Румыниялық жазушы, журналист және саясаткер Михай Садовяну

Romanian writer, journalist and politician

Mihail Sadoveanu (; occasionally referred to as Mihai Sadoveanu; 5 November 1880 – 19 October 1961) was a Romanian novelist, short story writer, journalist and political figure, who twice served as acting head of state for the communist republic (1947–1948 and 1958). One of the most prolific Romanian language writers, he is remembered mostly for his historical and adventure novels, as well as for his nature writing. An author whose career spanned five decades, Sadoveanu was an early associate of the traditionalist magazine Sămănătorul, before becoming known as a Realist writer and an adherent to the Poporanist current represented by Viața Românească journal. His books, critically acclaimed for their vision of age old solitude and natural abundance, are generally set in the historical region of Moldavia, building on themes from Romania's medieval and early modern history. Among them are Neamul Șoimăreștilor ("The Șoimărești Family"), Frații Jderi ("The Jderi Brothers") and Zodia Cancerului ("Under the Sign of the Crab"). With Venea o moară pe Siret ("A Mill Was Floating down the Siret "), Baltagul ("The Hatchet") and some other works of fiction, Sadoveanu extends his fresco to contemporary history and adapts his style to the psychological novel, Naturalism and Social realism. A traditionalist figure whose perspective on life was a combination of nationalism and Humanism, Sadoveanu moved between right and left wing political forces throughout the interwar period, while serving terms in Parliament. Rallying with People's Party, the National Agrarian Party, and the National Liberal Party Brătianu, he was editor of the leftist newspapers Adevărul and Dimineața, and was the target of a violent far right press campaign. After World War II, Sadoveanu became a political associate of the Romanian Communist Party. He wrote in favor of the Soviet Union and Stalinism, joined the Society for Friendship with the Soviet Union and adopted Socialist realism. Many of his texts and speeches, including the political novel Mitrea Cocor and the famous slogan Lumina vine de la Răsărit ("The Light Arises in the East"), are also viewed as propaganda in favor of communization. A founding member of the Romanian Writers' Society and later President of the Romanian Writers' Union, Sadoveanu was also a member of the Romanian Academy since 1921 and a recipient of the Lenin Peace Prize for 1961. He was also Grand Master of the Romanian Freemasonry during the 1930s. The father of Profira and Paul Mihu Sadoveanu, who also pursued careers as writers, he was the brother in law of literary critic Izabela Sadoveanu Evan.

Sadoveanu was born in Pașcani, in western Moldavia. His father's family hailed from the southwestern part of the Old Kingdom, in Oltenia. Their place of origin, Sadova, provided their chosen surname (lit. "from Sadova"), which was adopted by the family only in 1891. Mihail's father was the lawyer Alexandru Sadoveanu (d. 1921), whom literary critic George Călinescu described as "a bearded and well to do man"; Mihail's mother, Profira née Ursachi (or Ursaki; d. 1895), hailed from a line of Moldavian shepherds, all of whom, as the writer recalled, had been illiterate. Literary historian Tudor Vianu believes this contrast of regional and social identities played a part in shaping the author, opening him up to a "Romanian universality", but notes that, throughout his career, Sadoveanu was especially connected with his Moldavian roots. Mihail had a brother, also named Alexandru, whose wife was the Swiss educated literary critic Izabela Morțun (later known as Sadoveanu Evan, she was the cousin of socialist activist Vasile Morțun). Another one of his brothers, Vasile Sadoveanu, was an agricultural engineer. Beginning in 1887, Sadoveanu attended primary school in Pașcani. His favorite teacher, a Mr. Busuioc, later served as inspiration for one of his best known short stories, Domnu Trandafir ("Master Trandafir"). While away from school, young Sadoveanu used much of his spare time exploring his native region on foot, hunting, fishing, or just contemplating nature. He was also spending his vacations in his mother's native Verșeni. During his journeys, Sadoveanu visited peasants, and his impression of the way in which they were relating to authority is credited by critics with having shaped his perspective on society. Shortly after this episode, the young Sadoveanu left to complete his secondary studies in Fălticeni and at the National High School in Iași. While in Fălticeni, he was in the same class as future authors