Misplaced Pages

#85914

223-809: Fondane began a second career in 1923, when he moved to Paris . Affiliated with Surrealism , but strongly opposed to its communist leanings, he moved on to become a figure in Jewish existentialism and a leading disciple of Lev Shestov . His critique of political dogma, rejection of rationalism , expectation of historical catastrophe and belief in the soteriological force of literature were outlined in his celebrated essays on Charles Baudelaire and Arthur Rimbaud , as well as in his final works of poetry. His literary and philosophical activities helped him build close relationships with other intellectuals: Shestov, Emil Cioran , David Gascoyne , Jacques Maritain , Victoria Ocampo , Ilarie Voronca etc. In parallel, Fondane also had

446-577: A Breton woman, with whom he was in correspondence for the rest of his life. Under contract with the Falma-film company, Fondane was received with honors by the Romanian Argentine community, and, with the unusual cut of his preferred suit, is said to have even become a trendsetter in local fashion. For Ocampo and the Sur staff, literary historian Rosalie Sitman notes, his visit also meant an occasion to defy

669-526: A Nazi regime in Germany brought Fondane into the camp of anti-fascism . In December 1934, his Apelul studențimii ("The Call of Students") was circulated among the Romanian diaspora, and featured passionate calls for awareness: "Tomorrow, in concentration camps , it will be too late". The following year, he outlined his critique of all kinds of totalitarianism , L'Écrivain devant la révolution ("The Writer Facing

892-752: A Proto-Celtic form reconstructed as * kwar-is-io -. Alternatively, Pierre-Yves Lambert proposed to translate Parisii as the 'spear people', by connecting the first element to the Old Irish carr ('spear'), derived from an earlier * kwar-sā . In any case, the city's name is not related to the Paris of Greek mythology . Residents of the city are known in English as Parisians and in French as Parisiens ( [paʁizjɛ̃] ). They are also pejoratively called Parigots ( [paʁiɡo] ). The Parisii ,

1115-489: A brochure printed in 1848. The Caragiali brothers had two sisters, Ecaterina and Anastasia. Especially in his old age, the writer emphasized his family's humble background and his status as a self-made man . On one occasion, he defined the landscape of his youth as "the quagmires of Ploiești". Although it prompted his biographer Constantin Dobrogeanu-Gherea to define him as "a proletarian ", Caragiale's account

1338-406: A 1922 piece for Rampa , he remembered Bogdan-Pitești in ambivalent terms: "he could not stand moral elevation. [...] He was made of the greatest of joys, in the most purulent of bodies. How many generations of ancient boyars had come to pass, like unworthy dung, for this singular earth to be generated?" Pressed on by his family and the prospects of financial security, Fondane contemplated becoming

1561-468: A Chandelier"). For a while, the poet also joined his colleague Ilarie Voronca on the legal department of L'Abeille insurance company. After a period of renting furnished rooms, Fondane accepted an offer from Jean, brother of the deceased literary theorist Remy de Gourmont , and, employed as a librarian- concierge , moved into the Gourmonts' museum property on Rue des Saints-Pères, some distance away from to

1784-431: A March 1884 meeting of the society—Maiorescu recorded in his private notes that "[...] Caragiale [was] aggressive and rude toward Alecsandri." Caragiale's wealthy relative, Catinca Momulo Cardini (commonly known Catinca Momuloaia), who was the widow of a famous restaurateur and the cousin of his mother Ecaterina, died in 1885, and the writer had the prospect of inheriting a large fortune. He nonetheless became involved in

2007-562: A betrayer of the avant-garde) and witnessing from afar the eventual implosion of Romanian Surrealism on the model of French groups. In such dialogues, Roll complains about right-wing political censorship in Romania, and speaks in some detail about his own conversion to Marxism . With Fondane's approval and Minulescu's assistance, Priveliști also saw print in Romania during 1930. Published by Editura Cultura Națională , it sparked significant controversy with its nonconformist style, but also made

2230-479: A career in cinema: a film critic and a screenwriter for Paramount Pictures , he later worked on Rapt with Dimitri Kirsanoff , and directed the since-lost film Tararira in Argentina . A prisoner of war during the fall of France , Fondane was released and spent the occupation years in clandestinity. He was eventually captured and handed to Nazi German authorities, who deported him to Auschwitz-Birkenau . He

2453-435: A coalition of conservatives and liberals — as he later acknowledged in his Grand Hotel "Victoria Română" , he and his friends agreed to support the move by voting "yes" during a subsequent plebiscite , and, with tacit approval from the new authorities, even did so several times each. By the age of 18, he was an enthusiastic supporter of the liberal current, and sympathized with its republican ideals. In 1871, he witnessed

SECTION 10

#1732851987086

2676-821: A comment on Romanian translation projects ( Ferestre spre Occident , "Windows on the Occident "), he was later assigned the theatrical column. Fondane's work was again featured in Flacăra magazine (at the time under Minulescu's direction): the poem Ce simplu ("How Simple") and the essay Istoria Ideii ("The History of the Idea") were both published there in 1922. The same year, with assistance from fellow novelist Felix Aderca , Fondane grouped his earlier essays on French literature as Imagini și cărți din Franța ("Images and Books from France"), published by Editura Socec company. The book included what

2899-666: A contributor to newspapers or literary journals in France, Belgium, and Switzerland : a regular presence in Cahiers du Sud of Carcassonne , he had his work featured in the Surrealist press ( Discontinuité , Le Phare de Neuilly , Bifur ), as well as in Le Courrier des Poètes , Le Journal des Poètes , Romain Rolland 's Europe , Paul Valéry 's Commerce etc. In addition, Fondane's research

3122-553: A daughter, named Lenci. Ion Luca's uncles, Costache and Iorgu Caragiale , managed theater troupes and were very influential figures in the development of early Romanian theatre — in Wallachia and Moldavia alike. Luca Caragiali had himself performed with his brothers during his youth, before opting to settle down. All three had stood criticism for not taking part in the Wallachian Revolution , and defended themselves through

3345-454: A diary he kept at age 16, his birthday was officially recorded as November 15. Fondane was the only son of Isac Wechsler and his wife Adela (née Schwartzfeld), who also bore daughters Lina (b. 1892) and Rodica (b. 1905), both of whom had careers in acting. As a child Benjamin spends a lot of time in the north of Moldova in a place known as Fundoaia and hence the name he chooses for himself Fundoianu. From this rural and picturesque area he receives

3568-651: A fact checker for some months after his arrival to the capital. His activity as a journalist also allowed him to interview Arnold Davidovich Margolin , statesman of the defunct Ukrainian People's Republic , with whom he discussed the fate of Ukrainian Jews before and after the Soviet Russian takeover. Over the following years, he restarted his career in the press, contributing to various nationally circulated newspapers: Adevărul , Adevărul Literar și Artistic , Cuvântul Liber , Mântuirea , etc. The main topics of his interest were literary reviews, essays reviewing

3791-530: A fair amount of sunshine. Each year there are a few days when the temperature rises above 32 °C (90 °F). Longer periods of more intense heat sometimes occur, such as the heat wave of 2003 when temperatures exceeded 30 °C (86 °F) for weeks, reached 40 °C (104 °F) on some days, and rarely cooled down at night. Spring and autumn have, on average, mild days and cool nights, but are changing and unstable. Surprisingly warm or cool weather occurs frequently in both seasons. In winter, sunshine

4014-620: A fragment of prose referring to two inseparable friends, Șotrocea and Motrocea, was to serve as the first draft for the Lache and Mache series in Momente și schițe . Another notable work of the time is Pohod la șosea , a rhyming reportage documenting the Russian Army 's arrival to Bucharest, and the street reactions to the event. Claponul ceased publication in early 1878. It was probably through Eminescu that Ion Luca Caragiale came into contact with

4237-583: A house a short distance away from Foișorul de Foc . Between these changes of address, he established contacts with the Symbolist and avant-garde society of Bucharest: a personal friend of graphic artist Iosif Ross , he formed an informal avant-garde circle of his own, attended by writers F. Brunea-Fox , Ion Călugăru , Henri Gad , Sașa Pană , Claude Sernet-Cosma and Ilarie Voronca , as well as by artist-director Armand Pascal (who, in 1920, married Lina Fundoianu). Pană would later note his dominant status within

4460-702: A huge and emotional crowd down the Champs Élysées towards Notre Dame de Paris and made a rousing speech from the Hôtel de Ville . In the 1950s and the 1960s, Paris became one front of the Algerian War for independence; in August 1961, the pro-independence FLN targeted and killed 11 Paris policemen, leading to the imposition of a curfew on Muslims of Algeria (who, at that time, were French citizens). On 17 October 1961, an unauthorised but peaceful protest demonstration of Algerians against

4683-512: A lawyer. Having passed his baccalaureate examination in Bucharest, he was, according to his own account, a registered student at the University of Iași Law School, obtaining a graduation certificate but prevented from becoming a licentiate by the opposition of faculty member A. C. Cuza , the antisemitic political figure. According to a recollection of poet Adrian Maniu , Fondane again worked as

SECTION 20

#1732851987086

4906-497: A literary movement" under Lovinescu's leadership. Nevertheless, before that date, Lovinescu himself had come to criticize his former pupil (a disagreement which echoed his larger conflict with the unu group). Also in the 1930s, Fondane's work received coverage in the articles of two other maverick modernists: Perpessicius , who viewed it with noted sympathy, and Lucian Boz , who found his new poems touched by "prolixity". Back in France, where he had become Shestov's assistant, Fondane

5129-420: A living, agreed to contribute pieces for the party press, and thus briefly associated with Voința Națională (a journal issued by historian and politician Alexandru Dimitrie Xenopol ). Under the pen name Luca , he contributed two theater chronicles. In parallel, he taught classes at the privately run Sfântul Gheorghe High School in Bucharest. This episode of his career ended in 1888, when Maiorescu ascended to

5352-531: A manifesto on modernist music ), and supported Surrealist poet-director Antonin Artaud in his efforts to set up a theater named after Alfred Jarry (which was not, however, an all-Surrealist venue). In this context, he tried to persuade the French Surrealist group to tour his native country and establish contacts with local affiliates. By 1926, Fondane grew disenchanted with the communist alignment proposed by

5575-571: A massive work on Romanian grammar . According to literary historian Tudor Vianu , the relationship between Caragiale and Eminescu partly replicated that between the latter and the Moldavian Ion Creangă . Over that period, Timpul and Eminescu were engaged in a harsh polemic with the Reds, and especially their leader Rosetti. It was also then that Romania entered the Russo-Turkish War as

5798-511: A means to secure her complete independence from the Ottoman Empire . Caragiale reportedly took little interest in editing Timpul over that period, but it is assumed that several unsigned chronicles, covering foreign events, are his contributions (as are two short story adaptations of works by the American author Edgar Allan Poe , both published by Timpul in spring-summer 1878). The newspaper

6021-632: A personal project (reputedly, he was accepted there with a second application, his first one having been rejected in 1929). He worked first as an assistant director, before turning to screenwriting. Preserving his interest in Romanian developments, he visited the Paris set of Televiziune , a Romanian cinema production for which he shared directorial credits. His growing interest in Voronca's own poetry led him to review it for Tudor Arghezi's Bucharest periodical, Bilete de Papagal , where he stated: "Mr. Ilarie Voronca

