During the communist period, the writers wrote in secret. Their writings were in several copies so that, if the Security confiscated one of them, the rest could be taken across the border, where to be published. Others remained in the drawer, until the fall of communism.
Adevărul archive book
Raluca Spiridon, counselor at the National Council for the Study of Security Archives, revealed unique information about the literature of disidency and drawer literature.
Why did the totalitarian systems feel the need to destroy books and publications?
The explanation must be found in the very nature of these regimes that refuse the spirit of the time in which they are born, more relatively and open to intellectual freedoms. The realistic current, if we were to refer to literature, it was easier and easier to approach for the communists if the fluidity and complexity of the avant -garde currents. Finally, it could be stated that everything that could not be mastered by the Communists became undesirable, including books.
Except for books on Bessarabia and northern Bukovina, a consistent part of the works withdrawn on the basis of these lists were, then, of fascist, German, legionary and anti -Semitic orientation, and such a treatment was not a Romanian feature. What did fascist orientation books contain? Or anti -Semitic ones?
First of all, it should be noted that between March 21, 1945 and February 9, 1948, 50 lists comprising 3,318 titles of such books were published between the Official Gazette. Their content refers, most of the times, to racial purity and Eugenie, as numerous war propaganda books can be encountered or even regarding esotericism.
Opera Mihai Eminescu, danger to the new order
The work of classical writers was withdrawn from libraries. What about their work was withdrawn? What danger did the communists see in their writings?
In some cases, such as that of the poet Mihai Eminescu, his work was withdrawn almost entirely, except for poems such as “Emperor and proletarian”. A complex look at the authors and securities withdrawn from the circulation gives us the volume entitled “Prohibited publications until May 1, 1948” under the aegis of the Ministry of Arts and Information. We can specify that the extension of the prohibition sphere from the 3,318 titles published in the Official Gazette to everything that meant literature and Romanian authors undesirable to communist ideology between December 1, 1947 – May 1, 1948.
The forbidden writings upset their different spirit and content in relation to schematism, determinism and conformism promoted by communist ideology. However, it would be incorrect not to mention that after Stalin’s death on March 5, 1953, the rehabilitation of some of the interwar writers such as Octavian Goga, George Bacovia, Tudor Arghezi, Liviu Rebreanu or Mateiu Caragiale takes place.
The high -value politicians of Romania, who made Greater Romania, were proven by the new communist regime. We are talking about Maniu or Brătianu here. It is hard to believe that if you throw their books, they will not remain in the memory of the generations that have taken them and will not tell the future generations. What did the Communists hope destroying their work?
The withdrawal from the circulation of the speeches and volumes written by personalities of the democratic political life in Romania was a process in close connection with the rewriting of the Romanian history in accordance with the new criteria of the communist paradigm. Instead of the politicians who put the shoulder to the constitution of Greater Romania, the leaders of uprising and the illegalist communists who participated in strikes and workers were placed in the foreground.
What happened if you were caught with forbidden writings? What did you risk?
According to Law no. 364 The possession of forbidden publications was considered a crime and was punished with correctional imprisonment. More well -known is the case of the literary historian Nicolae Balotă who was declared guilty for such a crime by sentence no. 3,346 of December 21, 1948. The execution of the punishment will be suspended, only that he is the position of assistant at the Institute of Psychology.
What did “drawer literature” mean?
Chronologically the phenomenon of “drawer literature” can be divided into two large intervals, namely 1948-1964 and 1964-1989, in both intervals, being closely related to the censorship exercised by the communist authorities.
Excluded or marginalized from the professional affirmation frameworks, several writers will continue their vocation by nourishing the hope of returning better times. Followed by the Securitate to get in possession of his “hidden” works, Lucian Blaga saw the “streams” of his last volume of poems on the hospital bed.
In the repressive context generated by the withdrawal of Soviet troops from May 24, 1958 “drawer writings”, in a political literary fund, become “criminal bodies in processes”.