Eugen Lovinescu and I. Dragoslav, but, having lost interest in schoolwork, he failed to get his remove, before eventually graduating top of his class. but his first literary attempts date from the following year. It was in 1897 that a sketch story, titled Domnișoara M din Fălticeni ("Miss M from Fălticeni") and signed Mihai din Pașcani ("Mihai from Pașcani"), was successfully submitted for publishing to the Bucharest based satirical magazine Dracu. Sadoveanu was however dissatisfied with Densusianu's agenda, and critical of the entire Romanian Symbolist movement for which the review spoke. He began frequenting the bohemian society in the capital, where he began work on his first novellas and decided to make his living as a professional writer. The following year, Sadoveanu was drafted into the Romanian Land Forces, stationed as a guard near Târgu Ocna, and inspired by the experience to write some of his first social criticism narratives. Initially, the Sadoveanus lived in a house previously owned by celebrated Moldavian raconteur Ion Creangă, before they commissioned a new building, famed for its surrounding Grădina Liniștii ("Garden of Quietude"). Of his sons, Dimitrie Sadoveanu became a painter,

After receiving an invitation from poet Ștefan Octavian Iosif in 1903, Sadoveanu contributed works to the traditionalist journal Sămănătorul, led at the time by historian and critic Nicolae Iorga. He was by then also a contributor to Voința Națională, a newspaper published by the National Liberal Party and managed by politician Vintilă Brătianu—beginning December of the same year, the paper serialized Șoimii ("The Hawks"), an extended variant of Frații Potcoavă, with an introduction by historian Vasile Pârvan. After 1906, he rallied with the group formed around Viața Românească, which was also joined by his sister in law Izabela. With his subsequent pieces for Viața Românească, Sadoveanu became especially known as the raconteur of hunting trips, but also sparked controversy when a young woman writer, Constanța Marino Moscu, accused him of having plagiarized her works in his Mariana Vidrașcu, a serialized novel which was discontinued and later largely forgotten. 1904 was Sadoveanu's effective debut year: he published four separate books, including Șoimii, Povestiri ("Stories"), Dureri înăbușite ("Suppressed Pains") and Crâșma lui Moș Petcu ("Old Man Petcu's Alehouse"). The beginning of a prolific literary career covering more than a half century and of his collaboration with Editura Minerva publishing house, while the influential and aging critic Titu Maiorescu, leader of the conservative literary society Junimea, gave a positive review to Povestiri, and successfully proposed it for a Romanian Academy award in 1906. In a 1908 essay, Maiorescu was to list Sadoveanu among Romania's greatest writers. According to Vianu, Maiorescu saw in Sadoveanu and other young writers the triumph of his theory on a "popular" form of Realism, a vision which the Junimist thinker had advocated in his essays from as early as 1882. Sadoveanu later credited Iorga, Maiorescu, and especially so the cultural promoter Constantin Banu and Sămănătorul poet George Coșbuc, with having helped him capture the interest of the public and his peers. The magazine, originally a traditionalist mouthpiece founded by Alexandru Vlahuță and George Coșbuc, proclaimed with Iorga its purpose of establishing "a national culture", emancipated from foreign influence. However, according to Călinescu, this ambitious goal was only manifested in a "great cultural influence", as the journal continued to be an eclectic venue which grouped together ruralist traditionalists of the "national tendency" and adherents to the cosmopolitan currents such as Symbolism. Călinescu and Vianu agree that Sămănătorul was, for a large part, a promoter of older guidelines set by Junimea. Vianu also argues that Sadoveanu's contribution to the literary circle was the main original artistic element in its history, and credits Iosif with having accurately predicted that, during a period of literary "crisis", Sadoveanu was the person to provide innovation. He continued to publish at an impressive rate: in 1906, he again handed down for print four separate volumes. Nanu wrote of this period: "It is a clerical packed full with men of letters, no work is being done, people smoke, drink coffee, create dreams, poems and prose [ ]." Inspired by the bloody outcome of the Revolt, as well as by Haret's moves to educate the peasantry, Sadoveanu reportedly drew suspicion from the Police when he published self help guides aimed at industrious ploughmen, a brand of social activism