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Romanian literature |
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Romanian literature, the literature of Romania. Until the 16th cent. most writing by Romanians was in Slavonic. In 1541 a catechism in Romanian was issued at Sibiu, and from 1560 liturgical works were published in Romanian to meet the needs of the local Calvinist Church. Translations of the legend of Alexander the Great appeared c.1600, and in 1673 the Moldavian Bishop Dositheiu published the first volume of poetry in Romanian, a verse translation of the Psalms. Early historical works were the Moldavian Chronicle of Miron Costin (1633–91) and the famous Moldo-Wallachian Chronicle (1710) of Demetrius Cantemir (1673–1723).
Starting with the Chronicle, a movement gained force to emphasize the Latin as opposed to the Slavic elements in Romanian culture. The mainspring of this movement was Ion Eliade (1802–72), known as Radulescu, and its outcome was a dictionary of the Romanian language produced (1871–76) by August Laurianu et al., in which all words of non-Latin origin were eliminated. In 1860 Latin replaced Cyrillic as the official Romanian alphabet (the church used the Cyrillic until 1890); 1860 thus marks the beginning of modern Romanian literature. Vasile Alecsandri Alecsandri, Vasile , 1821–90, Romanian poet, dramatist, and statesman. He was (1858) provisional foreign minister and subsequently served in various diplomatic posts. Poetry flourished after Titu Maiorescu (1840–1917) founded (1867) the cosmopolitan journal Convorbiri literare [literary conversations] at Jassy in Moldavia, and soon began to publish the lyrics of Mihail Eminescu Eminescu, Mihail , 1850–89, Romanian poet. Eminescu is considered the foremost Romanian poet of his century. His poems, lyrical, passionate, and revolutionary, were published in periodicals and had a profound influence on Romanian letters. Themes of social concern were treated by Alexandru Vlahuta (1858–1919) in the novel Dan (1894) and by Duiliu Zamfirescu (1858–1922) in Country Life (1894). The contrast between rural and urban life was detailed in the realistic novels Dinu Millian by Constantin Mille and Parasites (1893) by Barbu Delavrancea (1858–1919). From the "back to the soil" movement in Romanian letters came the novel Ion (1920) by Liviu Rebreanu, known also for his novel of World War I, The Forest of the Hanged (1922). Major Romanian poets of the 20th cent. include Dimitrie Anghel (1872–1914) and Octavian Goga (1881–1938), an outspoken and often partisan advocate of Transylvania. Under the Ceauşescu regime (1965–89), postwar Romanian writing reflected a strong Communist influence. Nevertheless, after 1968 an independent movement emerged, subjected to great pressure in the years before Ceauşescu's overthrow. Along with the exiled writers Mircea Eliade Eliade, Mircea , 1907–86, American philosopher and historian of comparative religion, b. Bucharest. He studied Indian philosophy and Sanskrit at the Univ. of Calcutta (1928–31) and taught history of religion and metaphysics in Bucharest (1933–39). BibliographySee E. D. Tappe, Rumanian Prose and Verse (1956); J. Steinberg, ed., Introduction to Rumanian Literature (1966). Want to thank TFD for its existence? Tell a friend about us, add a link to this page, add the site to iGoogle, or visit the webmaster's page for free fun content. |
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