6244-402: A precaution against the antisemitic measures in the occupied north , he eventually made his way into the more permissive zone libre , and only made returns to Paris in order to collect his books. Throughout this interval, the poet refused to wear the yellow badge (mandatory for Jews), and, living in permanent risk, isolated himself from his wife, adopting an even more precarious lifestyle. He

6467-552: A reaction which surprised and impressed the young author. Although his poems went unpublished, his Iași-themed article A doua capitală ("The Second Capital"), signed Al. Vilara , was featured in an April 1916 issue. A follower of Arghezi, he was personally involved in raising awareness about Arghezi's unpublished verse, the Agate negre ("Black Diamonds") cycle. Remaining close friends with Fondane, Galaction later made persistent efforts of introducing him to critic Garabet Ibrăileanu , with

6690-481: A regular participant in Junimea' s activities, becoming good friends with some of its most important representatives ( Iacob Negruzzi , Vasile Pogor , and Petru Th. Missir ). With Negruzzi, he dramatized Hatmanul Baltag , a short story by Nicolae Gane . He became close to Veronica Micle , a woman writer who was also Eminescu's mistress. For a while, Caragiale and Micle had a love affair, although she continued to see

6913-485: A reply to Roland de Renéville 's monograph Rimbaud le Voyant ("Rimbaud the Seer"), consolidated Fondane's international reputation as a critic and literary historian. In the months after its publication, the book earned much praise from scholars and writers—from Joë Bousquet , Jean Cocteau , Benedetto Croce and Louis-Ferdinand Céline , to Jean Cassou , Guillermo de Torre and Miguel de Unamuno . It also found admirers in

Benjamin Fondane - Misplaced Pages Continue

7136-565: A reputation as a lawyer and judge in Ploiești , and married Ecaterina, the daughter of a merchant from the Transylvanian town of Brașov . Her maiden name was given as Alexovici ( Alexevici ) or as Karaboa ( Caraboa ). She is known to have been Greek herself, and, according to historian Lucian Nastasă, some of her relatives were Hungarian members of the Tabay family. The couple also had

7359-644: A section of Caragiale's fairy tale Kir Ianulea was a likely self-reference: in that fragment of text, the Christian Devil , disguised as an Arvanite trader, is shown taking pride in his Romanian language skills. Investigations carried out by the Center of Theatric Research in Athens , Greece and made public in 2002 offered an alternative take on the Caragiales' origin. According to this perspective, Ștefan Caragiali

7582-548: A series of French-language plays for the National Theater: Alexandre Parodi 's Rome vaincue (it was showcased in late 1877-early 1878), Paul Déroulède 's L'Hetman , and Eugène Scribe 's Une camaraderie . Together with the French republican Frédéric Damé , he also headed a short-lived journal, Națiunea Română . It was also then that he contributed a serialized overview of Romanian theater, published by

7805-447: A street brawl and believe that a revolution is imminent. It was also then that his first memoirs from the world of theater were published, which coincided with the release of Ion Creangă 's own book of memoirs, the well-known volume Amintiri din copilărie . Accompanied by Maiorescu, Caragiale left for Austria-Hungary . In Vienna , the two of them attended a staging of William Shakespeare 's A Midsummer Night's Dream , hosted by

8028-474: A student journal, signing his editorial with the pen name Van Doian , but only produced several handwritten copies of a single issue. Fondane's actual debut dates back to 1914, during the time when he became a student at the National High School Iași and formally affiliated with the provincial branch of the nationwide Symbolist movement . That year, samples of lyric poetry were also published in

8251-707: A sub-tribe of the Celtic Senones , inhabited the Paris area from around the middle of the 3rd century BC. One of the area's major north–south trade routes crossed the Seine on the Île de la Cité , which gradually became an important trading centre. The Parisii traded with many river towns (some as far away as the Iberian Peninsula) and minted their own coins. The Romans conquered the Paris Basin in 52 BC and began their settlement on Paris's Left Bank . The Roman town

8474-694: A teacher at the Romanian Orthodox Church of Saint George. Soon after, he was taught literary Romanian by the Transylvanian-born Bazilie Dragoșescu (whose influence on his use of the language he was to acknowledge in one of his later works). At the age of seven, he witnessed enthusiastic celebrations of the Danubian Principalities ' union, with the election of Moldavia's Alexandru Ioan Cuza as Prince of Wallachia; Cuza's subsequent reforms were to be an influence on

8697-518: A translation of S. Ansky 's The Dybbuk . The troupe ceased its activity in 1923, partly because of significant financial difficulties, and partly because of a rise in antisemitic activities, which put its Jewish performers at risk. For a while, Insula survived as a conference group, hosting modernist lectures on classical Romanian literature—with the participation of Symbolist and post-Symbolist authors such as Aderca, Arghezi, Millian, Pillat, Vinea, N. Davidescu , Perpessicius , and Fondane himself. He

8920-408: A trial with Momuloaia's other relatives, which prolonged itself until the early 20th century. Months after this, his new comedy, O scrisoare pierdută , was first shown to the public. A fresco of conflicting political machines , provincial corruption , petty ambitions, and incoherent demagogy, it was an instant hit with the public. Arguably the high point of Caragiale's career, it became one of

9143-706: A warm friendship with Constantin Brâncuși , the Romanian-born modern sculptor, visiting Brâncuși's workshop on an almost daily basis and writing about his work in Cahiers de l'Étoile . He witnessed first-hand and described Brâncuși's primitivist techniques, likening his work to that of a "savage man". Rimbaud le voyou was eventually published by Denoël & Steele company in 1933, the same year when Fondane published his poetry volume Ulysse (" Ulysses ") with Les Cahiers du Journal des Poètes . The Rimbaud study, partly written as

Benjamin Fondane - Misplaced Pages Continue

9366-517: Is Montmartre at 130 m (427 ft). Excluding the outlying parks of Bois de Boulogne and Bois de Vincennes , Paris covers an oval measuring about 87 km (34 sq mi) in area, enclosed by the 35 km (22 mi) ring road, the Boulevard Périphérique . Paris' last major annexation of outlying territories in 1860 gave it its modern form, and created the 20 clockwise-spiralling arrondissements (municipal boroughs). From

9589-767: Is 450 km (280 mi) southeast of London, 287 km (178 mi) south of Calais , 305 km (190 mi) southwest of Brussels , 774 km (481 mi) north of Marseille , 385 km (239 mi) northeast of Nantes , and 135 km (84 mi) southeast of Rouen . Paris has an oceanic climate within the Köppen climate classification , typical of western Europe. This climate type features cool winters, with frequent rain and overcast skies, and mild to warm summers. Very hot and very cold temperatures and weather extremes are rare in this type of climate. Summer days are usually mild and pleasant, with average temperatures between 15 and 25 °C (59 and 77 °F), and

9812-616: Is at the top of his form. I'm gladly placing my stakes on him." In 1931, the poet married Geneviève Tissier, a trained jurist and lapsed Catholic . Their home on Rue Rollin subsequently became a venue for literary sessions, mostly grouping the Cahiers du Sud contributors. The aspiring author Paul Daniel, who became Rodica Wechsler's husband in 1935, attended such meetings with his wife, and recalls having met Gaultier, filmmaker Dimitri Kirsanoff , music critic Boris de Schlözer , poets Yanette Delétang-Tardif and Thérèse Aubray , as well as Shestov's daughter Natalie Baranoff. Fondane also enjoyed

10035-414: Is believed to be a philosophical essay, Le Lundi existentiel ("The Existential Monday"), on which Fondane was working in 1944. Little is known about Provèrbes ("Proverbs"), which, he announced in 1933, was supposed to be an independent collection of poems. According to various accounts, Fondane made a point of not leaving Paris, despite the growing restrictions and violence. However, others note that, as

10258-719: Is derived from its early inhabitants, the Parisii , a Gallic tribe from the Iron Age and the Roman period . The meaning of the Gaulish ethnonym remains debated. According to Xavier Delamarre , it may derive from the Celtic root pario- ('cauldron'). Alfred Holder interpreted the name as 'the makers' or 'the commanders', by comparing it to the Welsh peryff ('lord, commander'), both possibly descending from

10481-440: Is scarce. Days are cool, and nights are cold but generally above freezing, with low temperatures around 3 °C (37 °F). Light night frosts are quite common, but the temperature seldom dips below −5 °C (23 °F). Paris sometimes sees light snow or flurries with or without accumulation. Paris has an average annual precipitation of 641 mm (25.2 in), and experiences light rainfall distributed evenly throughout

10704-540: Is seen as one of the main representatives of Junimea , an influential literary society with which he nonetheless parted during the second half of his life. His work, spanning four decades, covers the ground between Neoclassicism , Realism , and Naturalism , building on an original synthesis of foreign and local influences. Although few in number, Caragiale's plays constitute the most accomplished expression of Romanian theatre, as well as being important venues for criticism of late-19th-century Romanian society. They include

10927-679: The Junimea society. Through Moses Schwartzfeld, Fondane was also related with socialist journalist Avram Steuerman-Rodion , one of the literary men who nurtured the boy's interest in literature. The young Benjamin was an avid reader, primarily interested in the Moldavian classics of Romanian literature ( Ion Neculce , Miron Costin , Dosoftei , Ion Creangă ), Romanian traditionalists or neoromantics ( Vasile Alecsandri , Ion Luca Caragiale , George Coșbuc , Mihai Eminescu ) and French Symbolists . In 1909, after graduating from School No. 1 (an annex of

11150-537: The comédie en vaudeville tradition. In the end, however, the independent product could not compete with the Hollywood industry, which was at the time monopolizing the French market . In parallel with these events, Fondane followed Shestov's personal guidance and, by means of Cahiers du Sud , attacked philosopher Jean Wahl 's secular reinterpretation of Søren Kierkegaard 's Christian existentialism . Despite selling many copies of his books and having Rapt played at

11373-742: The Amigos del Arte society of Buenos Aires , Fondane left for Argentina and Uruguay in summer 1929. The object of his visit was promoting French cinema with a set of lectures in Buenos Aires, Montevideo and other cities (as he later stated in a Rampa interview with Sarina Cassvan-Pas , he introduced South Americans to the work of Germaine Dulac , Luis Buñuel and Henri Gad ). In this context, Fondane met essayist Eduardo Mallea , who invited him to contribute in La Nación ' s literary supplement. His other activities there included conferencing on Shestov at

SECTION 50

#1732851987086

11596-545: The Burgtheater . He was practically unemployed after returning, and, in 1881, gave up his position at Timpul . Nevertheless, that autumn, V. A. Urechia , Minister of Education in the Ion Brătianu National Liberal cabinet, assigned him the office of inspector general for the Moldavian counties of Suceava and Neamț . Profiting from the proximity between his new residence and Iași, Ion Luca Caragiale became

11819-599: The Champs-Élysées extended the city west to Étoile , while the working-class neighbourhood of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine on the eastern side of the city grew increasingly crowded with poor migrant workers from other regions of France. Paris was the centre of an explosion of philosophic and scientific activity, known as the Age of Enlightenment . Diderot and D'Alembert published their Encyclopédie in 1751, before