which even resulted in a formal inquiry. Mihail Sadoveanu became a professional writer in 1908–1909, after joining the Romanian Writers' Society, created in the previous year by poets Cincinat Pavelescu and Dimitrie Anghel, and becoming its president in September of that year. The same year, he, Iosif, and Anghel, together with author Emil Gârleanu, set up Cumpăna, a monthly directed against both Ovid Densusianu's eclecticism and the Junimist school (the magazine was no longer in print by 1910). At the time, he became a noted presence among the group of intellectuals meeting in Bucharest's Kübler Coffeehouse. In 1910, he was also appointed head of the National Theater Iași, a position which he filled until 1919. He resigned his office within the Writers' Society in November 1911, being replaced by Gârleanu, but continued to partake in its administration as a member of its leadership committee and a censor. Sadoveanu was again called under arms during the Second Balkan War of 1913, when Romania confronted Bulgaria. Having reached the rank of Lieutenant, after which he spent a short period on the front. The series of writings he published at the time includes the 1915 Neamul Șoimăreștilor. At the time, he was reelected President of the Writers' Society, a provisional mandate which ended in 1918, when Romania signed the peace with the Central Powers, He was joined by Topîrceanu, who had just been released from a POW camp in Bulgaria, and with whom he founded the magazine Însemnări Literare. In the 19th century, it had been the residence of politician Mihail Kogălniceanu, and, during the war, hosted composer George Enescu.

In 1921, Sadoveanu was elected a full member of the Romanian Academy; At the time, he renewed his contacts with Viața Românească: with Garabet Ibrăileanu and several others, he joined its interwar nucleus, while the review often featured samples of his novels (some of which were originally published in full by its publishing venture). His house was by then host to many cultural figures, among whom were writers Topîrceanu, Gala Galaction, Otilia Cazimir, Ionel and Păstorel Teodoreanu, and Dimitrie D. Pătrășcanu, as well as conductor Sergiu Celibidache. to the aristocrat and memoirist Gheorghe Jurgea Negrilești, and to a satirist named Radu Cosmin. Despite his health problems, Sadoveanu frequently traveled throughout Romania, notably visiting local sights which inspired his work: the Romanian Orthodox monasteries of Agapia and Văratec, and the Neamț Fortress. In 1926, after a period of indecision, Sadoveanu rallied with the People's Party, where his friend, the poet Octavian Goga, was a prominent activist. During the general election of 1927, he won a seat in the Chamber for Bihor County, in Transylvania, holding a seat in the Senate for Iași County after the 1931 suffrage. Under Nicolae Iorga's National Peasants' Party cabinet of the period, Sadoveanu was President of the Senate. In parallel, he began contributing to the left wing daily Adevărul. Sadoveanu was by then affiliated with the Freemasonry, as first recorded by the organization in 1928, but was probably a member since 1926 or 1927. Reaching the 33rd degree within the organization and overseeing the Masonic Lodge Dimitrie Cantemir of Iași, Affiliates of the radical right organized public burnings of his volumes. The scandal prolonged itself over the following years, with Sadoveanu being supported by his friends in the literary community. Among them was Topîrceanu, who was at the time hospitalized, and whose expression of support was made shortly before his death to liver cancer. In September 1937, as a statement of solidarity and appreciation, the University of Iași conferred Sadoveanu the title of doctor honoris causa. Mihail Sadoveanu withdrew from politics in the late 1930s and early 1940s, as Romania came to be led by successive right wing dictatorships, he offered a measure of support to King Carol II and his National Renaissance Front, which attempted to block the more radically fascist Iron Guard from power. He was personally appointed a member of the reduced corporatist Senate by Carol. In 1940, the official establishment Editura Fundațiilor Regale published the first volume of his Opere ("Works"). After publishing the final section of his Frații Jderi in 1942, Sadoveanu again retreated to the countryside, in his beloved Arieș area, where he had built himself a chalet and a church; this seclusion produced his Povestirile de la Bradu Strâmb ("Bradu Strâmb Stories"). During those years, the sixty year old writer met Valeria Mitru, a much younger feminist journalist, whom he married after a brief courtship.

