation, the measure to which these authors had chosen to emancipate themselves from fascism varied: Eliade, Noica and Ţuţea "never cured", while Cioran, who assimilated a "
nihilist
Nihilism () encompasses various views that reject certain aspects of existence. There have been different nihilist positions, including the views that life is meaningless, that moral values are baseless, and that knowledge is impossible. Thes ...
" perspective, was an unclear case.
He also believed that theologian and art critic
Nicolae Steinhardt, whose career was related to that of the ''Trăirists'', "carried the germ inside him when he proclaimed
fanaticism
Fanaticism is a belief or behavior involving uncritical zeal or an obsessive enthusiasm. The political theorist Zachary R. Goldsmith provides a "cluster account" of the concept of fanaticism, identifying ten main attributes that, in various com ...
as a virtue."
Manea interpreted these assessments with caution, arguing that Negoiţescu merged "names and situations that deserved nuancing", but noted that they satisfied the urgency of bringing the episodes in question up for public debate.
Beyond these chronological limits, Negoiţescu also proposed that Eminescu's own form of 19th century nationalism, and even the "angel of death" imagery of his posthumous poetry, may have been products of "the same affliction".
His pioneering role in discussing the connection between Eminescu's theories and Romanian fascism was subsequently acknowledged by his fellow literary historians.
A special portion of Negoiţescu's essays deals with the meeting point between the currents of Romanian nationalism and the themes recovered by the
Nicolae Ceauşescu Nicolae may refer to:
* Nicolae (name), an Aromanian and Romanian name
* ''Nicolae'' (novel), a 1997 novel
See also
*Nicolai (disambiguation)
*Nicolao Nicolao is an Italian given name and a surname. It may refer to the following:
Given name
*Ni ...
regime. During his exile years, he was especially vocal in condemning Constantin Noica's late essays, which communist authorities tolerated for their critique of the
Western world
The Western world, also known as the West, primarily refers to various nations and state (polity), states in Western Europe, Northern America, and Australasia; with some debate as to whether those in Eastern Europe and Latin America also const ...
.
To Noica's claim that Westerners had been pushed to "hate the world", forgetting their roots and heading for a collective disaster, he replied: "Is there now a place in the world that is more evidently heading for catastrophe than Romania is?
..Where has the world been tarnished and where is it still tarnished more than in Noica's homeland? Where o where is European culture more degraded at this time than in the country where the very monuments of European significance and value are being more and more systematically torn down or mutilated in every way conceivable?"
Deeming his adversary's statements "an offense to liberty itself",
Negoiţescu also placed Noica's
isolationism
Isolationism is a term used to refer to a political philosophy advocating a foreign policy that opposes involvement in the political affairs, and especially the wars, of other countries. Thus, isolationism fundamentally advocates neutrality an ...
and
anti-Europeanism
Anti-Europeanism, Anti-European sentiment, and Europhobia are political terms used in a variety of contexts, implying sentiment or policies in opposition to Europe.
In the context of racial or ethno-nationalist politics, this may refer to the di ...
in connection with a common attitude in post-World War II Romania. According to this claim, the country had been abandoned by Europe: "like Noica, whose writings have no echo in the Occident,
omaniansfeel that they are shouting in the desert and curse the desert which does not hear and does not answer them."
He believed to have identified the roots of this mentality in the political and cultural clashes of the
Cold War
The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...
, extending his earlier comments regarding the continental alignment of Romanian culture: "after 1947 our culture has been forcefully torn from its natural European context."
During the early 1990s, Negoiţescu published several articles which examined the political developments in
post-1989 Romania, focusing on the return to popularity of some
far right
Far-right politics, often termed right-wing extremism, encompasses a range of ideologies that are marked by ultraconservatism, authoritarianism, ultranationalism, and Nativism (politics), nativism. This political spectrum situates itself on ...
themes.
Marta Petreu paraphrased their content as "vocal appeals
arningthat we should not try to build a European Romania on the political ideas of Noica, Eliade, Cioran, Nae Ionescu, Eminescu and Vulcănescu".
