The Dynamics of Contemporary Romanian Poetry. Poetry Festivals & Workshops. The Telciu Poetry Workshop: A Case Study

The present article is a fragment from a larger study interested not only in contemporary Romanian poetry as such, but also in the cultural phenomena that calibrate the metabolism of Romanian poetry – namely poetry festivals and workshops, as well as any other vector organizing the dynamics of contemporary Romanian poetry. The relevance of the said vector is manifold: on the one hand, studying it helps one in forming an overview of the dominant and emergent poetic trends; on the other hand, one can more effectively compare the networks of poetry festivals and workshops from Romania with the similar Western (and world) festivals and workshops and identify the means for integrating Romanian semi-peripheral literature within the larger metabolism of Western (and world) literature. The case study of this article is represented by the Telciu poetry workshop, as it is a trans-generational workshop and conveys a larger and more significant vista on the general dynamics of contemporary Romanian poetry.
Keywords: semi-peripheral literature, world literature, contemporary Romanian poetry, poetry festivals and workshops,
the Telciu poetry workshop

• Tranzbordare 13. Anthology of the Telciu poetry workshop. Bistriţa: Casa de Editură Max Blecher, 2013
• Cărtărescu, Mircea. Postmodernismul românesc / Romanian Postmodernism. Bucureşti: Humanitas, 1999 (2nd edition 2003, 3rd edition 2010)
• Cistelecan, Alexandru. Top Ten. Cluj: Dacia, 2000
• Cistelecan, Alexandru. Al doilea top / The Second Top. Braşov: Aula, 2004
• Coman, Dan; Romoşan, Petru (eds.). Compania poeţilor tineri în 100 de titluri / The Company of Young Poets in 100 Titles. Bucureşti: Compania, 2011
• Marin, Daniel D. (ed.). Poezia antiutopică. O antologie a douămiismului poetic românesc / Anti-Utopian Poetry. An Anthology of Post-2000 Romanian Poetry. Piteşti: Paralela 45, 2010
• Mincu, Ştefania. Douămiismul poetic românesc / Post-2000 Romanian Poetry. Constanţa: Pontica, 2007
• Muşina, Alexandru. Eseu asupra poeziei moderne / Essay on Modern Poetry. Chişinău: Cartier, 1997
• Muşina, Alexandru. Teoria şi practica literaturii / Theory and Practice of Literature. Bucureşti: Muzeul Literaturii, 2013
• Soviany, Octavian. Cinci decenii de experimentalism. Compendiu de poezie românească actuală. Vol. II, Lirica epocii postcomuniste / Five Decades of Experimentalism. Compendium of Present Romanian Poetry. 2nd vol., The Poetry of Post-Communist Era. Bucureşti: Casa de Pariuri Literare, 2011
• Terian, Andrei. „Critica de export. O pledoarie” / „Export Criticism. A Plea”. In Transilvania, Sibiu, 11-12/2013
• Vancu, Radu. „Myths and Mythoids in Mircea Ivănescu’s Poetry”. In Transilvania, Sibiu, 11-12/2013

The proper names from the novels of Dumitru Ţepeneag

This study is about the proper names from the novels of an author known as a representative of the Aesthetic Onirisme in prose, a literary manifestation from the 60’s with strong experimental features. Playfulness, “weak thinking” and exhibition of textual strategies in Dumitru Ţepeneag’s prose have their counterpart in the election and the use of proper names of the characters. The attitude of this author towards onomastics reflects a postmodernist poetics characterized by a clear conscience of the procedures through exposing them and highlighting the relationship between fiction and reality through a type of text that tries in the same time reconstructing the atmosphere of the years following the Romanian revolution from December 89.
Keywords: proper names, novel, postmodernism, playful, experimental, interpretation.

