with verse, first under the name of Erotocrit and then slightly changed
as Filerot şi Antusa. Anton Pann printed it as his own composition.
Kritil şi Andronius (Jassy, 1794) is almost the last novel or story
translated direct from the Greek. The young men of Walachia had
come into contact with Western literature, which they were anxious
to transplant to their own country. Some had been sent to Paris
for their education, such as Poteca, Marcovici, the Voinescus, Moroiu
and others, who developed an almost feverish activity in translation.
Most of the writings of Florian, Marmontel, Le Sage, Montesquieu
and others were rapidly translated into Rumanian. The picaresque
novel Lazarillo de Tormes also found its translator, and appeared
in 1839, Paul and Virginia in 1831. Campe's German Robinson
Crusoe (1816) and his Discovery of America were translated by
Draghici (1835). G. Asaki and Alexander Bcidiman in Moldavia
developed a similar activity. Beldiman copied a number of ancient
chronicles, wrote a satire on the Greeks, and translated and adapted
a number of French tragedies and dramas, in verse and prose.
Nowhere has the theatre played a more important rôle in the history of civilization than in Walachia and Moldavia, more in the The Drama. former than in the latter. It formed the rallying-ground for the new generation which chafed under the tyranny of a Greek court. A certain Aristia, of Greek origin, but soon acclimatized to his surroundings as teacher at the high school in Bucharest, was the first to adapt foreign dramas for the Rumanian stage. These were first performed in Greek and afterwards translated into Rumanian. The plays produced on the Rumanian stage included most of the dramas of Molière, some of Corneille, Kotzebue and Metastasio, whose Achille in Schiro was the first drama translated into Rumanian (by Iordache Slǎtineau, printed at Şibiu in 1797). Schiller was also translated, and a few plays of Shakespeare (Hamlet, &c.) from a French version. Victor Hugo's Angelo and Maria Tudor were translated by Constantin Negruţin. Those who kept in touch with the old literature—men such as Beldiman, Marcovici and Negruţin—were able even in their metrical translations to do justice to the originals and at the same time not to distort the character of the Rumanian language. Among such translators was Skavinschi, who came originally from Transylvania to Jassy, and translated Regnald's Democrit into verse.
The lyrical and epic poetry of the time follows somewhat the same lines, but with certain notable differences. The individuality Poetry. of the authors is more marked, and they advance much sooner from translations to independent poetry. Transylvania, which awoke to a new life towards the end of the 18th century, produced some of the most popular poets. Among them were Vasile Aaron (1770-1822) and Ion Barak (1779-1848). Aaron wrote the Passion, in 10,000 verses (1802; often reprinted); the lyrical romances of Piram şi Tisbe (1808) and Sofronim şi Hariti (1821); and the humorous Leonat şi Dorofata, a satire on bad women and on drunken husbands, now a chapbook. Barak wrote Rǎsipirea Ierusalimului (1821), “The Destruction of Jerusalem,” almost as long as Aaron's Passion; and he versified a Magyar folktale, Argkir şi Elena, which has also become a chapbook, and has been interpreted as a political poem with a hidden meaning. He also translated the Arabian Nights from the German. In Walachia a certain Ion Budai Deleanu, a man of great learning, author of a hitherto unpublished Rumanian dictionary of great value, wrote a satirical epos in which gipsies play the chief part. It is called Ţiganiafa (1812) and consists of 12 songs and of many thousand verses. The author displays a profound knowledge of the life and the customs of the gipsies, and of Western literature from the Batrachomyomachia to the Pucelle of Voltaire.
The love-songs of the time are primitive imitations of the Neo-Greek lyric dithyrambs and rhapsodies, which through the teaching of the princes of Walachia were considered as the fountainhead of poetical inspiration. But a closer acquaintance with the West led to greater independence in poetical composition. In the three generations of the Vacarescu one can follow this process of rapid evolution. Ianache Vacarescu, author of the first native Rumanian grammar on independent lines, was also the first who tried his hand at poetry, following Greek examples. He then studied Italian, French and German poetry, and made translations from Voltaire and Goethe. His son Alecu (b. 1795) followed his example. Both were overshadowed by the grandson Ioan (b. 1818), who was more than any other man both the representative of an epoch fast vanishing and the harbinger of the new spirit that was stirring young Rumania. The collected poems of I. Vacarescu were published in 1848; but among them were some of the poems of Ianache and Alecu, which were confused with his own work. In this volume, Colecţie din poeziile domnului mare logofet I. Vacarescu, there are odes, hymns, patriotic poems, ballads, lyrical and didactic poems, some of them among the most beautiful in the language. A contemporary of his earlier period, Paris Mumuleanu (1794-1837), wrote his Rost de poezie (1820) under Greek influence, but afterwards passed under the spell of Maior and Tzikindea, whose Latin propaganda he was one of the first to advocate in Rumania. In his Caractere (Bucharest, 1828) Latin forms are common. One more poet, and a real one, is Vasile Cǎrlova (1809-1831), whose Ruins of Tĭrgovishtea sufficed to place him among the foremost Rumanian poets of the 19th century.