[ Marta Petreu]
"Laignel-Lavastine: metoda 'franceză' (I)"
, in ''Revista 22
''Revista 22'' (''22 Magazine'') is a Romanian weekly magazine, issued by the Group for Social Dialogue and focused mainly on politics and culture.
History and profile
''Revista 22'' was started in 1990. The first edition of the magazine was prin ...
'', Nr. 642, July 2002 In tandem, Negoiţescu was also rejecting the political stances of
post-communist
Post-communism is the period of political and economic transformation or transition in post-Soviet states and other formerly communist states located in Central-Eastern Europe and parts of Latin America, Africa, and Asia, in which new governments ...
leftist
Left-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy either as a whole or of certain social hierarchies. Left-wing politi ...
forces, in particular the ruling
National Salvation Front (FSN). In a letter cited by Manea, Negoiţescu strongly rejected the claims publicized by FSN member and former Communist Party activist
Silviu Brucan
Silviu Brucan (born Saul Bruckner; 18 January 1916 – 14 September 2006) was a Romanian communist politician.
He became a critic of the dictatorship of Nicolae Ceaușescu. After the Romanian Revolution, Brucan became a political analyst.
Ear ...
, who had publicly stated that, for lack of "democratic traditions", Romania could expect to undergo two decades of transition from communist institutions to a fully fledged
liberal democracy
Liberal democracy, also called Western-style democracy, or substantive democracy, is a form of government that combines the organization of a democracy with ideas of liberalism, liberal political philosophy. Common elements within a liberal dem ...
.
[Manea, p.171] He found Brucan's assertion "insulting" for Romania's population as a whole, while noting that, between 1881 and 1938, the
Kingdom of Romania
The Kingdom of Romania () was a constitutional monarchy that existed from with the crowning of prince Karl of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen as King of Romania, King Carol I of Romania, Carol I (thus beginning the Romanian royal family), until 1947 wit ...
had had democratic institutions, and comparing the overall context of the 1990s with Spain's
three-year-long transition.
At around the same time, Negoiţescu also reacted against the tendency of some Romanians to reassess their national literature purely on the basis of its political status under communism, primarily noting that various works once considered valuable for their
subtext
In any communication, in any medium or format, "subtext" is the underlying or implicit meaning that, while not explicitly stated, is understood by an audience.
The Oxford English Dictionary defines it as "an underlying and often distinct theme ...
had come to lose their importance, and called for a reevaluation.
Legacy
Influence
Negoiţescu's contribution left a mark on the cultural environment of
post-1989 period. In a 2001 essay, Norman Manea argued that Negoiţescu's condemnation of the Iron Guard's ideology, his criticism of post-1989 nationalist revival and his belonging to a sexual minority made him the target of threats and allegations. He concluded: "To what measure have his aesthetic, existential or political opinions, unavoidably interconnected, bothered and still bother not just part of the Romanian political establishment, but also the cultural one? What significance does the marginalization attempted immediately after 1989 (with its affiliated insults)
..carry in the Motherland to which he remained painfully and lovingly chained? We do not know who would still have, presently, the patience of picking up on the bitterness of such questions."
Petreu believes that "taking seriously" Negoiţescu's anti-fascist messages, alongside Balotă's early demand for Romania to recognize the Antonescu regime's
complicity in the Holocaust, could have engendered a reassessment of the past, thus preventing the resurgence of political and social problems.
Likewise, Negoiţescu's cultural theses, volumes and presence continued to be interpreted by later literature.
Ion Simuţ thus sees ''Euphorionism'' manifested not just in Negoiţescu's essays, but also in the drama writings of Radu Stanca and the "speculative and meditative" poems by Doinaş.
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 l ...
wrote that Nicolae Manolescu's own 2008 synthesis on Romanian literary history allocated much space to a debate with his deceased colleague over the classification of Eminescu's contributions.