• Nicolae Bârna, Ţepeneag. Introducere într-o lume de hârtie / Ţepeneag. Introduction to a paper world, Bucureşti, Albatros, 1998.
• Nicolae Bârna, Dumitru Ţepeneag, Cluj, Biblioteca Apostrof, 2007.
• Marian Victor Buciu, Ţepeneag între onirism, textualism, postmodernism / Ţepeneag between onirisme, textualism and postmodernism, Craiova, Aius, 1998.
• Daiana Felecan, Între veghe şi vis sau Spaţiul operei lui D. Ţepeneag / Between wake and dream or The space of Ţepeneag’s creation, Cluj, Limes, 2006.
• Laura Pavel, Dumitru Ţepeneag şi canonul literaturii alternative / Dumitru Ţepeneag and the canon of alternative literature, Cluj, Casa Cărţii de Ştiinţă, 2007.

Poetry of Alexander Musina. Experiments, experiences, epigrams

The present article is an essay and an analysis of Alexandru Muşina’s poetry, focused on his methods and his themes such as they are approached in his experimental and epigrammatic poems. Between the concepts that he used, such as experimentalism, irony, subversion, the such called trivial poetry, the author emphasizes the importance of satire, the main expression of Muşina’s critical attitude. Thus, Muşina created an intelligent, social, comic though bitter poetry, masterfully learned and practiced. The article also shows how the communist environment and the censorship were incentives for poet’s imagination and, on the other hand, how this biting game of hide and seek has become an important mark of Muşina’s poetry.
Keywords: contemporary Romanian poetry, generation 80, Alexandru Muşina, postmodernism, experimentalism, epigrammatic poetry in postmodernism

• Diaconu, Mircea A. Poezia postmodernă / Postmodern Poetry. Braşov: Aula, 2002
• Lefter, Ion Bogdan. O oglindă purtată de-a lungul unui drum. Fotograme din postmodernitatea românească / A Mirror Carried Alng a Road. Photograms from Romanian Postmodernism. Piteşti: Paralela 45, 2010
• Lefter, Ion Bogdan. Flashback 1985: Începuturile „noii poezii” / Flashback 1985: The Beginnings of the „New Poetry”. Piteşti: Paralela 45, 2005
• Muşina, Alexandru. Paradigma poeziei moderne / The Paradigm of Modern POetry. Braşov: Aula, 2004
• Perian, Gheorghe. Scriitori români postmoderni / Postmodern Romanian Writers. Bucureşti: Ed. Didactică şi Pedagogică, 1996
• Ţeposu, Radu G. Istoria tragică & grotescă a întunecatului deceniu literar nouă / The Tragic & Grotesque History of the Dark Literary Decade Nine. Bucureşti: Cartea Românească, 2006

Reality – Main Character in Mariana Marin’s Poetry (II)

The present study observes Mariana Marin’s poetry from the point of view of its relation with the reality and the real. Thus, it is clearly shown one of the high performances of Mariana Marin was to be able to write a poetry of direct reactivity to the reality in political times when any direct reference to the real was strictly forbidden and punished (namely, under the communist regime of the 1980s). Unlike most of her colleagues in the so-called “generation ‘80”, Mariana Marin refused to understand poetry as a textualist play with conventions, no matter how sophisticated and attractive; for her, poetry also comprised a strong ethical nature, it had to be reactive to reality, and not evasive in front of it. This explains why reality is, with a memorable phrase, indeed, the main character in Mariana Marin’s poetry.
Keywords: contemporary Romanian poetry, generation ‘80, Mariana Marin, textualism, relation with the reality, evasion, postmodernism

• Ion Bogdan Lefter, Flashback 1985: Începuturile „noii poezii” / Flashback 1985: The beginnings of the „new poetry”, Editura Paralela 45, Piteşti 2005
• Iulian Boldea, Poeţi români postmoderni / Postmodern Romanian Poets, Editura Ardealul, Târgu-Mureş, 2006
• Al. Cistelecan, „Aripa secretă” de Mariana Marin / „The Secret Wing” of Mariana Marin, în Familia, nr. 10/1987
• Alexandru Muşina, Paradigma poeziei moderne / The Paradigm of modern poetry, Editura Aula, Braşov, 2004
• Georgeta Moarcăs, Disonanţe. Studii asupra expresionismului în poezia contemporană / Dissonances. Studies on expressionism in contemporary poetry, Editura Universităţii Transilvania din Braşov, 2011
• Mihail Vakulovski, Portret de grup cu generaţia optzeci (poezia) / Group portrait with generation 80 (poetry), Editura Tracus Arte, 2010

