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Mapping Romania - Notes for a Journey

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Mapping Romania - Notes for a Journey Mapping Romania - notes for a journey To enter into the subjective life of another culture – its symbolic codes, its overt beliefs and implicit assumptions – requires, as any immigrant or nomad can tell you, a considerable effort of consciousness and imagination; a kind of stretching of self towards the other- and a gradual grasp of differences which are sometimes imperceptible and subtle. ….. Cultures are neither static nor monolithic organisms – they are complex, changeable and internally diverse. What is considered healthily assertive in one culture may be seen as aggressive or hostile in another; certain kinds of personal disclosure which may seem quite unproblematic in one society may be seen as embarrassing or entirely unacceptable elsewhere…… We live in a world in which various kinds of cross-national movement – migrations, travel, various kinds of both enforced and voluntary nomadism – are ever on the rise… If we are to meet with each other on the basis of trust rather than tension or insidious indifference, we need to have ways of getting acquainted with each other which are more than cursory, or purely instrumental. But how can this be accomplished? What kind of knowledge is needed to feed meaningful cross-cultural contacts? Inner Lives of Cultures (2011) ed Eva Hoffman Ronald G Young 2014; Sirnea, 1 Dedicated to Daniela - whose love and help has given me a certain understanding of Romania And also to Maritsa and Viciu……. The best of neighbours and friends! 2 CONTENTS 1. Introduction 2. Blogs about Romania 3. Travelogues 4. Literature – home and away 5. Histories – disputed lands 6. Memoirs, biographies etc 7. Some Snapshots 8. Painting 9. Photographs and buildings 10. Cinema - New Wave on the Black Sea? 11. Beliefs 12. Music and Media 13. Exploring – places, wine and food 14. Just the Hors d’oeuvre Annexes • Le Monde meets Romanian Farmers • Romania’s Social Networks; Ronnie Smith • Poor Policy-making – why and what? Sorin Ionitsa • How the Weak Vanquished the Strong; review of T Gallagher 2010 book on Romania and the EU by Christopher Lawson • ”Romania; bottom of the heap” – NYRB - Tony Judt 2001 • ”Birth and Death in Romania – in the 1980s”; Pavel Campeanu NYRB • excerpt from ”When Cultures Collide” RD Lewis • New Wave on the Black Sea 3 Acknowledgements This little guide is what they call „a labour of love” – freely available for family, friends and others on my website. Because the readers of blogs and personal websites are generally numbered in the low hundreds, we bloggers often forget that the text we so casually type and send into the ether is subject to national and international legislation – whether relating to intellectual rights or to slander. This is particularly the case for extensive quotations or reproductions of articles. Readers of my blog - Balkan and Carpathian Musings - will know that one of its distinctive features is its use of links to other sources. We are rarely aware of the influence which others have on our thinking – and I am always very grateful to come across good writing and therefore happy to acknowledge it. For this briefing note, I have used a lot of material I found on the internet. I have assumed that this poses no problems of intellectual property. But I have been careful to attribute the various extractions and would certainly want to place on record my appreciation in particular to- • The Counterpoint organization (London) - for permission to quote from “The Inner lives of Cultures” ed Eva Hoffman • The “New York Review of Books” - for use of the 2 book reviews which form annexes 2 and 3 • Christopher Lawson - for his review of Tom Gallagher’s 2010 book on “Romania and the EU” • The Nicholas Breasley publishers - for the excerpt at annex 4 from RD Lewis’ “When Cultures Collide” • The website “SibiWeb”- for use of text on the history of • Carmen Fimen - for use of sections of her chapter “Surrealism and Survival in Romania” in “The Inner lives of Cultures” ed Eva Hoffman • Lorna Fox and “The Nation” - for an excerpt from this book review • AO Scott and “The New York Times” - for use of his review of contemporary Romanian cinema • The “Sarah in Romania” blog - for extensive use of her posts in the sections on “beliefs” and “music” • City Compass Guide and Ronnie Smith – for his piece in “Romania, Bucharest and Beyond 2013” • Prof Carmen Aida Huţu – for excerpts from “A Romanian Cultural Perspective” • M Dawson and Left Field Cinema for their extensive post on the Romanian New Wave 4 1. Introduction 1.1 Purpose of Guide? How do we begin to get a handle on a country – let alone try to penetrate its soul? As a nomad for the past 25 years who has lived, for extended periods of time, in