During the late years of the 20th century, poet
Iustin Panta founded and edited the Sibiu-based magazine ''Euphorion'', which owed partial inspiration to Negoiţescu's project and had Doinaş as its honorary director.
Together with art critic
Petru Comarnescu
__NOTOC__
Petru Comarnescu (23 November 1905 – 27 November 1970) was a Romanian literary and art critic and translator.
Born in Iași into a family that was related to the metropolitan bishop , he studied law at the University of Bucharest (degr ...
and writer-filmmaker
Petre Sirin, Ion Negoiţescu was listed in an annex to the Romanian edition of Paul Russell's ''The Gay 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Gay Men and Lesbians, Past and Present'' (''100 Cele mai influente personalităţi gay'',
Editura Paralela 45, 2004).
The writer's articles and essays of the 1938–1947 period were reissued as a single volume in 2007, under the title ''De la "elanul juvenil" la "visatul Euphorion"'' ("From the 'Juvenile Impulse' to the 'Dreamed Euphorion'") and edited by critic Lelia Nicolescu.
A second edition of ''Straja dragonilor'' saw print with
Humanitas
(from the Latin , "human") is a Latin noun meaning human nature, civilization, and kindness. It has uses in the Enlightenment, which are discussed below.
Classical origins of term
The Latin word corresponded to the Greek concepts of (loving ...
in 2009, being edited by
Ion Vartic
An ion () is an atom or molecule with a net electrical charge. The charge of an electron is considered to be negative by convention and this charge is equal and opposite to the charge of a proton, which is considered to be positive by convent ...
and prefaced by
Ioana Pârvulescu
Ioana Pârvulescu (born 1960) is a Romanian writer. She was born in Brașov and studied at the University of Bucharest. She graduated in 1983, and went on to complete a PhD in literature in 1999. She teaches modern literature at the same universit ...
.
''
Apostrof ''Apostrof'' (Romanian for "Apostrophe") is a monthly literary magazine published in Cluj-Napoca, Romania under the Romanian Writers' Union patronage. It was founded in 1990 by Babeș-Bolyai University professor Marta Petreu, who is also its edit ...
'' magazine awards an annual Ion Negoiţescu Prize to contributions by Romanian writers.
["Premiul 'Ion Negoiţescu', decernat de revista ''Apostrof''"]
in ''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 during the Kingd ...
'', October 5, 2002
The writer's will specified that the totality of his diary could only be published in or after 2023.
It was assigned by Negoiţescu himself in the care of journalist
Emil Hurezeanu
Emil Horațiu Hurezeanu (; born August 26, 1955) is a Romanian journalist, writer, politician and diplomat. He is the current Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Romania), Romanian Minister of Foreign Affairs. He has previously served as Romania's amba ...
, his Radio Free Europe colleague, who took the liberty of releasing a short fragment (covering the date of 4 January 1949).
Pârvulescu, who calls the piece "an exceptional essay on love" and compares it to
Plato
Plato ( ; Greek language, Greek: , ; born BC, died 348/347 BC) was an ancient Greek philosopher of the Classical Greece, Classical period who is considered a foundational thinker in Western philosophy and an innovator of the writte ...
's ''
Phaedrus'' or ''
Symposium
In Ancient Greece, the symposium (, ''sympósion'', from συμπίνειν, ''sympínein'', 'to drink together') was the part of a banquet that took place after the meal, when drinking for pleasure was accompanied by music, dancing, recitals, o ...
'', suggests that the undisclosed volume may prove to be "Ion Negoiţescu's one great work."
Much of his personal correspondence was bequeathed to
Cornel Regman, and partly republished by his son, researcher Ştefăniţă Regman.
Securitate archives and related controversy
In 2009, ''
Cotidianul
The logo used between 2003 and 2007
''Cotidianul'' (meaning ''The Daily'' in English) is a Romanian-language newspaper published in Bucharest, Romania
Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern E ...
'' journalist
Mirela Corlăţan Mirela is a Southern and Eastern European feminine given name with a Latin origin, cognate to Mirella.