After the Soviet backed advent of the Communist system in Romania, Sadoveanu supported the new authorities, and turned from his own version of Realism to officially endorsed Socialist realism (see Socialist realism in Romania). This was also the start of his association with the Soviet sponsored Romanian Society for Friendship with the Soviet Union (ARLUS), which was led by biologist and physician Constantin Ion Parhon. Having served as a host to official Soviet envoys Andrey Vyshinsky and Vladimir Kemenov during their late 1944 visits, he soon after became president of the ARLUS "Literary and Philosophical Section" (seconded by Mihai Ralea and Perpessicius). In February 1945, he joined Parhon, Enescu, linguist Alexandru Rosetti, composer George Enescu, biologist Traian Săvulescu and mathematician Dimitrie Pompeiu in a protest against the cultural policies of Premier Nicolae Rădescu and his cabinet, one in a series of moves to discredit the non communist Rădescu and make him leave power. With Ion Pas, Gala Galaction, Horia Deleanu, Octav Livezeanu and N. D. Cocea, Sadoveanu edited the association's weekly literary magazine Veac Nou after June 1946. Sadoveanu's literary and political change became known to the general public in March 1945, when he lectured about Soviet leader Joseph Stalin at a conference hall in Bucharest. Part of a conference cycle, his speech was famously titled Lumina vine de la Răsărit, which soon became synonymous with the attempts to improve the image of Stalinism in Romania. ARLUS would issue the text of his conference as a printed volume later in the year. Invited by the Soviet Academy of Sciences to attend the 220th anniversary of its foundation, they also visited research institutes, kolhozy, and day care centers, notably meeting with Nikolay Tsitsin, an agronomist favored by Stalin. After his return, he wrote other controversial texts and gave lectures which offered ample praise to the Soviet system. That year, the ARLUS enterprise Editura Cartea Rusă also published his translation of Ivan Turgenev's A Sportsman's Sketches. In its first ever session (December 1946), the legislative body elected him its president. He was at the time residing in Ciorogârla, having been awarded a villa previously owned by Pamfil Șeicaru, a journalist whose support for fascist regimes had made him undesirable, and who had moved out of Romania. The decision was viewed as evidence of political corruption by the opposition National Peasants' Party, whose press deemed Sadoveanu the "Count of Ciorogârla". In 1948, after Romania's King Michael I was overthrown by the BPD member parties and the communist regime officially established, Sadoveanu rose to the highest positions ever granted to a Romanian writer, and received significant material benefits. In 1947–1948, he was, alongside Parhon, Ștefan Voitec, Gheorghe Stere, and Ion Niculi, a member of the Presidium of the People's Republic, which was elected by the BPD dominated legislative. He also kept his seat at the academy, which at the time was undergoing a communist led purge, and, with several other pro Soviet intellectuals, was voted in the Academy Presidium.

Sadoveanu's personality and experience played a major part in shaping his literary style. After his 1901 marriage, Mihail Sadoveanu adopted what Călinescu deemed "patriarchal" lifestyle. Recognized, like his epigramist colleague Păstorel Teodoreanu, as a man of refined culinary tastes, Sadoveanu cherished Romanian cuisine and Romanian wine. The lifestyle choices were akin to his literary interests: alongside the secluded and rudimentary existence of his main characters (connected by Călinescu with the writer's supposed longing for "regressions to the patriarchal times"), Sadoveanu's work is noted for its imagery of primitive abundance, and in particular for its lavish depictions of ritualistic feasts, hunting parties and fishing trips. Călinescu opined that the value of such descriptions within individual narratives grew with time, and that the author, once he had discarded lyricism, used them as "a means for the senses to enjoy the fleshes and the forms that nature offers man." He added that Sadoveanu's aesthetics could be said to recall the art of the Golden Age in Holland: "One could almost say that Sadoveanu rebuilds in present day Moldavia [ ] the Holland of wine jugs and kitchen tables covered in venison and fish." The traditionalist Garabet Ibrăileanu, referring to Sadoveanu's poetic nature writing, even declared it to have "surpassed nature." At the other end, the modernist Eugen Lovinescu specifically objected to Sadoveanu's depiction of a primordial landscape, arguing that, despite adopting Realism, his rival was indebted to Romanticism and subjectivity. Lovinescu's attitude, critic Ion Simuț notes, was partly justified by the fact that Sadoveanu never truly parted with the traditionalism of Sămănătorul. Unlike Lovinescu, Vianu saw these traits as "not at all detrimental to the balance of [Sadoveanu's] art." Seen by literary critic Ioan Stanomir as