12042-785: The College of Sorbonne , and a palace for himself, the Palais-Cardinal . After Richelieu's death in 1642, it was renamed the Palais-Royal . Due to the Parisian uprisings during the Fronde civil war, Louis XIV moved his court to a new palace, Versailles , in 1682. Although no longer the capital of France, arts and sciences in the city flourished with the Comédie-Française , the Academy of Painting, and

12265-545: The English poet David Gascoyne , who was afterward in correspondence with Fondane, and the American novelist Henry Miller . Ulysse itself illustrated Fondane's interest in scholarly issues: he sent one autographed copy to Raïssa Maritain , wife of Jacques Maritain (both of whom were Catholic thinkers). Shortly after this period, the author was surprised to read Voronca's own French-language volume Ulysse dans la cité ("Ulysses in

12488-634: The European Space Agency , the European Banking Authority and the European Securities and Markets Authority . The football club Paris Saint-Germain and the rugby union club Stade Français are based in Paris. The 81,000-seat Stade de France , built for the 1998 FIFA World Cup , is located just north of Paris in the neighbouring commune of Saint-Denis . Paris hosts the annual French Open Grand Slam tennis tournament on

12711-456: The Expressionist tribune Der Sturm published samples of his works, alongside those of nine other Romanian modernists, translated by Leopold Kosch. As Paul Daniel notes, the polemics surrounding Priveliști only lasted for a year, and Fondane was largely forgotten by the Romanian public after this moment. However, the discovery of Fondane's avant-garde stance by traditionalist circles took

12934-442: The French Academy of Sciences . To demonstrate that the city was safe from attack, the king had the city walls demolished and replaced with tree-lined boulevards that would become the Grands Boulevards . Other marks of his reign were the Collège des Quatre-Nations , the Place Vendôme , the Place des Victoires , and Les Invalides . Paris grew in population from about 400,000 in 1640 to 650,000 in 1780. A new boulevard named

13157-489: The Fundoaia estate (which the poet later used as the basis for his signature). Adela was from an intellectual family, of noted influence within the urban Jewish community: her father, poet B. Schwartzfeld, was the owner of a book collection, while her uncles Elias and Moses both had careers in humanities . Adela herself was well acquainted with the intellectual elite of Iași, Jewish as well as ethnic Romanian , and kept recollections of her encounters with authors linked with

13380-427: The Grand Paris project, to integrate Paris more closely with the towns in the region around it. After many modifications, the new area, named the Metropolis of Grand Paris , with a population of 6.7 million, was created on 1 January 2016. In 2011, the City of Paris and the national government approved the plans for the Grand Paris Express , totalling 205 km (127 mi) of automated metro lines to connect Paris,

13603-473: The Iași -based Junimea , the influential literary society which was also a center for anti-National Liberal politics. Initially, Caragiale met with Junimea founder, the critic and politician Titu Maiorescu , during a visit to the house of Dr. Kremnitz, physician to the family of Domnitor Carol I . The doctor's wife and Maiorescu's sister-in-law, Mite Kremnitz , was herself a writer, and later became Eminescu's lover. During several meetings, Caragiale

SECTION 60

#1732851987086

13826-422: The Montgolfier Brothers launched the first manned flight in a hot air balloon on 21 November 1783. Paris was the financial capital of continental Europe, as well the primary European centre for book publishing, fashion and the manufacture of fine furniture and luxury goods. On 22 October 1797, Paris was also the site of the first parachute jump in history, by Garnerin . In the summer of 1789, Paris became

14049-402: The Paris Commune held power for two months, before being harshly suppressed by the French army during the " Bloody Week " at the end of May 1871. In the late 19th century, Paris hosted two major international expositions: the 1889 Universal Exposition , which featured the new Eiffel Tower, was held to mark the centennial of the French Revolution; and the 1900 Universal Exposition gave Paris

14272-412: The Pont Alexandre III , the Grand Palais , the Petit Palais and the first Paris Métro line. Paris became the laboratory of Naturalism ( Émile Zola ) and Symbolism ( Charles Baudelaire and Paul Verlaine ), and of Impressionism in art ( Courbet , Manet , Monet , Renoir ). By 1901, the population of Paris had grown to about 2,715,000. At the beginning of the century, artists from around

14495-402: The Pont des Arts . During the Restoration , the bridges and squares of Paris were returned to their pre-Revolution names; the July Revolution in 1830 (commemorated by the July Column on the Place de la Bastille ) brought to power a constitutional monarch, Louis Philippe I . The first railway line to Paris opened in 1837, beginning a new period of massive migration from the provinces to

14718-400: The Republic of Ploiești — a short-lived stated created by the liberal groups, in an attempt to oust Domnitor Carol I (the future King of Romania ). Later in life, as his opinions veered towards conservatism , Caragiale ridiculed both the attempted coup d'état and his participation in it. He returned to Bucharest later that year, after manager Mihail Pascaly hired him as one of

14941-496: The Romanian repertoire (a goal published as an art manifesto in Contimporanul ), Insula produced mostly conventional Symbolist and Neoclassical plays: its inaugural shows included Legenda funigeilor ("Gossamer Legend") by Ștefan Octavian Iosif and Dimitrie Anghel , one of Lord Dunsany 's Five Plays and (in Fondane's own translation) Molière 's Le Médecin volant . Probably aiming to enrich this program with samples of Yiddish drama , Fondane began, but never finished,

15164-442: The Seine in the city centre has been classified as a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1991. Paris is home to several United Nations organizations including UNESCO, as well as other international organizations such as the OECD , the OECD Development Centre , the International Bureau of Weights and Measures , the International Energy Agency , the International Federation for Human Rights , along with European bodies such as

15387-402: The Siege of Paris (885–886) , for which the then Count of Paris ( comte de Paris ), Odo of France , was elected king of West Francia . From the Capetian dynasty that began with the 987 election of Hugh Capet , Count of Paris and Duke of the Franks ( duc des Francs ), as king of a unified West Francia, Paris gradually became the largest and most prosperous city in France. By the end of

15610-465: The Trei Ierarhi Monastery ), he was admitted into the Alexandru cel Bun secondary school, where he did not excel as a student. A restless youth (he recalled having had his first love affair at age 12, with a girl six years his senior), Fondane twice failed to get his remove before the age of 14. Benjamin divided his time between the city and his father's native region. The latter's rural landscape impressed him greatly, and, enduring in his memory, became

15833-426: The United States and by Victoria Ocampo in Argentina. Paris Paris ( French pronunciation: [paʁi] ) is the capital and largest city of France . With an estimated population of 2,102,650 residents in January 2023 in an area of more than 105 km (41 sq mi), Paris is the fourth-largest city in the European Union and the 30th most densely populated city in

16056-420: The University of Buenos Aires and publishing articles on several subjects (from Shestov's philosophy to the poems of Tzara), but the fees received in return were, in his own account, too small to cover the cost of decent living. In October 1929, Fondane was back in Paris, where he focused on translating and popularizing some of Romanian literature's milestone texts, from Mihai Eminescu 's Sărmanul Dionis to

16279-500: The anthology L'Honneur des poètes ("The Honor of Poets"), published by the Resistance activists as an anti-Nazi manifesto. Fondane also preserved his column in Cahiers du Sud for as long as it was possible, and had his contributions published in several other clandestine journals. After 1941, Fondane became friends with another Romanian existentialist in France, the younger Emil Cioran . Their closeness signaled an important stage in

16502-401: The baritone Agostino Mazzoli, is believed to have been his first contribution to the belles-lettres (as opposed to journalism). In 1896, Macedonski reflected with irony: "As early as 1872, the clients of some beer gardens in the capital have had the occasion to welcome among them of a noisy young man, a bizarre spirit who seemed destined, were he to have devoted himself to letters or

16725-670: The comedies O noapte furtunoasă , Conu Leonida față cu reacțiunea , O scrisoare pierdută , and the tragedy Năpasta . In addition to these, Caragiale authored a large number of essays, articles, short stories, novellas and sketch stories , as well as occasional works of poetry and autobiographical texts such as Din carnetul unui vechi sufleur . In many cases, his creations were first published in one of several magazines he edited — Claponul , Vatra , and Epoca . In some of his later fiction writings, including La hanul lui Mânjoală , Kir Ianulea , Abu-Hasan , Pastramă trufanda and Calul dracului , Caragiale adopted

16948-638: The fantasy genre or turned to historical fiction . Ion Luca Caragiale was interested in the politics of the Romanian Kingdom , and oscillated between the liberal current and conservatism . Most of his satirical works target the liberal republicans and the National Liberals , evidencing both his respect for their rivals at Junimea and his connections with the literary critic Titu Maiorescu . He came to clash with National Liberal leaders such as Dimitrie Sturdza and Bogdan Petriceicu Hasdeu , and

17171-594: The galley proofs , and received instead an irritated reply from manager Al. Ștefănescu; he was eventually featured with poems in three separate issues of Revista Critică . At around that time, he also wrote a memoir of his childhood, Note dintr-un confesional ("Notes from a Confessional "). Around 1915, Fondane was discovered by the journalistic tandem of Tudor Arghezi and Gala Galaction , both of whom were also modernist authors, left-wing militants and Symbolist promoters. The pieces Fondane sent to Arghezi and Galaction's Cronica paper were received with enthusiasm,

17394-576: The poetic drama pieces Philoctète , Les Puits de Maule ("Maule's Well", an adaptation of Nathaniel Hawthorne 's The House of the Seven Gables ) and Le Féstin de Balthazar (" Belshazzar 's Feast"); a study about the life and work of Romanian-born philosopher Stéphane Lupasco ; and the selection from his interviews with Shestov, Sur les rives de l'Illisus ("On the Banks of the Illisus "). His very last text

17617-485: The prompts at the National Theater in the capital, a period about which he reminisced in his Din carnetul unui vechi sufleur . The poet Mihai Eminescu , with whom Ion Luca was to have cordial relations as well as rivalries, had previously been employed for the same position by the manager Iorgu Caragiale. In addition to his growing familiarity with the repertoire , the young Caragiale educated himself by reading

17840-572: The prose poem genre, while Gaultier did the same for his philosophical outlook. The self-exiled debutant was nevertheless still viewing his career with despair, describing it as languishing, and noting that there was a chance of him failing to earn a solid literary reputation. The mid-1920s brought Benjamin Fondane's affiliation with Surrealism , the post-Dada avant-garde current centered in Paris. Fondane also rallied with Belgian Surrealist composers E. L. T. Mesens and André Souris (with whom he signed

18063-556: The third-busiest airport in Europe , and Orly Airport . Opened in 1900, the city's subway system, the Paris Métro , serves 5.23   million passengers daily. It is the second-busiest metro system in Europe after the Moscow Metro . Gare du Nord is the 24th-busiest railway station in the world and the busiest outside Japan , with 262   million passengers in 2015. Paris has one of

18286-432: The xenophobic and antisemitic agenda of Argentine nationalist circles. Centered on the tango , Fondane's film enlisted contributions from some leading figures in several national film and music industries, having Miguel Machinandiarena as producer and John Alton as editor ; in starred, among others, Orestes Caviglia , Miguel Gómez Bao and Iris Marga . The manner in which Tararira approached its subject scandalized