eleven countries during those years this is a question which I find of increasing fascination. For the past few years “I have been commuting” – as they say in all the best book blurbs -.between homes in…… the Carpathian Mountains, Bucharest and Sofia This little guide started as a ten-part series of blogposts I did, at the turn of the year, on things Romanian - which can be accessed at Balkan and Carpathian Musings. These had been triggered by an account of a recent walk which an ex-pat Irishman did in mid-winter from the northern part of Maramures (just at the border with Ukraine) down to Bucharest. I wanted to set his book in the wider context of what other foreigners had written over the years about Romania – since I’ve had an apartment and house here for the past decade - and then realized that, having blogged extensively about Bulgaria and Germany in the past year (and produced a little book about Bulgarian painting), the accounts needed to be evened a bit….. One of my daughters will be visiting me here in Romania in the summer for the first time and has asked for some advance reading. A “know-it-all” father is a real bore but fortunately she is an experienced traveller with a mind of her own. Hopefully it will be useful to all readers for dipping into.. Romania is not one of the most visited countries in the world! Go to any of the huge sections in a European bookshop which deal with travel (German bookshops seem to have the largest – they are serious travellers!) and you will be lucky to find even there more than 3-4 titles about the country. But good material about Romania can be found in other sections and places. Indeed I have been surprised ,as I explored the net for these posts, by the amount of relevant material – except that I shouldn’t be surprised….it’s a big country after all - 20-odd million people – a lot of whom are (and have been) very highly educated. Indeed you could argue that the Romanian intellectual is so clever as to be almost off the planet! 5 So let me guide you through what’s available – recognizing that there are different ways to find out about a country. I had originally sub-titled this intro as “Under the Skin” but realize that this could be misunderstood – not least because of the recent film of that name (ironically enough, shot in Glasgow) And don’t worry – my own scribbles are only about 40 pages – the rest of the booklet is clearly marked excerpts, hyperlinks and annexes for dipping into! My purpose, in these pages, is to act as a guide to what is available in the various fields you can encounter in Romania – using all the senses at your disposal. It is for the reader to click the various hyperlinks and decide what to follow through – what books excerpts to read; what paintings, pictures and landscapes to view; what music to listen to…… 1.2 Sixteen different ways to …… If you are a reasonably conscientious visitor - relying on the written word for your exploration of Romania - you will start looking at - • Travel guides • Travelogues – which can be divided into the serious or the (sadly increasing number of) tongue-in-cheek type • histories - which deal with what are considered to be the key events in the shaping of a nation • novels; • social and cultural histories (including jokes) – which give insights into how ordinary people lived their lives • memoirs and diaries – dealing with those who were more “distinguished” • blogs • magazines But there are an equal number of other generally non-verbal ways of trying to enter the spirit of a country- • television, films and plays • photographs • paintings and caricatures • buildings • conversations and encounters • friendships • music • food and wine That’s actually 16 different perspectives – no wonder we get confused! And I forgot the most important – “walking and exploring”……………………I don’t say anything about that, however, since it well covered in other books – or blogs…But I have added some sites……. The Guide which follows has separate sections on most of the genres in the list – but first let me 6 say something about the selection of topics and the order in which they appear…. 1.3 What you will find – and what not This is most decidedly not a travel guide. These are easily obtained - I’m told (by the travel group Beyond the Forest) that The Rough Guide to Romania (5th edition) is “the must-have general guide for anybody travelling to or interested in Romania” although I have never actually seen it. I have relied upon Caroline Juler’s quite excellent Blue Guide to Romania; (2000) – now, be warned, difficult to buy. It covers cultural and historical aspects rather than the logistical. That same site also has an interesting list of books for the discriminating visitor (the Blue Guide lists 4 pages of cultural and historical titles you won’t find in other guide books).
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