People
Notable persons with that name include:
*Mirela (singer) (born 1990), Spanish singer
*Mirela Balić (born 1999), Spanish actress
*Mirela ...
contributed an article in which the claim according to which
Petru Romoşan had been a
Securitate
The Department of State Security (), commonly known as the Securitate (, ), was the secret police agency of the Socialist Republic of Romania. It was founded on 30 August 1948 from the '' Siguranța'' with help and direction from the Soviet MG ...
delator was asserted on the basis of archive material kept by the
CNSAS government agency.
One such document paraphrased Romoşan's alleged claim that Negoiţescu needed to be punished for his "
anti-social behavior
Anti-social behaviours, sometimes called dissocial behaviours, are actions which are considered to violate the rights of or otherwise harm others by committing crime or nuisance, such as stealing and physical attack or noncriminal behaviours ...
", alongside personal statement recounting details from Negoiţescu's private life.
Also cited was a 1985 statement by Securitate colonel Victor Achim, responsible for reporting on the
Writers' Union Writers' Union may refer to the following organizations:
Statewide unions
* Writers Union of Armenia
* Azerbaijani Writers Union
* Writers' Union of Canada
* Chinese Writers Union
* Estonian Writers' Union
* Hungarian Writers' Union
* Iraqi Writer ...
, who assessed that Romoşan was "our link on critic Ion Negoiţescu", acknowledging the role played by such information in getting Negoiţescu to "admit his guilt".
Another note, issued after Romoşan's own departure for
People's Republic of Hungary
The Hungarian People's Republic (HPR) was a landlocked country in Central Europe from its formation on 20 August 1949 until the establishment of the current Republic of Hungary on 23 October 1989. It was a professed communist state, govern ...
(and subsequent defection to the West), told of a plan to make him the target of a negative campaign by leaking information on his relationship with and betrayal of Negoiţescu.
The scandal was enhanced when
Cornel Nistorescu
Cornel Nistorescu (born December 15, 1948) is a Romanian journalist, known for his editorial " Ode to America" regarding the American response to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
Nistorescu was born in Turmaș, Hunedoara County, the ...
, the newly appointed editor in chief of ''Cotidianul'', decided to postpone the publication of Corlăţan's article and later to terminate her contract.
[ Camelia Moga, George Florea]
"Debutul lui Cornel Nistorescu la ''Cotidianul'': acuzat de cenzurarea unei anchete despre prietenul său, Petru Romoşan. Ioan T. Morar anunţă că nu mai scrie la ''Cotidianul''"
Hotnews.ro, August 2, 2009; retrieved September 28, 2009[ ]Cornel Nistorescu
Cornel Nistorescu (born December 15, 1948) is a Romanian journalist, known for his editorial " Ode to America" regarding the American response to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
Nistorescu was born in Turmaș, Hunedoara County, the ...
"Despre vinovăţie, eroism şi prostie"
, in ''Cotidianul
The logo used between 2003 and 2007
''Cotidianul'' (meaning ''The Daily'' in English) is a Romanian-language newspaper published in Bucharest, Romania
Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern E ...
'', August 5, 2009 Deeming his friend a victim "of the Romanian appetite for filth, rummages through one's private life and public executions",
Nistorescu decided to temporarily remove the article from the newspaper's online archive, prompting accusations of censorship.
As a result, several ''Cotidianul'' authors, including
Ioan T. Morar, announced that they were ceasing their collaboration with the paper.
Soon after these incidents, Corlăţan publicized audio samples of threats she had allegedly received from Romoşan.
Cornel Nistorescu himself explained that he had decided not to publish the piece because he considered it superficial.
He also claimed that the paper had renounced Corlăţan's services only after she had joined in public criticism of the paper.