The apocryphal gospel of Marta Petreu: elective identities – emotional corporality

The poetic imagery of Marta Petreu’s overcrowds the world of her verse with death visions and captures and, at the same time, points out to second degree, intellectualized states of mind which are meant not to reveal the pure emotion of the poet, but represent the processing of this emotion into the melting pot-brain of the poem. Her poems intend to be
both authentic and concept-based. Desperation, fury, curses, physical and psychological pain, obsession, hysteria, all of these represent the state of mind the reader adopts. And this happens mainly because Marta Petreu proves to be a skilled, self-centred orchestrator of inner degradation. The concept is Marta Petreu’s ontological space where she isolates herself looking for semantic and linguistic uniqueness among other feminine Romanian voices of her generation. For her, even the ever searched for, analyzed, classified love remains deeply conflicting and generates several interrogations that raise the appetite for self-devouring.
Keywords: Marta Petreu, confessional poetry, ontological space, self-devouring

• Petreu, Marta, Aduceţi verbele / Bring the verbs, Bucureşti, Cartea Românească, 1981
• Petreu, Marta, Apocalipsa după Marta / Revelation of Marta, Iaşi, Polirom, 2011 Petreu, Marta, Cartea mâniei / The Book of wrath, Bucureşti, Albatros, 1997
• Petreu, Marta, Dimineaţa tinerelor doamne / The Morning of the young ladies, Bucureşti, Cartea Românească, 1983
• Petreu, Marta, Falanga / The Phalanx, Cluj-Napoca, Biblioteca Apostrof, 2001
• Petreu, Marta, Loc psihic / Psychic place, Cluj-Napoca, Editura Dacia, 1991
• Bourdieu, Pierre, La domination masculine / Male domination, Paris, Seuil, 1998
• Damasio, Antonio R., Le Sentiment même de soi. Corps, émotions, conscience / The Feeling of the self. Body, emotion, conscience, Paris, Éditions Odile Jacob, 2002
• Deleuze, Gilles, Nietzsche, Bucureşti, Editura All Educaţional, 2002
• De Souzennelle, Annick, Le symbolisme du corps humain / The Symbolism of the human body, Paris, Albin Michel, 2000
• Diaconu, Mircea A., Atelierele poeziei / The studios of poetry, Bucureşti, Editura Fundaţiei Culturale Ideea Europeană, 2005
• Hume, D., A Treatise of Human Nature, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1978
• Le Breton, David, Anthropologie du corps et modernité / The Anthropology of the body and modernity, Paris, PUF, 2011
• Lefter, Ion Bogdan, Flashback 1985: Începuturile „noii poezii” / Flashback 1985: The Beginnings of the „new poetry”, Piteşti, Paralela 45, 2005
• Lipovetsky, Gilles, L’ere du vide. Essais sur l’individualisme contemporain / The age of the void. Essays on contemporary individualism, Paris, Gallimard, 1993
• Manolescu, Nicolae, Istoria critică a literaturii române. 5 secolede literatură / The critical history of Romanian literature. 5 centuries of literature, Piteşti, Paralela 45, 2008
• Nietzsche, Friedrich, Dincolo de bine şi de rău / Beyond the good and the evil, Bucureşti, Editura Humanitas, 1991
• Ricoeur, Paul, Soi-même comme un autre / Oneself as another, Paris, Seuil, 1990
• Rosset, Clément, Loin de moi. Étude sur l’identité / Far from me. Study on identity, Paris, Les Éditions de Minuit, 1999
• Starobinski, Jean, Melancolie, nostalgie, ironie / Melancholy, nostalgy, irony, Bucureşti, Editura Meridiane, 1993
• Ţeposu, Radu G., Istoria tragică & grotescă a întunecatului deceniu literar nouă, Bucureşti, Cartea Românească, 2006