marked by "volubility", and thus contrasting with his famously taciturn and seemingly embittered nature, the form of Romanian used by Mihail Sadoveanu, particularly in his historical novels, was noted for both its use of archaisms and the inventive approach to the Romanian lexis. Often borrowing plot lines and means of expression from medieval and early modern Moldavian chroniclers such as Ion Neculce and Miron Costin, the author creatively intercalates several local dialects and registers of speech, moving away from a mere imitation of the historical language. Generally third person narratives, his books often make little or no dialectal difference between the speech used by the story teller and the character's voices. According to Călinescu, Sadoveanu displays "an enormous capacity of authentic speech", similar to that of Caragiale and Ion Creangă. Building on observations made by several critics, who generally praised the poetic qualities of Sadoveanu's prose, Crohmălniceanu spoke in detail about the Moldavian novelist's role in reshaping the literary language. This particular contribution was first described early in the 20th century, when Sadoveanu was acclaimed by Titu Maiorescu for having adapted his writing style to the social environment and the circumstances of his narratives. Vianu however notes that Sadoveanu's late writings tend to leave more room for neologisms, mostly present in those parts where the narrator's voice takes distance from the plot. Another unifying element in Sadoveanu's creation is his recourse to literary types. As early as 1904, Maiorescu praised the young raconteur for accurately depicting characters in everyday life and settings. Tudor Vianu stressed that, unlike most of his Realist predecessors, Sadoveanu introduced an overtly sympathetic view of the peasant character, as "a higher type of human, a heroic human". He added: "Simple, in the sense that they are moved by a few devices [which] coincide with the fundamental instincts of mankind, [they] are, in general, mysterious." In this line, Sadoveanu also creates images of folk sages, whose views on life are of a Humanist nature, and often depicted in contrast with the rationalist tenets of Western culture. Commenting on this aspect, Sadoveanu's friend George Topîrceanu believed that Sadoveanu's work transcended the "more intellectual [and] more artificial" notion of "types", and that "he creates [ ] humans." The main topic of his subsequent work, Sandqvist argues, was "an archaic world where the farmers and the landlords were free men with equal rights" (or, according to Simuț, "a utopia of archaic heroism"). while Topîrceanu spoke of "the paradoxical discovery that [Sadoveanu] is our greatest poet since Eminescu." Mihail Sadoveanu also shaped his traditionalist views on literature by investigating Romanian folklore, which he recommended as a source of inspiration to his fellow writers during his 1923 speech at the Romanian Academy. The prose piece Năluca ("The Apparition") centers on the conjugal conflict between two old people, both of whom attempt to hide the shame of their past. George Călinescu notes that, particularly in Năluca, Sadoveanu begins to explore the staple technique of his literary contributions, which involves "suggesting the smolder of passions [through] a contemplative breath in which he evokes a static element: landscapes or set pieces from nature." For Călinescu, this choice of style brought "damaging effects" on Sadoveanu's writings, and made Dureri înăbușite "perhaps the poorest" of his collections of stories. the indentured laborer in Sluga ("The Servant") is unable to take revenge on his cruel employer at the right moment; in Doi feciori ("Two Sons"), a boyar comes to feel affection for his illegitimate son, whom he has nonetheless reduced to a lowly condition. He did however reproach the writer "a certain monotony", arguing that Sadoveanu came to use such techniques in virtually all his later works. At times, they confront the morals of barely literate people with the stern authorities: a peasant obstinately believes that the 1859 union between Wallachia and Moldavia was meant to ensure the supremacy of his class; a young lower class woman becomes the love interest of a boyar but chooses a life of freedom; and a Rom deserts from the Army after being told to bathe. In La noi, la Viișoara ("At Our Place in Viișoara"), the life of an old man degenerates into bigotry and avarice, to the point where he makes his wife starve to death. Sadoveanu's positive portrayal of hajduks as fundamentally honest outlaws standing up to feudal injustice, replicates stereotypes found in Romanian folklore, and is mostly present in some of the stories through (sometimes recurrent) heroic characters: Vasile the Great, Cozma Răcoare, Liță Florea etc. In the piece titled Bordeenii (roughly, "The Mud hut Dwellers"), he shows eccentrics and misanthropes presided upon by the dark figure of Sandu Faliboga, brigands who flee all public authority and whom commentators have likened to settlers of