This is the case of the novel “Waiting for the clock” by Dinu Pillat, to whom it was not conferred, in the interpretation of the Security, a legionary content or the manuscripts of Constantin Noica. Between 1949-1958 he had had a mandatory residence in Câmpulung-Muscel, during which time he will dedicate himself to studying Goethe and Hegel, devoting to their work the books “anti-Goethe” and “Stories from Hegel”. For this “drawer literature”, which could not be published Dinu Pillat and Constantin Noica were convicted for “uniting against social order” to difficult years of imprisonment.
In the same repressive context, Ion Negoiţescu is incarcerated for the works of literary criticism: “Romanian poetry. Critical studies “(notebook no.1) and” Romanian poetry. Anthology ”(notebook no.2). Interesting to mention is the fact that the manuscript “Romanian poetry. Critical studies “was the basis of the volume” Eminescu’s poetry “, published in 1968, when the communist regime allowed, without it containing the chapter on pre -eminescian poetry. As for “Romanian poetry. Critical studies “This was only published in 1997 by the efforts of Cornel Regman.
Removed from the Writers’ Union and without the right of signature, the lyrical creation of the poet Vasile Voiculescu was a permanent site in work. Between 1954-1958 the 90 sonnets were written later in the posthumous volume “The last imagined sonnets of Shakespeare, in imaginary translation by Vasile Voiculescu”. As for ID Sârbu it could be stated that at the time of the second sentence on February 14, 1958, the song “Sovrom Cărbune” had been destroyed. Written, as a reply to the song “Miners” by Mihai Davidoglu, this was a non -deformed presentation of the life of the mining in the Jiu Valley. After being released from prison ID Sârbu, he will rewrite it under the title “Arsing leaves”, placing the action during the Second World War.
During the second period of Romanian communism (1964-1989) the phenomenon of “drawer literature” must be seen much more nuanced, because we are dealing with former political prisoners who release from prisons begin to wait on paper, or to us We find out in front of anti -communist manuscripts, as was the case of the “Happiness Journal” by Nicolae Steinhard, confiscated by the security due to the information provided by Ion Caraion (the informant “Artur”). In other situations that did not endanger the monopoly of the communist power, the Security only summarized in photographing the pages of the manuscripts, such an example constituting the memories of Nina Casian.
Pamphlet to the regime, sent to Mircea Eliade
Can we also speak in Romania of literature of dissident?
Obvious. A lesser -known case is that of the historian Vlad Georgescu who in March 1977 tries to send Mircea Eliade, in the hope of their popularization, three important works through the US ambassador in Bucharest, Harry Barnes. It was about manuscripts entitled “Politics and history. The case of the Romanian Communists 1944-1947 “; “The program of the dissenting movement in Romania” and “Caragea’s plague”, a pamphlet to the communist regime.
Of course, in the matter of literature, Paul Goma is the representative writer through the “Ostinato” novels, a penetrating look about life and abuses in communist prisons or the door – a vehement protest against censorship, but in the same category of dissident literature could be included. and the “key texts” that are found in the volume of poems “Sometimes the float” of Dorin Tudoran or in the novel “Refugii” by Augustin Buzura, basically a criticism of the socialist society from the Ceausescu period.
Are authors who tried to take their manuscripts across the border and publish them there?
In the face of a very restrictive censure, several Romanian writers intended to publish their manuscripts abroad, only that the Security through a whole network of informants managed to prevent this. With all the vigilance of the repressive apparatus, we can also mention a few cases.
The novels written by Paul Goma that we have already mentioned have already been published in Germany and France, Marius Mircu manages to remove from the country the novel SF-“after 30 years”, and Bujor Nedelcovici, sends the manuscript of the novel “The tanned heretic” , edited in France under the title “Second Message” (1985).
In other countries under Soviet rule, did it be the same with censorship?
Once entered under the Soviet influence, the specific censors’ mechanisms were also adopted, which customized Romania was the existence of a repressive and oppressive apparatus that controlled the written word in the smallest. In Romania, there was no samizdat literature, that is, written and distributed literature under the communist regime.