18509-473: The Île Saint-Louis and the larger Île de la Cité , which form the oldest part of Paris. The river's mouth on the English Channel ( La Manche ) is about 233 mi (375 km) downstream from Paris. Paris is spread widely on both banks of the river. Overall, Paris is relatively flat, and the lowest point is 35 m (115 ft) above sea level . Paris has several prominent hills, the highest of which

18732-553: The "most significant and devoted of Shestov's followers". In 1929, as a frequenter of Shestov's circle, Fondane also met Argentinian female author Victoria Ocampo , who became his close friend (after 1931, he became a contributor to her modernist review, Sur ). Fondane's essays were more frequently than before philosophical in nature: Europe published his tribute Shestov (January 1929) and his comments of Edmund Husserl 's phenomenology , which included his own critique of rationalism (June 1930). Invited (on Ocampo's initiative) by

18955-512: The 12th century, Paris had become the political, economic, religious, and cultural capital of France. The Palais de la Cité , the royal residence, was located at the western end of the Île de la Cité. In 1163, during the reign of Louis VII , Maurice de Sully , bishop of Paris, undertook the construction of the Notre Dame Cathedral at its eastern extremity. After the marshland between the river Seine and its slower 'dead arm' to its north

19178-499: The 1860 area of 78 km (30 sq mi), the city limits were expanded marginally to 86.9 km (33.6 sq mi) in the 1920s. In 1929, the Bois de Boulogne and Bois de Vincennes forest parks were annexed to the city, bringing its area to about 105 km (41 sq mi). The metropolitan area is 2,300 km (890 sq mi). Measured from the 'point zero' in front of its Notre-Dame cathedral , Paris by road

19401-495: The Argentine public, and it was eventually rejected by its distributors (no copies survive, but writer Gloria Alcorta , who was present at a private screening, rated it a "masterpiece"). Fondane, who had earlier complained about the actors' resistance to his ideas, left Argentina before the film was actually finished. It was on his return trip that he met Jacques and Raïssa Maritain, with whom he and Geneviève became good friends. With

19624-596: The City"): although puzzled by the similarity of titles with his own collection, he described Voronca as a "great poet." Also then, in Romania, B. Iosif completed the Yiddish translation of Fondane's Psalmul leprosului ("The Leper's Psalm"). The text, left in his care by Fondane before his 1923 departure, was first published in Di Woch , a periodical set up in Romania by poet Yankev Shternberg (October 31, 1934). The 1933 establishment of

19847-704: The Frank , the first king of the Merovingian dynasty , made the city his capital from 508. As the Frankish domination of Gaul began, there was a gradual immigration by the Franks to Paris and the Parisian Francien dialects were born. Fortification of the Île de la Cité failed to avert sacking by Vikings in 845 , but Paris's strategic importance—with its bridges preventing ships from passing—was established by successful defence in

20070-426: The French Surrealist photographers' group was Eli Lotar , the illegitimate son of Arghezi). The "cine-poems" were intentionally conceived as unfilmable screenplays, in what was his personal statement about artistic compromise between experimental film and the emerging worldwide film industry . The book notably comprised his verdict about cinema being "the only art that was never classical." With time, Fondane became

20293-553: The French police and gendarmes arrested 12,884 Jews, including 4,115 children, and confined them during five days at the Vel d'Hiv ( Vélodrome d'Hiver ), from which they were transported by train to the extermination camp at Auschwitz . None of the children came back. On 25 August 1944, the city was liberated by the French 2nd Armoured Division and the 4th Infantry Division of the United States Army . General Charles de Gaulle led

20516-449: The Moldavian teenager, describing him as "a rare bird" and "a poet of talent". The same year, at age 52, Isac Wechsler fell ill with typhus and died in Iași's Sfântul Spiridon Hospital , leaving his family without financial support. At around that time, Fondane began work on the poetry cycle Priveliști ("Sights" or "Panoramas", finished in 1923). In 1918, he became one of the contributors to

20739-584: The National Liberal Ion Ghica . When he asked for an official explanation, O noapte furtunoasă was removed from the season's program. Over the following years, independent troupes staged the play or its plagiarized versions for their own benefit. It was restored to the National Theater's repertoire in 1883, and was so successful that state theaters in cities such as Craiova and Iași made efforts to have it included in their own programs. Caragiale subsequently took part in directing his plays at

20962-422: The National Theater, where his main collaborator was actor and manager Constantin I. Nottara . Together, they are credited with having put a stop to the techniques favored by Mihail Pascaly , replacing emphatic declamation with a more natural and studied perspective on acting. In 1880, he printed Conu Leonida față cu reacțiunea — a play centered on an uncultured "Red" pensioner and his naive wife, who overhear

21185-568: The Panthéon Cinema, Benjamin Fondane was still facing major financial difficulties, accepting a 1936 offer to write and assist in the making of Tararira , an avant-garde musical product of the Argentine film industry . This was his second option: initially, he contemplated filming a version of Ricardo Güiraldes ' Don Segundo Sombra , but met opposition from Güiraldes' widow. While en route to Argentina, he became friends with Georgette Gaucher,

21408-525: The Paramount studios the same year, disappointed with company policies and without having had any screen credit of his own (although, he claimed, there were over 100 Paramount scripts to which he had unsigned contributions). During 1935, he and Kirsanoff were in Switzerland, for the filming of Rapt , with a screenplay by Fondane (adapted from Charles Ferdinand Ramuz 's La séparation des races novel). The result

21631-466: The Place Royale, now Place des Vosges . In spite of Henry IV's efforts to improve city circulation, the narrowness of Paris's streets was a contributing factor in his assassination near Les Halles marketplace in 1610. During the 17th century, Cardinal Richelieu , chief minister of Louis XIII , was determined to make Paris the most beautiful city in Europe. He built five new bridges, a new chapel for

21854-811: The Revolution"), supposed to be delivered in front of the Paris-held International Congress of Writers for the Defense of Culture (organized by left-wing and communist intellectuals with support from the Soviet Union ). According to historian Martin Stanton, Fondane's activity in film, like Jean-Paul Sartre 's parallel beginnings as a novelist, was itself a political statement in support of the Popular Front : "[they were] hoping to introduce critical dimensions in

22077-521: The Revolution, but after 1799 it surged with 160,000 new residents, reaching 660,000 by 1815. Napoleon replaced the elected government of Paris with a prefect that reported directly to him. He began erecting monuments to military glory, including the Arc de Triomphe , and improved the neglected infrastructure of the city with new fountains, the Canal de l'Ourcq , Père Lachaise Cemetery and the city's first metal bridge,

22300-532: The Surrealist venue of Bucharest, which was edited by several of his avant-garde friends at home. His contributions there included a text on Tzara's post-Dada works, which he analyzed as Valéry-like "pure poetry". In December 1928, unu published some of Fondane's messages home, as Scrisori pierdute ("Lost Letters"). Between 1931 and 1934, Fondane was in regular correspondence with the unu writers, in particular Stephan Roll , F. Brunea-Fox and Sașa Pană , being informed about their conflict with Voronca (attacked as

22523-722: The Transylvanian prose writer Ioan Slavici , who were both employed by the paper. This order of events remains unclear, and depends on sources saying that Eminescu was employed by the paper in March 1876. Other testimonies indicate that it was actually Eminescu who arrived last, beginning work in January 1878. Slavici later recalled that three of them engaged in lengthy discussions at Timpul' s headquarters on Calea Victoriei and in Eminescu's house on Sfinților Street, where they planned to co-author

22746-670: The Tuileries Palace. In 1793, as the revolution turned increasingly radical, the king, queen and mayor were beheaded by guillotine in the Reign of Terror , along with more than 16,000 others throughout France. The property of the aristocracy and the church was nationalised , and the city's churches were closed, sold or demolished. A succession of revolutionary factions ruled Paris until 9 November 1799 ( coup d'état du 18 brumaire ), when Napoleon Bonaparte seized power as First Consul. The population of Paris had dropped by 100,000 during

22969-489: The accusation was false, and that only one polemical article on a political topic could be traced back to Caragiale. The young journalist began drifting away from National Liberal politics soon after 1876, when the group came to power with Ion Brătianu as Premier . According to many versions, Eminescu, who was working on the editorial staff of the main Conservative newspaper, Timpul , asked to be joined by Caragiale and

23192-489: The arts, to be entirely original. Indeed, this young man's appearance, his hasty gestures, his sarcastic smile [...], his always irritated and mocking voice, as well as his sophistic reasoning easily attracted attention." Over the following years, Caragiale collaborated on various mouthpieces of the newly created National Liberal Party , and, in May 1877, created the satirical magazine Claponul . Later in 1877, he also translated

23415-400: The arts. Other writers who marked this stage were Creangă, Slavici, Vasile Alecsandri and Vasile Conta —together with Caragiale, they soon became the foremost representatives of Junimea ' s direct influence on literature. To varying degrees, they all complimented the main element of Junimist discourse, Maiorescu criticism of "forms without a foundation"—the concept itself referred to

23638-699: The author the target of critics' interest. As a consequence, Fondane was also sending material to Isac Ludo 's Adam review, most of it notes (some hostile) clarifying ambiguous biographical detail discussed in Aderca's chronicle to Priveliști . His profile within the local avant-garde was also acknowledged in Italy and Germany : the Milanese magazine Fiera Letteraria commented on his poetry, reprinting fragments originally featured in Integral ; in its issue of August–September 1930,

23861-588: The best-known works of its kind in Romanian literature. Maiorescu was pleased by its success, and believed that it was a sign of maturity in Romanian society, which, as he put it, was "starting to laugh" at the National Liberal rhetoric. Ion Luca Caragiale was romantically involved with an unmarried young woman, Maria Constantinescu, who worked for the Bucharest Town Hall — in 1885, she gave birth to Mateiu , whom Caragiale recognized as his son. During

24084-460: The capital of France, was the most populous city of Europe. By comparison, London in 1300 had 80,000 inhabitants. By the early fourteenth century, so much filth had collected inside urban Europe that French and Italian cities were naming streets after human waste. In medieval Paris, several street names were inspired by merde , the French word for "shit". During the Hundred Years' War , Paris

24307-471: The celebrated literary café Les Deux Magots . In the six years before Pascal's 1929 death, Fondane left Gourmont's house and, with his sister and brother-in-law, moved into a succession of houses (on Rue Domat, Rue Jacob, Rue Monge), before settling into a historical building once inhabited by author Bernardin de Saint-Pierre (Rue Rollin, 6). Complaining about eye trouble and exhaustion, and several times threatened with insolvency, Fondane often left Paris for

24530-417: The celebrated play O noapte furtunoasă . The work, ridiculing the petite bourgeoisie ' s mix of liberal values and demagogy over a background of superficial culture, immediately struck a chord with the majority-conservative grouping. Its reception was one of the pivotal moments in the second period of Junimea activities, characterized by the society's expansion to Bucharest and its patronage of

24753-664: The centre stage of the French Revolution . On 14 July, a mob seized the arsenal at the Invalides , acquiring thousands of guns, with which it stormed the Bastille , a principal symbol of royal authority. The first independent Paris Commune , or city council, met in the Hôtel de Ville and elected a Mayor , the astronomer Jean Sylvain Bailly , on 15 July. Louis XVI and the royal family were brought to Paris and incarcerated in