Constantin Acosmei. The ironic bolgiae

The present study is focused on the poetry of a foremost recent poet, Constantin Acosmei, whose first (and, as far as now, last) collection of poems, Deadman’s Toy, has become a landmark in contemporary Romanian poetry. His poetry is seen as a playful and derisive descensus ad inferos, an exploration of some sarcastic and ironic bolgiae with a scope and tension never to be found somewehere else in recent Romanian poetry. Thus, the poems of Constantin Acosmei coagulate in one of the most consistent example of the poetics of derision.
Keywords: contemporary Romanian poetry, Constantin Acosmei, generation 2000, poetics of derision, ironic and sarcastic bolgiae

• Rita Chirian, Agonie şi agonistică / Agony and agonistics, în Cultura, nr. 97, http://revistacultura.ro/cultura.php? articol=1886 (accesat la data de 15 iunie, 2012)
• Cosmin Ciotloş, Constantin Acosmei, „Jucăria mortului” / Constantin Acosmei, „Deadman’s Toy”, în Noua Revistă Vorbită, 2008, http://nrv.radiocultura.ro/?p=99 (accesat la 17 iunie, 2012)
• Bogdan Creţu, Jucăria mortului sau arta deriziunii / Deadman’s Toy or the art of derision, în Ziarul financiar, 2009, http://www.zf.ro/ziarul-de-duminica/iasii-lui-cretu-jucaria-mortului-sau-arta-deriziunii-5148110 (accesat la 17 iunie, 2012)
• Daniel Cristea-Enache, Scrisoarea unui provincial – Jucăria mortului de Constantin Acosmei / The letter of a provincial – Deadman’s Toy by Constantin Acosmei, pe Liternet.ro, 2008, http://atelier.liternet.ro/articol/5297/Daniel-Cristea-Enache/Scrisoarea-unui-provincial-Jucariamortului-de-Constantin-Acosmei.html (accesat la data de 15 iunie, 2012)
• Octavian Soviany, Jocul cu parantezele / The game with the parantheses, în Tribuna (Cluj), nr. 141/2008.
• Andrei Terian, Poezia în zdrenţe / Poetry in rags, în Cultura, nr. 64/2009, http://revistacultura.ro/cultura.php?articol=1021 (accesat la data de 15 iunie, 2012)
• Mihail Vakulovski, Poezia care se încheie cu „etc.” / Poetry ending with „etc.”, în Tiuk! http://www.tiuk.reea.net/4/5.html (accesat la data de 15 iunie, 2012)

A Mode of Self-Portrayal in Lesley Saunders’ Volume of Poems Entitled “No Doves”

Lesley Saunders’ twofold poetic concern with retrieving identity in a ritual of self-portrayal and with promoting an authentic self capable of integrating into the recognition and acceptance of herself and others will be tackled upon via a Jungian socio-psychological approach which involves important issues of identity and sensibility vis-à-vis the archetypes of animus, anima and the process of individuation. As Lesley Saunders’ main preoccupation is human nature and artistic personality, Lakoff ’s cognitive theory and Bachelard’s poetics based on the merging of dreams and reflection will be also turned to good account with the view to revealing the original source of the poetess’ inner light.
Keywords: Lesley Saunders, Jungian psychology, Bachelard, Lakoff, archetypes, dreams.

• Bachelard, Gaston. Dreptul de a visa / The Right to Dream. Bucureşti: Editura Univers, 2009
• Jung, Carl, Gustav. Memories, Dreams, Reflections (ed. Anelia Jaffe, Richard and Clara Winston, trans.). London: Flamingo, 1983
• Nielsen, Thomas William, Fitzgerald, Robert and Fettes, Mark, Imagination in Educational Theory and Practice. A Many-sided Vision, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2010
• Saunders, Lesley. No Doves. Mulfran Press, 2010

Struggle and Spiritual Awakening in Charlotte Bronte’s “Jane Eyre” and Nathaniel Hawtorne’s “The Scarlet Letter”