the Americas. Lepădatu, an unwanted child, speaks for the entire group: "What could I do [ ] wherever there are big fairs and lots of people? I'd have a better time with the cattle; it is with them that I have grown up and with them that I get along." Romanticizing the obscure events of early medieval history in Vremuri de bejenie ("Roving Times", 1907), Sadoveanu sketches the improvised self defense of a refugee community, their last stand against nomadic Tatars. In reference to the stories in this series, Călinescu stresses that Sadoveanu's main interest is in depicting men and women cut away from civilization, who view the elements of Westernization with nothing more than "wonderment": "Sadoveanu's literature is the highest expression of the savage instinct." In later works, the critic believed, Sadoveanu moved away from depicting isolation as the escape of primitives into their manageable world, but as "the refinement of souls whom civilization has upset." Some of the early stories, Crohmălniceanu argues, do follow the moralizing Sămănătorist pattern, but part with it when they refuse to present the countryside in "idyllic" fashion, or when they adopt a specific "mythical realism". Sadoveanu began his career as a novelist with more in depth explorations into subjects present in his stories and novellas. At the time, Crohmălniceanu stresses, he was being influenced by the naturalism of Caragiale (minus the comedic effect), and by his own experience growing up in characteristically underdeveloped Moldavian cities and târguri (somewhat similar to the aesthetic of boredom, adopted in poetry by George Bacovia, Demostene Botez or Benjamin Fondane). Among his first works of the kind is Floare ofilită ("Wizened Flower"), where a simple girl, Tincuța, marries a provincial civil servant, and finds herself deeply unhappy and unable to enrich her life on any level. Tincuța, seen by Călinescu as one of Sadoveanu's "savage" characters, only maintains urban refinement when persuading her husband to return for supper, A rather similar plot is built for Însemnările lui Neculai Manea ("The Recordings of Neculai Manea"), where the eponymous character, an educated peasant, experiences two unhappy romantic affairs before successfully courting a married woman who, although grossly uncultured, makes him happy. Călinescu noted that such novels were "usually less valuable than direct accounts", and deemed Însemnările lui Neculai Manea "without literary interest";

Praised by its commentators, the short novel Haia Sanis (1908) shows the eponymous character, a Jewish woman who throws herself into the arms of a local Gentile, although she knows him to be a seducer. Călinescu, who wrote with admiration about how the subject dissimulated pathos into "technical indifference", notes that the erotic rage motivating Haia has drawn "well justified" comparisons with Jean Racine's tragedy Phèdre. Crohmălniceanu believes Haia Sanis to be "perhaps [Sadoveanu's] best novella", particularly since the "wild beauty" Haia has to overcome at once antisemitism, endogamy and shame, before dying "in terrible pain" during a botched abortion. Sadoveanu's work of the time also includes Balta liniștii ("Tranquillity Pond"), where Alexandrina, pushed into an arranged marriage, has a belated and sad revelation of true love. In other sketch stories, such as O zi ca altele ("A Day like Any Other") or Câinele ("The Dog"), Sadoveanu follows Caragiale's close study of suburban banality.

The novella Hanu Ancuței ("Ancuța's Inn"), described by George Călinescu as a "masterpiece of the jovial idyllicism and barbarian subtlety", is a frame story in the line of medieval allegories such as Giovanni Boccaccio's Decameron and Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. It retells the stories of travelers meeting in the eponymous inn. Much of the story deals with statements of culinary tastes and shared recipes, as well as with the overall contrast between civilization and rudimentary ways: in one episode of the book, a merchant arriving from the Leipzig Trade Fair bemuses the other protagonists when he explains the more frugal ways and the technical innovations of Western Europe. Sadoveanu applied the same narrative technique in his Soarele în baltă ("The Sun in the Waterhole"), which, Călinescu argues, displays "a trickier style." focuses on early events in Nicoară's life, building on the story according to which he and his brother Alexandru were the brothers of Prince Ioan Vodă cel Cumplit, whose execution by the Ottomans they tried to avenge. The text also follows their attempt to seize and kill Ieremia Golia, a boyar whose alleged betrayal had led to Prince Ioan's capture, and whose daughter Ilinca becomes the brothers' prisoner. Călinescu described Șoimii novel as "still awkward", noting that Sadoveanu was only beginning to experiment with the genre. In Călinescu's view, the novel is "somewhat more consistent from an epic perspective", but fails to respect the conventions of the adventure novel it sets out to replicate.