24976-506: The circulation of Romanian literature in France, he received official funds from the Culture Ministry's directorate (at the time headed by Minulescu); in addition, he published unsigned articles in various newspapers, and even relied on handouts from Romanian actress Elvira Popescu (who visited his home, as did avant-garde painter M. H. Maxy ). He also translated into French Zissu's novel Amintirile unui candelabru ("The Recollections of

25199-459: The circumstances of his appointment. In it, he attributed his own rise to the interest Junimea had taken in his work, while defending the literary society, which was, as he put it, "lost from the public eye at a time of political obscurity". Reviewing his own merits as a writer and manager, he elaborated and later put into practice a program for state-run theaters — according to Vianu, it signified "punctuality and rigor". He nonetheless resigned at

25422-529: The city. In 1848, Louis-Philippe was overthrown by a popular uprising in the streets of Paris. His successor, Napoleon III , alongside the newly appointed prefect of the Seine, Georges-Eugène Haussmann , launched a huge public works project to build wide new boulevards, a new opera house, a central market, new aqueducts, sewers and parks, including the Bois de Boulogne and Bois de Vincennes . In 1860, Napoleon III annexed

25645-433: The clash of cultures. Although a Sburătorist , he was still in contact with Galaction and the left-wing circles. In June 1921, Galaction paid homage to "the daring Benjamin" in an article for Adevărul Literar și Artistic , calling attention to Fondane's "overwhelming originality." A year later, Fondane was employed by Vinea's new venue, the prestigious modernist venue Contimporanul . Having debuted in its first issue with

25868-499: The contraction of his family name, and the more elaborate Palicar . He mostly performed basic services for the editorial staff and its printing press , given that, after Luca Caragiali died in 1870, he was the sole provider for his mother and sister. Following his return to Bucharest, he became even more involved with the radical and republican wing of the liberal trend—a movement commonly referred to as "the Reds". As he later confessed, he frequently attended its congresses, witnessing

26091-414: The contribution of Romanian and French authors, various art chronicles, and opinion pieces on social or cultural issues. A special case was his collaboration with Mântuirea , a Zionist periodical founded by Zissu, where, between August and October 1919, he published his studies collection Iudaism și elenism ("Judaism and Hellenism "). These pieces, alternating with similar articles by Galaction, showed how

26314-563: The cultural segments of the Romanian diaspora : around 1924, he and Millian were founding members of the Society of Romanian Writers in Paris, presided upon by the aristocrat Elena Văcărescu . Meanwhile, Fondane acquired a profile on the local literary scene, and, in his personal notes, claimed to have had his works praised by novelist André Gide and philosopher Jules de Gaultier . They both were his idols: Gide's work had shaped his own contribution in

26537-507: The curfew led to violent confrontations between the police and demonstrators, in which at least 40 people were killed. The anti-independence Organisation armée secrète (OAS) carried out a series of bombings in Paris throughout 1961 and 1962. In May 1968, protesting students occupied the Sorbonne and put up barricades in the Latin Quarter . Thousands of Parisian blue-collar workers joined

26760-586: The current (primarily defined by him as an artistic transposition of eternal idealism ), and comprised the slogan: "We are too many not to be strong, and too few not to be intelligent." In May 1920, another of his Rampa contributions spoke out against Octavian Goga , Culture Minister of the Alexandru Averescu executive, who contemplated sacking George Bacovia from his office of clerk. The same year, Lumea Evree published his verse drama fragment Monologul lui Baltazar (" Belshazzar 's Soliloquy"). Around

26983-483: The dramatist to the general public, but also led to a polemic between Maiorescu and the philosopher Constantin Dobrogeanu-Gherea (a Marxist who claimed that Maiorescu was contradicting himself). Dobrogeanu-Gherea argued in favor of Caragiale's work, but considered D-ale carnavalului to be his weakest play. Despite his earlier conflicts with the National Liberals, Caragiale, who still faced problems in making

27206-409: The end of the season, and resumed his literary activities. In January 1889, he married Alexandrina, the daughter of architect Gaetano Burelly. She was a member of the Bucharest elite, which served to improve Ion Luca Caragiale's social standing. They had two children of their own: Luca (known as Luky; born 1893) and Ecaterina (or Tușchi; born 1894; later married name: Logadi). Several years later,

27429-437: The expense of N. D. Popescu-Popnedea , the author of popular almanacs , whose taste he questioned. Soon after, he ridiculed the rising poet Alexandru Macedonski , who had publicized his claim that he was a "Count Geniadevsky", and thus of Polish origin. The article contributed by Caragiale, in which he speculated that Macedonski (referred to with the anagram Aamsky ) was using the name solely because it reminded people of

27652-794: The fact that his sister and brother-in-law (the Pascals) had returned impoverished from an extended stay in Paris , Fondane crossed Europe by train and partly by foot. The writer (who adopted his Francized name shortly after leaving his native country) was eventually joined there by the Pascals. The three of them continued to lead a bohemian and at times precarious existence, discussed in Fondane's correspondence with Romanian novelist Liviu Rebreanu , and described by researcher Ana-Maria Tomescu as "humiliating poverty". The poet acquired some sources of income from his contacts in Romania: in exchange for his contribution to

27875-520: The far right. In 1942, his own Romanian citizenship rights, granted by the Jewish emancipation of the early 1920s, were lost with the antisemitic legislation adopted by the Ion Antonescu regime, which also officially banned his entire work as "Jewish". At around that time, his old friends outside France made unsuccessful efforts to obtain him a safe conduct to neutral countries. Such initiatives were notably taken by Jacques Maritain from his new home in

28098-417: The fields they felt the fascists had colonized." Fondane nevertheless ridiculed the communist version of pacifism as a "parade of big words", noting that it opposed mere slogans to concrete German re-armament . Writing for the film magazine Les Cahiers Jaunes in 1933, he expressed the ambition of creating "an absurd film about something absurd, to satisfy [one's] absurd taste for freedom". Fondane left

28321-541: The first Bishop of Paris: according to legend, when he refused to renounce his faith before the Roman occupiers, he was beheaded on the hill which became known as Mons Martyrum (Latin "Hill of Martyrs"), later " Montmartre ", from where he walked headless to the north of the city; the place where he fell and was buried became an important religious shrine, the Basilica of Saint-Denis , and many French kings are buried there. Clovis

28544-403: The first association between Caragiale and comedian Mihai Mateescu , who went on to portray some of his most popular characters. The play was a hit, and acclaim reached Caragiale despite the fact that he had refused to have his name printed on the posters. Caragiale was soon outraged to discover that, by the second staging, his text had been toned down by the government-appointed Head of Theaters,

28767-460: The first in a series of dementia attacks (owing to a disease that was to kill him in 1889). Caragiale reportedly broke into tears. This succession of events also saw him becoming involved in conflicts among Junimea members: like Pogor, Caragiale objected to the style of Vasile Alecsandri , an aged Junimist poet, and was shocked to find out that he was ridiculing the much younger Eminescu. He thus decided to criticize Alecsandri in public, during

28990-611: The first socialist mayor. He was re-elected in March 2008. In 2007, in an effort to reduce car traffic, he introduced the Vélib' , a system which rents bicycles. Bertrand Delanoë also transformed a section of the highway along the Left Bank of the Seine into an urban promenade and park, the Promenade des Berges de la Seine , which he inaugurated in June 2013. In 2007, President Nicolas Sarkozy launched

29213-599: The first year. Notably, Caragiale was taught history by Constantin Iennescu, who was later the mayor of Ploiești. The young Caragiale opted to follow in his uncles' footsteps, and was taught declamation and mimic art by Costache at the latter's theater school in Bucharest , where he was accompanied by his mother and sister. It is also probable that he was a supernumerary actor for the National Theater Bucharest . He

29436-468: The following years, Fondane was one of the more prolific contributors to that newspaper, and frequently made use of either pseudonyms ( Diomed , Dio , Funfurpan , Const. Meletie ) or initials ( B. F. , B. Fd. , fd. ). These included his January 1916 positive review of Plumb , the first major work by Romania's celebrated Symbolist poet, George Bacovia . In 1917, after Romania joined the Entente side and

29659-544: The form of bemusement or indignation, which lasted into the next decades. The conservative critic Const. I. Emilian , whose 1931 study discussed modernism as a psychiatric condition, mentioned Fondane as one of the leading "extremists", and deplored his abandonment of traditionalist subjects. Some nine years later, the antisemitic far right newspaper Sfarmă-Piatră , through the voice of Ovidiu Papadima , accused Fondane and "the Jews" of having purposefully maintained "the illusion of

29882-555: The front line at the First Battle of the Marne . The city was also bombed by Zeppelins and shelled by German long-range guns . In the years after the war, known as Les Années Folles , Paris continued to be a mecca for writers, musicians and artists from around the world, including Ernest Hemingway , Igor Stravinsky , James Joyce , Josephine Baker , Eva Kotchever , Henry Miller , Anaïs Nin , Sidney Bechet and Salvador Dalí . In

30105-536: The front page of Dimineața daily, which campaigned for Romanian intervention against the Central Powers (they were the first of several contributions Fondane signed with the pen name Alex. Vilara , later Al. Vilara ). His parallel contribution to the Bârlad -based review Revista Critică (originally, Cronica Moldovei ) was more strenuous: Fondane declared himself indignant that the editorial staff would not send him

30328-572: The future critic, who remained one of Fondane's best friends (and whose poetry Fondane proposed for publishing in Revista Noastră ). Late in 1914, Fondane also began his short collaboration with the Iași Symbolist tribune Vieața Nouă . While several of his poems were published there, the review's founder Ovid Densusianu issued objections to their content, and, in their subsequent correspondence, each writer outlines his stylistic disagreements with

30551-486: The group, describing him as the "stooping green-eyed youth from Iași, the standard-bearer of the iconoclasts and rebels of the new generation". The group was occasionally joined by other friends, among them Millian and painter Nicolae Tonitza . In addition, Fondane and Călugăru frequented the artistic and literary club established by the controversial Alexandru Bogdan-Pitești , a cultural promoter and political militant whose influence spread over several Symbolist milieus. In

30774-473: The innermost three departments around Paris, airports and high-speed rail (TGV) stations, at an estimated cost of €35 billion. The system is scheduled to be completed by 2030. In January 2015, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula claimed attacks across the Paris region. 1.5 million people marched in Paris in a show of solidarity against terrorism and in support of freedom of speech. In November of

30997-505: The inspiration for the poems that will later be published in a collection called Priveliști "Landscapes" in Hebrew. As a teenage boy, Fundoianu traveled a lot in the north of Moldova, collected and delved into the local Romanian folklore of the villages, and from that too he was inspired to write songs which, according to his words, he started composing at the age of 8. Wechsler was a Jewish man from Hertsa region , his ancestors having been born on

31220-560: The late 12th century, Philip Augustus extended the Louvre fortress to defend the city against river invasions from the west, gave the city its first walls between 1190 and 1215, rebuilt its bridges to either side of its central island, and paved its main thoroughfares. In 1190, he transformed Paris's former cathedral school into a student-teacher corporation that would become the University of Paris and would draw students from all of Europe. With 200,000 inhabitants in 1328, Paris, then already