Romoşan, who had earlier denied involvement with the Securitate, claimed that Negoiţescu had actually both been recruited as an agent since their release from prison in the 1960s, and had spied for the Securitate's
foreign bureau
A news bureau is an office for gathering or distributing news. Similar terms are used for specialized bureaus, often to indicate a geographic location or scope of coverage: a 'Tokyo bureau' refers to a given news operation's office in Tokyo; 'fo ...
during his time in Germany.
Speaking after Corlăţan's article, he admitted having functioned as a Securitate informer, but not before 1987, when his wife, writer
Adina Kenereş, was threatened with losing her travel privileges.
He indicated that his signature on any other such documents was obtained with the use of violence and intimidation.
He argued: "I presently think that I was being used by the Securitate, which destroyed my reputation in order to provide Negoiţescu with a cover", and claims that Negoiţescu himself apologized to him for "all the harm" during a chance meeting in the early 1990s.
According to Nistorescu's assessment: "When the threads of Negoiţescu's file will come loose, perhaps I'll understand something from
omoşan'sadventure."
In contrast, Morar and
Ştefan Agopian both assessed that Romoşan's own flight abroad was part of a Securitate diversion.
Literary critic
Dan C. Mihăilescu gave Romoşan's claims the benefit of the doubt and urged for the Negoiţescu file to be publicized in its entirety, but also asserted that Romoşan had lost his credibility.
Notes
References
* Mihaela Albu
"Atât de departe... atât de aproape... (Literatura română—între ''a fi'' şi ''a nu fi'' în Europa)" in the
University of Iaşi
The Alexandru Ioan Cuza University (; acronym: UAIC) is a public university located in , Romania. Founded by an 1860 decree of Prince Alexandru Ioan Cuza, under whom the former was converted to a university, the University of , as it was named ...
'
''Philologica Jassyensia'' Nr. 1/2007, p. 87-92
*
Nicolae Balotă Nicolae may refer to:
* Nicolae (name), an Aromanian and Romanian name
* ''Nicolae'' (novel), a 1997 novel
See also
*Nicolai (disambiguation)
*Nicolao Nicolao is an Italian given name and a surname. It may refer to the following:
Given name
*Ni ...
, ''Arte poetice ale secolului XX: ipostaze româneşti şi străine'',
Editura Minerva
Editura Minerva is one of the largest publishing houses in Romania. Located in Bucharest, it is known, among other things, for publishing classic Romanian literature, children's books, and scientific books.
The company was founded in Bucharest in ...
, Bucharest, 1976.
*
Matei Călinescu
Matei Alexe Călinescu (June 15, 1934 – June 24, 2009) was a Romanian literary critic and professor of comparative literature at Indiana University Bloomington, Indiana University, in Bloomington, Indiana.
Biography
Călinescu was born in ...
,
Ion Vianu
Ion Vianu (15 April 1934 – 20 June 2024) was a Romanian writer and psychiatry, psychiatrist, who lived in Switzerland from 1977. He was the son of literary critic Tudor Vianu and his wife, Elena Vianu, Elena.
Vianu first studied classical phi ...
, ''Amintiri în dialog. Memorii'',
Polirom
Polirom or Editura Polirom ("Polirom" Publishing House) is a Romanian publishing house with a tradition of publishing classics of international literature and also various titles in the fields of social sciences, such as psychology, sociology, and ...
, Iaşi, 2005.
*
Norman Manea, ''Plicuri şi scrisori'', Polirom, Iaşi, 2004.
*
Vladimir Tismăneanu
Vladimir Tismăneanu (; born July 4, 1951) is a Romanian American political scientist, political analyst, sociologist, and professor at the University of Maryland, College Park. A specialist in political systems and comparative politics, he is d ...
, ''Stalinism pentru eternitate'', Polirom, Iaşi, 2005.
External links
''Straja dragonilor'' (fragment) at the
Humanitas
(from the Latin , "human") is a Latin noun meaning human nature, civilization, and kindness. It has uses in the Enlightenment, which are discussed below.
Classical origins of term
The Latin word corresponded to the Greek concepts of (loving ...
site
{{DEFAULTSORT:Negoitescu, Ion
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