The paper is meant to find out in what way Bronte’s treatment of the woman obliged to challenge conventional social and spiritual freedom and Hawthorne’s intention to contrast Puritan morality with passion and individualism are illustrated through their women characters, Jane Eyre and Hester Prynne respectively, in one of these writers’ best creations, Jane Eyre and The Scarlet Letter. The first part of the study shapes Jane’s struggle against rage, passion, and obedience, against the British patriarchal system where men are those responsible for taking decisions, making women obey the social and political rules. The analysis will describe the heroine’s ways of facing the world beset by trials and temptation in search of grace, as well as her desire to create a world free of oppression, both gender and economic oppression. Jane Eyre possesses a sense of her self-worth and dignity, a commitment to justice and principle, a trust in God and a passionate disposition. The second part of the paper renders Hester Prynne in terms of the struggle within society, by facing the cruel judgment of the Puritans. The investigation portrays Hester as a woman who seems to have embraced the Puritan theology wholeheartedly, but who in her mind and heart is a different person, who has turned away from the Puritan’s way of life. Her remorse toward her husband versus the sympathy for her lover, her compulsion to remain in Boston, her voluptuousness as opposed to her effort to repent and conform, all these tensions are the very essence of our idea of Hester. Both Jane and Hester are winners in the battle against life. The former confronted life and its hardships without violating her own principles and nature. The latter faced her punishment and accepted the weight of her sin, thus accepting herself.
Keywords: patriarchal society, Puritanism, individualism, spiritual freedom, justice, rage, passion

Primary Sources

• Bronte, Charlotte. Jane Eyre, London, Penguin Popular Classics, 1994.
• Hawthorne, Nathaniel. The Scarlet Letter, Ohio, Penguin Classics, 1986.

Secondary Sources

• Bailin, Miriam. The Sickroom in Victorian Fiction. The Art of Being Ill, London, Cambridge UP, 1994
• Carter, Ronald, and McRae, John. The Routledge History of Literature in Britain and Ireland, London and New York, Routledge, 1997
• Chai, Leon. The Romantic Foundations of the American Renaissance, Ithaca and London, Cornell UP, 1987
• Chase, Richard. The American Novel and its Tradition, New York, Gordian Press, 1978
• Concise Dictionary of British Literary Biography. Victorian Writers. Vol.3, London: A Bruccoli Clark Layman Book, 1992
• Craig, G. Armour. “Private Vision and Social Order in Nineteenth-Century English Fiction.” In Jane Eyre: Authoritative Text, Backgrounds, Criticism. 2nd ed. Ed. Richard J. Dunn, New York, Norton, 1987
• Fussell, Edwin. Frontier: American Literature and the American West, New Jersey, Princeton UP, 1965
• Gilbert, Sandra, and Gubar, Susan. The Mad Woman in the Attic: The Woman Writer of the Nineteenth-Century Literary Imagination, New Haven and London, Yale UP, 1979
• Gollin, Rita K. Nathaniel Hawthorne: The Truth of Dreams, Barton Rouge and London, Lousiana State UP, 1979
• Gordon, Lyndal. Charlotte Bronte: A Passionate Life, London, Chatto and Windus, 1994
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• Poovey, Mary. “The Anathematized Race: The Governess and Jane Eyre.” In The Nineteenth-Century Novel, By Stephen Regan, London and New York, The Open University, 2001
• Rich, Adrienne. “Jane Eyre: The Temptations of a Motherless Woman.” Rpt. in On Lies, Secrets, and Silence: Selected Prose 1966-1978, New York, W.W. Norton, 1979
• Sanders, Andrew. The Short Oxford History of English Literature, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1994
• Wagenknecht, Edward. Nathaniel Hawthorne: The Man, His Tales and Romances, New York, Continuum, 1989
• Wagenknecht, Edward. Cavalcade of the American Novel from the Birth of the Nation to the Middle of the Twentieth Century, New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Toronto,
  London, Holt Rinehart and Winston Inc., 1952
• Waggoner, H Hyatt. Hawthorne. A Critical Study, Massachusetts, The Belknap Press of Harvard University, 1971