31443-457: The latter's career: Cioran was slowly moving away from his fascist sympathies and his antisemitic stance, and, although still connected to the revolutionary fascist Iron Guard , had reintroduced cosmopolitanism to his own critique of Romanian society. In 1943, transcending ideological boundaries, Fondane also had dinner with Mircea Eliade , the Romanian novelist and philosopher, who, like their common friend Cioran, had an ambiguous connection with

31666-428: The lowly position of clerk for the civil registry administration. It is probably during this period that his melodrama O soacră was written and published — Caragiale, who was aware of its faults, indicated that it was a work from his youth, and dated it to 1876. His account is challenged by several details in the text. In June 1883, while visiting Maiorescu's house, he received news that Eminescu had suffered

31889-576: The magazine Chemarea , published in Iași by the leftist journalist N. D. Cocea , with help from Symbolist writer Ion Vinea . In the political climate marked by the Peace of Bucharest and Romania's remilitarization, Fondane used Cocea's publication to protest against the arrest of Arghezi, who had been accused of collaborationism with the Central Powers. In this context, Fondane spoke of Arghezi as being "Romania's greatest contemporary poet" (a verdict which

32112-480: The magazines Valuri and Revista Noastră (whose owner, writer Constanța Hodoș , even offered Fondane a job on the editorial board, probably unaware that she was corresponding with a high school student). Also in 1914, the Moldavian Symbolist venue Absolutio , edited by Isac Ludo , featured pieces he signed with the pen name I. Hașir . Among his National High School colleagues was Alexandru Al. Philippide ,

32335-415: The main Surrealist faction and its mentor, André Breton . Writing at the time, he commented that the ideological drive could prove fatal: "Perhaps never again will [a poet] recover that absolute freedom that he had in the bourgeois republic ." A few years later, the Romanian writer expressed his support for the anti-Breton dissidents of Le Grand Jeu magazine, and was a witness at the 1930 riot which opposed

32558-634: The modern city of Paris was first mentioned in the mid-1st century BC by Julius Caesar as Luteciam Parisiorum (' Lutetia of the Parisii ') and is later attested as Parision in the 5th century AD, then as Paris in 1265. During the Roman period, it was commonly known as Lutetia or Lutecia in Latin, and as Leukotekía in Greek, which is interpreted as either stemming from the Celtic root *lukot- ('mouse'), or from * luto- ('marsh, swamp'). The name Paris

32781-535: The money received in Buenos Aires, the writer contemplated returning on a visit to Romania, but he abandoned all such projects later in 1936, instead making his way to France. He followed up on his publishing activity in 1937, when his selected poems, Titanic , saw print. Encouraged by the reception given to Rimbaud le voyou , he published two more essays with Denoël & Steele: La Conscience malheureuse ("The Unhappy Consciousness", 1937) and Faux traité d'esthétique ("False Treatise of Aesthetics ", 1938). In 1938, he

33004-740: The most sustainable transportation systems and is one of only two cities in the world that received the Sustainable Transport Award twice. Paris is known for its museums and architectural landmarks: the Louvre received 8.9   million visitors in 2023, on track for keeping its position as the most-visited art museum in the world. The Musée d'Orsay , Musée Marmottan Monet and Musée de l'Orangerie are noted for their collections of French Impressionist art. The Pompidou Centre , Musée National d'Art Moderne , Musée Rodin and Musée Picasso are noted for their collections of modern and contemporary art . The historical district along

33227-459: The negative impact of modernization , which, Junimea argued, had by then only benefited the upper strata of Romanian society, leaving the rest with an incomplete and increasingly falsified culture. Ion Luca Caragiale also associated with Junimea' s mouthpiece, Convorbiri Literare , and continued to contribute there even after 1885, when the society began to decline in importance. It was here that all his major comedies were first presented to

33450-705: The new site of the Bibliothèque nationale de France (1996), the Arche de la Défense (1985–1989) in La Défense , as well as the Louvre Pyramid with its underground courtyard (1983–1989); Jacques Chirac (2006), the Musée du quai Branly . In the early 21st century, the population of Paris began to increase slowly again, as more young people moved into the city. It reached 2.25 million in 2011. In March 2001, Bertrand Delanoë became

33673-516: The newspaper România Liberă , in which Caragiale attacked the inferiority of Romanian dramaturgy and the widespread recourse to plagiarism . According to literary historian Perpessicius , the series constituted "one of the most solid critical contributions to the history of our theater". Macedonski later alleged that, in his contributions to the liberal newspapers, the young writer had libeled several Conservative Party politicians—when researching this period, Șerban Cioculescu concluded that

33896-439: The office of Minister of Education in the Teodor Rosetti cabinet (formed by a group of Junimist Conservatives). Caragiale requested to be appointed Head of Theaters, which also implied leadership of the National Theater. Although Maiorescu was initially opposed, Caragiale eventually received the post. The ultimate decision was attributed to Romania's Queen Elisabeth having asked Maiorescu to reconsider, or, alternatively, to

34119-439: The other. During the first two years of World War I and Romania's neutrality , the young poet established new contacts within the literary environments of Iași and Bucharest . According to his brother-in-law and biographer Paul Daniel, "it is amazing how many pages of poetry, translations, prose, articles, chronicles have been written by Fundoianu in this interval." In 1915, four of his patriotic -themed poems were published on

34342-572: The philosophical works of Enlightenment-era philosophes . It was also recorded that, at some point between 1870 and 1872, he was employed in the same capacity by the Moldavian National Theater in Iași . During the period, Caragiale also proofread for various publications and worked as a tutor . Ion Luca made his literary debut in 1873, at the age of 21, with poems and humorous chronicles printed in G. Dem. Teodorescu 's liberal-inspired satirical magazine, Ghimpele . He published relatively few articles under various pen names — among them Car. ,

34565-429: The poet. This caused the friendship between Eminescu and Caragiale to sour. The former was jealous of Cargiale's relations with Micle, while she resented the poet's affair with Mite Kremnitz. Just one year after, Caragiale was moved back to Wallachia, becoming inspector general in Argeș and Vâlcea . He was ultimately stripped of this position in 1884, and found himself on the verge of bankruptcy ; he thus accepted

34788-521: The poetry of Ion Barbu , Minulescu, Arghezi and Bacovia. In the same context, the expatriate writer helped introduce Romanians to some of the new European tendencies, becoming, in the words of literary historian Paul Cernat , "the first important promoter of French Surrealism in Romanian culture." In the mid-1920s, Fondane and painter János Mattis-Teutsch joined the external editorial board of Integral magazine, an avant-garde tribune published in Bucharest by Ion Călugăru , F. Brunea-Fox and Voronca. He

35011-461: The poets George Coșbuc and Mite Kremnitz , the psychologist Constantin Rădulescu-Motru , and the Transylvanian poet and activist Octavian Goga . Ion Luca was the nephew of Costache and Iorgu Caragiale , who were major figures of the 19th century Romanian theatre. His sons Mateiu and Luca were both modernist writers. Ion Luca Caragiale was born into a family of Greek descent, whose members first arrived in Wallachia soon after 1812, during

35234-419: The political choices Caragiale made in his old age. The new ruler visited his primary school later in 1859, being received with enthusiasm by Dragoșescu and all his pupils. Caragiale completed gymnasium at the Sfinții Petru și Pavel school in the city, and never pursued any form of higher education. He was probably enlisted directly in the second grade, as records do not show him to have attended or graduated

35457-456: The population of France. The Paris Region had a nominal GDP of €765 billion (US$ 1.064 trillion when adjusted for PPP ) in 2021, the highest in the European Union. According to the Economist Intelligence Unit Worldwide Cost of Living Survey, in 2022, Paris was the city with the ninth-highest cost of living in the world. Paris is a major railway, highway, and air-transport hub served by two international airports: Charles de Gaulle Airport ,

35680-575: The present-day poems with a political intent, the odes on solemn days, the theatrical compositions for dynastic glorifications are a simulacrum of art, and not the real art. Even patriotism, the most important sense for the citizen of a state in his actions as a citizen, has no place in art as an ad-hoc form of patriotism [...]. Is there a single lyric of French patriotism in Corneille ? Is there any national spouting in Racine ? Is there one in Molière ? Is there one in Shakespeare ? Is there one in Goethe ?" The article played an essential part in reconciling

35903-456: The pseudonym I. G. Ofir , in the local literary review Floare Albastră , whose owner, A. L. Zissu , was later a noted novelist and Zionist political figure. Later research proposed that these, like some other efforts of the 1910s, were collective poetry samples, resulting from a collaboration between Fondane and Groper (the former was probably translating the latter's poetic motifs into Romanian). In 1913, Fondane also tried his hand at editing

36126-406: The public. He did not, however, join Petre P. Carp 's movement, which aimed to consolidate Junimea as a third force in Romanian politics, and remained a staunch independent over the following years. Caragiale was nevertheless associated with the Junimist journal Constituționalul . In early January 1879, O noapte furtunoasă was first staged by the National Theater. Its production brought

36349-638: The purpose of having him published by the Poporanist Viața Românească review, but Ibrăileanu refused to recognize Fondane as an affiliate. Fondane had more success in contacting Flacăra review and its publisher Constantin Banu : on July 23, 1916, it hosted his sonnet Eglogă marină ("Marine Eclogue "). Between 1915 and 1923, Fondane also had a steady contribution to Romanian-language Jewish periodicals ( Lumea Evree , Bar-Kochba , Hasmonaea , Hatikvah ), where he published translations from international representatives of Yiddish literature ( Hayim Nahman Bialik , Semyon Frug , Abraham Reisen etc.) under

36572-502: The realm of far right ideas. By the early 1930s, Fondane was in contact with the mainstream modernist Jacques Rivière and his Nouvelle Revue Française circle. In 1928, his own collaboration with the Surrealists took shape as the book Trois scenarii: ciné-poèmes ("Three Scenarios: Cine-poems"), published by Documents internationaux de l'esprit nouveau collection, with artwork by American photographer Man Ray and Romanian painter Alexandru Brătășanu (one of his other contacts in

36795-442: The red clay of Roland Garros . Paris hosted the 1900 , the 1924 , and the 2024 Summer Olympics . The 1938 and 1998 FIFA World Cups , the 2019 FIFA Women's World Cup , the 2007 Rugby World Cup , as well as the 1960 , 1984 and 2016 UEFA European Championships were held in Paris. Every July, the Tour de France bicycle race finishes on the Avenue des Champs-Élysées in Paris. The ancient oppidum that corresponds to

37018-445: The regular Hollywood films . Exploring what he defined as "the great ballet of contemporary French poetry", Fondane also published individual notes on writers Aragon, Jean Cocteau , Joseph Delteil , Paul Éluard and Pierre Reverdy . In 1927, Integral also hosted one of Fondane's replies to the communist Surrealists in France, as Le surréalisme et la révolution ("Surrealism and Revolution"). He also came into contact with unu ,

37241-426: The required 3,000 francs fee through a public subscription, enlisting particularly large contributions from music producer Renaud de Jouvenel (brother of Bertrand de Jouvenel ) and philosopher-ethnologist Lucien Lévy-Bruhl . Only months after this event, with the outbreak of World War II , Fondane was drafted into the French Army . During most of the " Phoney War " interval, considered too old for active service, he