In Moldavia a similar development took place, translations leading up to independent production. The most prominent figure is that of the scholar and linguist Constantin Konaki (1777-1849), who might be termed the Rumanian Longfellow for the facility and felicity of his translations from Western poetry and for his short poems, easily set to music and very popular. His Alcǎtuiri şi tǎlmǎciri appeared in 1858. Constantin Negrutin, who was at first influenced by the Russian poets, notably Pushkin, successfully translated poems of Victor Hugo, and rivalled Konaki in his dexterity and fidelity to the original.
Third Period: 1830-.—The agitation for the transliteration of the alphabet, the elimination of all non-Latin words from the language and the ostracism of the old literature, completely crippled all literary activity, first in Transylvania and then in Rumania. The Latin movement was first brought into Walachia by a certain George Lazar from across the mountains. Lazar was appointed teacher at the St Sava school of Bucharest, where he spread the new doctrine of the Latin origin of the Rumanians; Latinizing tendencies were, however, not yet imported into the language. Of his pupils there was one whose influence became decisive: Ion Eliade (Heliade), Eliade. afterwards also known as I. E. Radulescu (1802-1872), a man of immense activity, of great power of initiative and of still greater imagination. He it was who ushered in the new epoch, and for close upon forty years he stood at the head of almost every literary undertaking.
There were two periods in his life—the latter the exact opposite and negation of the former. Up to 1848 he was closely connected with politics, the theatre and the school—he was the successor to Lazar; he wrote grammars, and the introductions to his grammars are models of lucidity, combined with a wide historical view. He was the founder of the first political and literary review, and he had a genius for discovering talent, and the merit of assisting it. Through his reviews he trained the middle-class to read and to take an active interest in literary problems. Through his Curier de ambe sexe (1837-41) he disseminated translations from political and other works, thus paving the way for the political change of 1848. About this time he turned to philology, and fell under the spell of the Transylvanian school. Slowly he developed his theories about language and writing, and he ended as a fanatic wedded to extraordinary views. He was a prolific writer and translator of dramas and novels from French and Italian, the latter appearing mostly in his periodical. The number of his publications is legion.
All the prominent Rumanians of that period were politicians; they strove to obtain the emancipation of the country from Turkish Bolintineanu. dominion, and, later on, the union of Walachia and Moldavia. Everything was placed at the service of this national aspiration, which is the keynote of the poems of Bolintineanu (1826-1873). He also was discovered by Radulescu, who published his first and best known poem, “The Dying Virgin.” In 1848 he was exiled, together with the other leaders of the revolution, and he spent the next nine years in travels in the East. There he gathered the materials for his lyrical poems “Macedonele” and “Florile Bosforului?” Returning in 1857 to Walachia, he occupied high administrative posts, and he wrote a number of historical novels (Traian, Mircea, Ştefan, &c.), dramas (Lǎpuşneanu, Mihnea, Mihaiu, &c.), longer poems (Sorin, Conrad), and his politico-philosophical novel Elena. These mostly patriotic compositions were as a rule less felicitous than his political satires (Nemesis, Menade, &c.). His peculiar strength lay in the historical ballad, which he was the first to introduce into Rumanian poetry, and in the vivid portraiture of Oriental scenery and emotions. He died in a lunatic asylum forgotten by all, and even his writings have, save in one early edition, not been published without unwarranted alterations by the editor Sion.
A contemporary of Bolintineanu was Grigorie Alexandrescu (1812-1885), also a pupil of Eliade. Imperfect in his rhyme and G. Alexandrescu. rhythm, his poetry is of a didactical nature, and his best poems are rhymed fables, many of which are thinly disguised political satires. He also translated the Alzire (1834) and Mérope (1847) of Voltaire. Among his contemporaries may be mentioned G. Creţeanu (1829-1887) and A. Sihleanu (1834-1857), who left some weak poems of a sentimental and patriotic character. A Deparaţianu (1835-1865), whose language shows traces of the new Latinizing school; and Nicolae Nicoleanu (1833-1871), whose powerful poems, full of deep and often mystical reflections, lead on from Alexandrescu to Eminescu, all three being the poets of pessimism. In Teodor Şerbǎnescu (b. 1839) we find the reflex of Bolintineanu of the earlier period, in the beauty and simplicity of his lyrical poems not yet published in complete form. Like Şerbǎnescu, Vasile Alecsandri (1821-1890), the greatest of Rumanian lyrical poets (see Alecsandri), was a Moldavian. In France, under the influence of Beranger and the romantic school, he was led to turn to popular
