Archive

Radu Cosaşu’s The Survivals takes place in Romania immediately after the Second World War. The newly installed communist regime had come to power by means of massive electoral fraud. Telling stories of everyday life, Cosaşu paints a world turned upside down. Although it is more than that, the ...

Mircea Horia Simionescu

With Luther on the Fork

December 01, 2008

Translated by: Patrick Camiller

MAURICE PRINTEMPS: Pope Clement XII and the Blow on the Head. – After describing the splendour of the papal court, Maurice Printemps – who lived in the Vatican for fifteen years doing research in the archives – draws an admirable portrait of the great Clement XII. Remarkably fine ...

Reviews / Essays | Mircea Horia Simionescu

The Artist Doesn’t Need Peace and Quiet

December 01, 2008

Translated by: Jean Harris

“It’s a farce! Someone told you, I’m 80 years old? I’ve heard that rumor’s going around town myself, but I’m telling you, it’s not true! I haven’t hit 80. If you want to believe I’m 80, that’s your business or the newspaper’s.” You turned 80 on January 23, 2008. How ...

Reviews / Essays | Mircea Nedelciu

Mircea Nedelciu : A Brief Introduction

November 01, 2008

Critic: Sanda Cordoş

Translated by: Alistair Ian Blyth

Mircea Nedelciu died shortly before the age of forty-nine. He lived under a totalitarian regime for thirty-nine years, and he confronted illness and death for the last ten years of his life. Born on 12 November 1950, in Fundulea where his parents worked the land, Nedelciu attended the village high ...

Mircea Nedelciu

The Controlled Echo Effect

November 01, 2008

Translated by: Florin Bican

A thick glass tumbler, chipped around the rim, brimming with wine the colour of cooking oil, the glaring light of a desk lamp, a stack of white paper, the noise of faucets reverberating through pipes all over the building, a door left ajar, the entrance hall, a second door left ajar can be seen ...

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About this issue

This July, The Observer Translation Project leaves its usual format to present a special CRISIS ISSUE. Things are tough all over. Hard Times suddenly feels like the book of the moment. The global economic crisis impacts life as we know it, and viewed from Bucharest the effects reverberate in domains that include geo-politics and publishing in Romania and abroad, with the crisis at The Observer Translation Project as an instance of a universal phenomenon. read more...

Translator's Choice

Author: Stelian Tănase
Translated by: Jean Harris

From Maestro: A Melodrama. Episode 7

Emiluţa has an unfortunate thought. She’ll throw herself off the top of the building. Why? What the fuck? Let’s say for the cause of PeaceonEarth, for the slumdogs, Europe, for the lonely. Which is to say she doesn’t have a ghost of a reason. Viva Walachia! The way things stand, if ...

Translator’s Note
Translator’s Note: a synopsis

Author: Ştefan Agopian
Translated by: Ileana Orlich

How I Learned to Read (from Tache de Catifea / The Velvet Man)

The bearded man was the owner of an apothecary shop where he worked with two apprentices. Nobody paid me any mind, so I spent all day in what was supposed to be the shop. I say this because it was a large, dark room full of odors—a mix of smells from everywhere. The room hadn’t been cleaned ...

Translator’s Note
Re: Learning to Read, from Tache de catifea / The Velvet Man

Author: Gabriela Adameşteanu
Translated by: Patrick Camiller

Wasted Morning - Napoleon in Bucharest

“What you’ve got here is heaven on earth,” Vica says as she drops onto the kitchen chair. “But where’s your mother?” “At work,” Gelu lazily replies, leaning sideways against the door. “She’s doing mornings this week, didn’t you know?” He is tall and thin, with unset ...

Author: Petre Ispirescu
Translated by: Jean Harris

Youth Without Age and Life Without Death

It happened once as never before-y, ‘cause if it couldn’t be true, it wouldn’t make a story about the time when the poplar tree made berries and the willow tree broke out in cherries, when bears began to brawl with their tails, and wolf and lamb, unfurling their sails, threw arms around each ...

Translator’s Note
On Petre Ispirescu