37464-405: The resort of Arcachon . Claudia Millian, who was also spending time in Paris, described Fondane's new focus on studying Christian theology and Catholic thought, from Hildebert to Gourmont's own Latin mystique (it was also at this stage that the Romanian writer acquired and sent home part of Gourmont's bibliophile collection). He coupled these activities with an interest in grouping together

37687-463: The rule of Prince Ioan Gheorghe Caragea —Ștefan Caragiali, as his grandfather was known locally, worked as a cook for the court in Bucharest . Ion Luca's father, who reportedly originated from the Ottoman capital of Istanbul , settled in Prahova County as the curator of the Mărgineni Monastery (which, at the time, belonged to the Greek Orthodox Saint Catherine's Monastery of Mount Sinai ). Known to locals as Luca Caragiali, he later built

37910-425: The same year, terrorist attacks , claimed by ISIL, killed 130 people and injured more than 350. On 22 April 2016, the Paris Agreement was signed by 196 nations of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in an aim to limit the effects of climate change below 2 °C. Paris is located in northern central France, in a north-bending arc of the river Seine , whose crest includes two islands,

38133-445: The same year, Caragiale's D-ale carnavalului , a lighter satire of suburban morals and amorous misadventures, was received with booing and heckling by members of the public — critics deemed it "immoral", due to its frank depiction of adultery gone unpunished. The controversy saw Maiorescu taking his friend's side and publishing an essay highly critical of National Liberal cultural tenets (titled Comediile domnului Caragiale , it

38356-411: The series of light satires he contributed for the magazine, Caragiale was trying out his style, and thus "entertaining the suburbanites, in order to study them". A piece he authored of the time featured an imaginary barber and amateur artist, Năstase Știrbu, who drew a direct parallel between art, literature and cutting hair—both the theme and the character were to be reused in his later works. Similarly,

38579-565: The setting in several of his poems. The adolescent Fondane took extended trips throughout northern Moldavia, making his debut in folkloristics by writing down samples of the narrative and poetic tradition in various Romanian-inhabited localities. Among his childhood friends was the future Yiddish-language writer B. Iosif, with whom he spent his time in Iași's Podul Vechi neighborhood. In this context, Fondane also met Yiddishist poet Iacob Ashel Groper —an encounter which shaped Fondane's intellectual perspectives on Judaism and Jewish history . At

38802-504: The signatures B. Wechsler , B. Fundoianu and F. Benjamin . Fondane also completed work on a translation of the Ahasverus drama, by the Jewish author Herman Heijermans . His collaboration with the Bucharest-based Rampa (at the time a daily newspaper) also began in 1915, with his debut as theatrical chronicler, and later with his Carpathian -themed series in the travel writing genre, Pe drumuri de munte ("On Mountain Roads"). With almost one signed or unsigned piece per issue over

39025-401: The speeches held by Reds leader C. A. Rosetti ; he thus became intimately acquainted with a Populist discourse, which he later parodied in his works. Working for Ghimpele , he made the acquaintance of republican writer N. T. Orășanu . Several of his articles for Ghimpele were sarcastic in tone, and targeted various literary figures of the day. In June 1874, Caragiale amused himself at

39248-469: The students, and the movement grew into a two-week general strike. Supporters of the government won the June elections by a large majority. The May 1968 events in France resulted in the break-up of the University of Paris into 13 independent campuses. In 1975, the National Assembly changed the status of Paris to that of other French cities and, on 25 March 1977, Jacques Chirac became the first elected mayor of Paris since 1793. The Tour Maine-Montparnasse ,

39471-452: The support offered by the influential Junimist Petre P. Carp . The appointment caused some controversy at the time: Ion Luca Caragiale, unlike all his predecessors (the incumbent C.I. Stăncescu included), was both a professional in the field and a person of modest origins. As the National Liberals intensified their campaign against him, the dramatist drafted an open letter for the Bucharest press, outlining his intentions and explaining

39694-417: The surrounding towns and created eight new arrondissements, expanding Paris to its current limits. During the Franco-Prussian War (1870–1871), Paris was besieged by the Prussian Army . Following several months of blockade, hunger, and then bombardment by the Prussians, the city was forced to surrender on 28 January 1871. After seizing power in Paris on 28 March, a revolutionary government known as

39917-435: The syllable ca twice in a row, which is generally avoided in Romanian due to its scatological connotations. It has however become one of the few cacophonies accepted by the Romanian Academy . Born in the village of Haimanale , Prahova County (the present-day I. L. Caragiale commune , Dâmbovița County ), Caragiale was educated in Ploiești. During his early years, as he later indicated, he learned reading and writing with

40140-415: The tallest building in the city at 57 storeys and 210 m (689 ft) high, was built between 1969 and 1973. It was highly controversial, and it remains the only building in the centre of the city over 32 storeys high. The population of Paris dropped from 2,850,000 in 1954 to 2,152,000 in 1990, as middle-class families moved to the suburbs. A suburban railway network, the RER (Réseau Express Régional),

40363-725: The theatrical troupe Insula ("The Island"), which stated its commitment to avant-garde theater . Probably named after Minulescu's earlier Symbolist magazine, the group was likely a local replica of Jean Copeau 's nonconformist productions in France. Hosted by the Maison d'Art galleries in Bucharest, the company was joined by, among others, actresses Lina Fundoianu-Pascal and Victoria Mierlescu , and director Sandu Eliad . Other participants were writers (Cocea, Pană, Zissu, Scarlat Callimachi , Mărgărita Miller Verghy , Ion Pillat ) and theatrical people ( George Ciprian , Marietta Sadova , Soare Z. Soare , Dida Solomon , Alice Sturdza , Ionel Țăranu ). Although it stated its goal of revolutionizing

40586-420: The throne Henry IV , after converting to Catholicism to gain entry to the capital, entered the city in 1594 to claim the crown of France. This king made several improvements to the capital during his reign: he completed the construction of Paris's first uncovered, sidewalk-lined bridge, the Pont Neuf , built a Louvre extension connecting it to the Tuileries Palace , and created the first Paris residential square,

40809-428: The time of his relocation to Bucharest, Fondane first met the moderate modernist critic Eugen Lovinescu , and afterward became both an affiliate of Lovinescu's circle and a contributor to his literary review Sburătorul . Among his first contributions there was a retrospective coverage of the boxing match between Jack Dempsey and Georges Carpentier , which comprised his reflections on the mythical power of sport and

41032-564: The time, Fondane became known to his family and friends as Mielușon (from miel , Romanian for "lamb", and probably in reference to his bushy hairdo), a name which he later used as a colloquial pseudonym. Although Fondane later claimed to have started writing poetry at age eight, his earliest known contributions to the genre date from 1912, including both pieces of his own and translations from such authors as André Chénier , Joseph Freiherr von Eichendorff , Heinrich Heine and Henri de Régnier . The same year, some of these were published, under

41255-487: The tract O lămurire despre simbolism ("An Explanation of Symbolism"). In 1919, upon the war's end, Benjamin Fondane settled in Bucharest, where he stayed until 1923. During this interval, he frequently changed domicile: after a stay at his sister Lina's home in Obor area, he moved on Lahovari Street (near Piața Romană ), then in Moșilor area, before relocating to Văcărești (a majority Jewish residential area, where he lived in two successive locations), and ultimately to

41478-427: The two factions. His anti-communist discourse was again aired in 1932: commenting on indictment of Surrealist poet Louis Aragon for communist texts (read by the authorities as instigation to murder), Fondane stated that he did believe Aragon's case was covered by the freedom of speech . His ideas also brought him into conflict with Pierre Drieu La Rochelle , who was moving away from an avant-garde background and into

41701-434: The wake of the 1907 Romanian Peasants' Revolt , and ultimately joined the Conservative-Democratic Party of Tache Ionescu . He was both a friend and rival to writers such as Mihai Eminescu, Titu Maiorescu, and Barbu Ștefănescu Delavrancea , while maintaining contacts with, among others, the Junimist essayist Iacob Negruzzi , the socialist philosopher Constantin Dobrogeanu-Gherea , the literary critic Paul Zarifopol ,

41924-449: The word "genius", was the first act in a long polemic between the two literary figures. Caragiale turned Aamsky into a character on his own, envisaging his death as a result of overwork in editing magazines "for the country's political development". Caragiale also contributed poetry to Ghimpele : two sonnets , and a series of epigrams (one of which was another attack on Macedonski). The first of these works, an 1873 sonnet dedicated to

42147-523: The world in 2022. Since the 17th century, Paris has been one of the world's major centres of finance , diplomacy , commerce , culture , fashion , and gastronomy . Because of its leading role in the arts and sciences and its early adaptation of extensive street lighting, it became known as the City of Light in the 19th century. The City of Paris is the centre of the Île-de-France region , or Paris Region, with an official estimated population of 12,271,794 inhabitants in January 2023, or about 19% of

42370-431: The world including Pablo Picasso , Modigliani , and Henri Matisse made Paris their home. It was the birthplace of Fauvism , Cubism and abstract art , and authors such as Marcel Proust were exploring new approaches to literature. During the First World War , Paris sometimes found itself on the front line; 600 to 1,000 Paris taxis played a small but highly important symbolic role in transporting 6,000 soldiers to

42593-465: The writer considered all references to his lineage to be insults. On several occasions, he preferred to indicate that he was "of obscure birth". Nevertheless, as literary critic Tudor Vianu noted, Caragiale's outlook on life was explicitly Balkanic and Oriental , which, in Vianu's view, mirrored a type "which must have been found in his lineage". A similar opinion was expressed by Paul Zarifopol , who speculated that Caragiale's conservative mindset

42816-401: The year. Paris is known for intermittent, abrupt, heavy showers. The highest recorded temperature was 42.6 °C (108.7 °F), on 25 July 2019. The lowest was −23.9 °C (−11.0 °F), on 10 December 1879. For almost all of its long history, except for a few brief periods, Paris was governed directly by representatives of the king, emperor, or president of France. In 1974, Paris

43039-423: The years after the peace conference , the city was also home to growing numbers of students and activists from French colonies and other Asian and African countries, who later became leaders of their countries, such as Ho Chi Minh , Zhou Enlai and Léopold Sédar Senghor . On 14 June 1940, the German army marched into Paris, which had been declared an " open city ". On 16–17 July 1942, following German orders,

43262-611: The young man's views in cultural anthropology had been shaped by his relationship with Groper (with whom he nevertheless severed all contacts by 1920). Fondane also renewed his collaboration with Rampa . He and another contributor to the magazine, journalist Tudor Teodorescu-Braniște , carried out a debate in the magazine's pages: Fondane's articles defended Romanian Symbolism against criticism from Teodorescu-Braniște, and offered glimpse into his personal interpretation of Symbolist attitudes. One piece he wrote in 1919, titled Noi, simboliștii ("Us Symbolists") stated his proud affiliation to

43485-402: Was a Romanian playwright, short story writer, poet, theater manager, political commentator and journalist. Leaving behind an important cultural legacy, he is considered one of the greatest playwrights in Romanian language and literature , as well as one of its most important writers and a leading representative of local humour . Alongside Mihai Eminescu , Ioan Slavici and Ion Creangă , he

43708-421: Was a highly poetic production, and, despite Fondane's still passionate defense of silent film , the first talkie in Kirsanoff's career. The poet was enthusiastic about this collaboration, claiming that it had enjoyed a good reception from Spain to Canada , standing as a manifesto against the success of more "chatty" sound films. In particular, French critics and journalists hailed Rapt as a necessary break with

43931-470: Was a lifelong adversary of the Symbolist poet Alexandru Macedonski . As a result of these conflicts, the most influential of Caragiale's critics barred his access to the cultural establishment for several decades. During the 1890s, Caragiale rallied with the radical movement of George Panu , before associating with the Conservative Party . After having decided to settle in Berlin , he came to voice strong criticism for Romanian politicians of all colours in

44154-424: Was a native of Kefalonia , and his original surname, Karaialis , was changed on Prince Caragea's request. Various authors also believe that Caragiale's ancestors were Albanian or Aromanian . Originally, Ion Luca was known as Ioanne L. Caragiali . His family and friends knew him as Iancu or, rarely, Iancuțu —both being antiquated hypocoristics of Ion . The definitive full version of his name features

44377-401: Was actually issued as a collaborative effort, which makes it hard to identify the authors of many other articles. According to Slavici, Caragiale occasionally completed unfinished contributions by Eminescu whenever the latter had to leave unexpectedly. He concentrated instead on Claponul , which he edited and wrote single-handedly for the duration of the war. Zarifopol believed that, through

44600-415: Was asked by Maiorescu to write down a series of aphorisms in an album. His concise musings are contemplative in tone, and some of them have been construed by some present-day reviewers to contain evidence of misanthropy and, to a certain degree, misogyny . In 1878, Caragiale and Maiorescu left for Iași, where they attended Junimea ' s 15th anniversary, and where Caragiale read his first draft of

44823-418: Was assigned a permanent column, known as Fenêtres sur l'Europe/Ferestre spre Europa (French and Romanian for "Windows on Europe"). With Barbu Florian , Fondane became a leading film reviewer for the magazine, pursuing his agenda in favor of non-commercial and "pure" films (such as René Clair 's Entr'acte ), and praising Charlie Chaplin for his lyricism , but later making some concessions to talkies and

45046-439: Was at the time working on his own play, Filoctet (" Philoctetes ", later finished as Philoctète ). In 1923, Benjamin Fondane eventually left Romania for France, spurred on by the need to prove himself within a different cultural context. He was at the time interested in the success of Dada , an avant-garde movement launched abroad by the Romanian-born author Tristan Tzara , in collaboration with several others. Not dissuaded by

45269-483: Was beginning work on other books: the essay on 19th-century poet Arthur Rimbaud — Rimbaud le voyou ("Rimbaud the Hoodlum")—and, despite an earlier pledge not to return to poetry, a new series of poems. His eponymously titled study-portrait of German philosopher Martin Heidegger was published by Cahiers du Sud in 1932. Despite his earlier rejection of commercial films, Fondane eventually became an employee of Paramount Pictures , probably spurred on by his need to finance

45492-424: Was built to complement the Métro; the Périphérique expressway encircling the city, was completed in 1973. Most of the postwar presidents of the Fifth Republic wanted to leave their own monuments in Paris; President Georges Pompidou started the Centre Georges Pompidou (1977), Valéry Giscard d'Estaing began the Musée d'Orsay (1986); President François Mitterrand had the Opéra Bastille built (1985–1989),

45715-410: Was captured by the Germans in June 1940 (shortly before the fall of France ), and was taken into a German camp as a prisoner of war . He managed to escape captivity, but was recaptured in short time. After falling ill with appendicitis , he was transported back to Paris, kept in custody at the Val-de-Grâce , and operated on. Fondane was eventually released, the German occupiers having decided that he

45938-489: Was disputed by several other researchers, who noted that the family had a good social standing. Ion Luca Caragiale was discreet about his ethnic origin for the larger part of his life. In parallel, his foreign roots came to the attention of his adversaries, who used them as arguments in various polemics. As his relations with Caragiale degenerated into hostility, Mihai Eminescu is known to have referred to his former friend as "that Greek swindler". Aware of such treatment,

46161-466: Was filled in from around the 10th century, Paris's cultural centre began to move to the Right Bank. In 1137, a new city marketplace (today's Les Halles ) replaced the two smaller ones on the Île de la Cité and Place de Grève (Place de l'Hôtel de Ville) . The latter location housed the headquarters of Paris's river trade corporation, an organisation that later became, unofficially (although formally in later years), Paris's first municipal government. In

46384-566: Was granted municipal autonomy by the National Assembly. The first modern elected mayor of Paris was Jacques Chirac , elected March 1977, becoming the city's first mayor since 1871 and only the fourth since 1794. The current mayor is Anne Hidalgo , a socialist , first elected in April 2014 , and re-elected in June 2020 . Ion Luca Caragiale Ion Luca Caragiale ( Romanian pronunciation: [iˈon ˈluka karaˈdʒjale] ; 13 February [ O.S. 30 January] 1852 – 9 June 1912), commonly referred to as I. L. Caragiale ,

46607-470: Was hosted by specialized venues such as Revue Philosophique , Schweizer Annalen and Carlo Suarès ' Cahiers de l'Étoile . After a long period of indecision, the Romanian poet became a dedicated follower of Lev Shestov , a Russian -born existentialist thinker whose ideas about the eternal opposition between faith and reason he expanded upon in later texts. According to intellectual historian Samuel Moyn , Fondane was, with Rachel Bespaloff , one of

46830-460: Was in the military reserve force , but in February 1940 was called under arms with the 216 Artillery Regiment . According to Lina, "he left [home] with unimaginable courage and faith." Stationed at the Sainte Assise Castle in Seine-Port , he edited and stenciled a humorous gazette, L'Écho de la I C-ie ("The 1st Company Echo"), where he also published his last-ever work of poetry, Le poète en patrouille ("The Poet on Patrolling Duty"). Fondane

47053-441: Was invaded by the Central Powers, Fondane was in Iași, where the Romanian authorities had retreated. It was in this context that he met and befriended the doyen of Romanian Symbolism, poet Ion Minulescu . Minulescu and his wife, author Claudia Millian , had left their home in occupied Bucharest, and, by spring 1917, hosted Fondane at their provisional domicile in Iași. Millian later recalled that her husband had been much impressed by

47276-465: Was later to be approved of by mainstream critics). According to one account, Fondane also worked briefly as a fact checker for Arena , a periodical managed by Vinea and N. Porsenna . His time with Chemarea also resulted in the publication of his Biblical -themed short story Tăgăduința lui Petru (" Peter's Denial "). Issued by Chemarea ' s publishing house in 41 bibliophile copies (20 of which remained in Fondane's possession), it opened with

47499-434: Was no longer fit for soldierly duty. He was working on two poetry series, Super Flumina Babylonis (a reference to Psalm 137 ) and L'Exode ("The Exodus"), as well as on his last essay, focusing on 19th-century poet Charles Baudelaire , and titled Baudelaire et l'expérience du gouffre ("Baudelaire and the Experience of the Abyss"). In addition to these, his other French texts, incomplete or unpublished by 1944, include:

47722-400: Was not able to find full employment in this field, and, around the age of 18, worked as a copyist for the Prahova County Tribunal. Throughout his life, Caragiale refused to talk about his training in the theater, and hid it from the people closest to him (including his wife Alexandrina Burelly, who came from an upper middle class environment). In 1866, Caragiale witnessed Cuza's toppling by

47945-554: Was occupied by England-friendly Burgundian forces from 1418, before being occupied outright by the English when Henry V of England entered the French capital in 1420; in spite of a 1429 effort by Joan of Arc to liberate the city, it would remain under English occupation until 1436. In the late 16th-century French Wars of Religion , Paris was a stronghold of the Catholic League , the organisers of 24 August 1572 St. Bartholomew's Day massacre in which thousands of French Protestants were killed. The conflicts ended when pretender to

48168-505: Was of particular importance, serving to explain his political choices and alleged social bias. On one occasion, Caragiale mentioned that his paternal grandfather was "a Greek cook". In several contexts, he referred to his roots as being in the island of Hydra . In one of his photographs, he posed in Oriental costume and sitting cross-legged, which was interpreted by Vianu as an additional reference to his Balkan background. Two of his biographers, Zarifopol and Șerban Cioculescu , noted that

48391-430: Was originally called Lutetia (more fully, Lutetia Parisiorum , "Lutetia of the Parisii", modern French Lutèce ). It became a prosperous city with a forum, baths, temples, theatres, and an amphitheatre . By the end of the Western Roman Empire , the town was known as Parisius , a Latin name that would later become Paris in French. Christianity was introduced in the middle of the 3rd century AD by Saint Denis ,

48614-660: Was possibly owed to the "lazyness of one true Oriental" (elsewhere, he referred to the writer as "a lazy southerner, fitted with definitely supranormal intelligence and imagination"). In his main work on the history of Romanian literature, George Călinescu included Caragiale among a group of "Balkan" writers, whose middle class status and often foreign origin, he argued, set them apart irrespective of their period—others in this category were, in chronological order, Anton Pann , Tudor Arghezi , Ion Minulescu , Urmuz , Mateiu Caragiale , and Ion Barbu . In contrast, critic Garabet Ibrăileanu proposed that Caragiale's Wallachian origin

48837-439: Was probably the first Romanian study of Marcel Proust 's contribution as a novelist. The author announced that he was planning a similar volume, grouping essays about Romanian writers, both modernists (Minulescu, Bacovia, Arghezi, Maniu, Galaction) and classics ( Alexandru Odobescu , Ion Creangă , Constantin Dobrogeanu-Gherea , Anton Pann ), but this work was not published in his lifetime. Also in 1922, Fondane and Pascal set up

49060-435: Was sent to the gas chamber during the last wave of the Holocaust . His work was largely rediscovered later in the 20th century, when it became the subject of scholarly research and public curiosity in both France and Romania. In the latter country, this revival of interest also sparked a controversy over copyright issues . Fondane was born in Iași , the cultural capital of Moldavia, on November 14, 1898, but, as he noted in

49283-436: Was still in contact with writers of various ethnic backgrounds, and active on the clandestine literary scene. In this context, Fondane stated his intellectual affiliation to the French Resistance : his former Surrealist colleague Paul Éluard published several of his poems in the pro-communist Europe , under the name of Isaac Laquedem (a nod to the Wandering Jew myth). Such pieces were later included, but left unsigned, in

49506-425: Was to be reprinted in 1889, as a preface to Caragiale's collected plays). In it, the critic, who was influenced by the ideas of Arthur Schopenhauer , argued that Caragiale had not failed in uplifting the human spirit, precisely because he had risen above both didacticism and egotism ( see Arthur Schopenhauer's aesthetics ). In reference to accusations that the play was unpatriotic , Maiorescu answered: "[...]

49729-516: Was working on a collected edition of his Ferestre spre Europa , supposed to be published in Bucharest but never actually seeing print. At around that date, Fondane was also a presenter for the Romanian edition of 20th Century Fox 's international newsreel , Movietone News . In 1939, Fondane was naturalized French . This followed an independent initiative of the Société des écrivains français professional association, in recognition for his contribution to French letters. Cahiers du Sud collected

#85914