Zodia Cancerului, Sadoveanu's later historical novel, is set late in the 17th century, during the third rule of Moldavian Prince Gheorghe Duca, and is seen by Călinescu as "of a superior artistic level." ends with Alecu's defeat and killing on Duca's orders. In the background, the story depicts the visit of an Abbé de Marenne, a Roman Catholic priest and French envoy, who meets and befriends Ruset. Their encounter is another opportunity for Sadoveanu to show the amiable but incomplete exchange between the mentalities of Western and Eastern Europe. In various episodes of the novel, de Marenne shows himself perplexed by the omnipresent wilderness of underpopulated Moldavia, and in particular by the abundance of resources this provides. In one paragraph, seen by George Călinescu as a key to the book, Sadoveanu writes: "[De Marenne's] curious eye was permanently satisfied. Here was a desolation of solitudes, one that his friends in France could not even guess existed, no matter how much imagination they had been gifted with; for at the antipode of civilization one occasionally finds such things that have remained unchanged from the onset of creation, preserving their mysterious beauty." The narrative then focuses on the Battle of Finta and the siege of Suceava, through which a Wallachian Transylvanian force repelled the Moldo Cossack forces and, turning the tide, entered deep into Moldavia and placed Gheorghe Ștefan on the throne. Sadoveanu also invents a love story between Ruxandra and the boyar Bogdan, whose rivalry with Tymofiy ends in the latter's killing. In both Zodia Cancerului and Nunta Domniței Ruxandra, the author took significant liberties with the historical facts. In addition to Tymofiy's death at the hands of Bogdan, the latter narrative used invented or incorrect names for some of the personages, and portrays the muscular, mustachioed, Gheorghe Ștefan as thin and bearded; likewise, in Zodia Cancerului, Sadoveanu invents the character Guido Celesti, who stands in for the actual Franciscan leader of Duca's Iași, Bariona da Monte Rotondo. In the first volume, titled Ucenicia lui Ionuț ("Ionuț's Apprenticeship"), the eponymous Jderi brothers, allies of Stephen and friends of his son Alexandru, fight off the enemies of their lord on several occasions. In what is the start of a Bildungsroman, the youngest Jder, Ionuț Păr Negru, consumed by love for Lady Nasta, who was kidnapped by Tatars. He goes to her rescue, only to find out that she had preferred suicide to a life of slavery. Călinescu, who believed the volumes show Sadoveanu's move to the consecrated elements of adventure novels, called them "remarkable", but stressed that the narrative could render "the feeling of stumbling, of a languishing flow", and that the dénouement was "rather depressing". The second book in the series (Izvorul alb, "The White Water Spring") intertwines the life of the Jderi brothers with that of Stephen's family: the ruler weds the Byzantine princess Mary of Mangop, while Simion Jder falls for Marușca, who is supposedly Stephen's illegitimate daughter. The major episodes in the narrative are Marușca's kidnapping by a boyar, her captivity in Jagiellon Poland, and her rescue at the hands of the Jderi. The 1942 conclusion of the cycle, Oamenii Măriei sale ("His Lordship's Men"), the brothers are shown defending their ancestral rights and their lord against the Ottoman invader and ambivalent boyars, and crushing the former at the Battle of Vaslui. The Jderi books, again set to the background of primitivism and natural abundance, also feature episodes of intense horror. These, Călinescu proposes, are willingly depicted "with an indolent complacency", as if to underline that the slow pace and monumental scale of history give little importance to personal tragedies. a secondary character, claiming precognition, prepares his own funeral. For the 1925 Venea o moară pe Siret , Sadoveanu received much critical acclaim. The boyar Alexandru Filotti falls in love with a miller's daughter, Anuța, whom he educates and introduces to high society. The beautiful young lady is also courted by Filotti's son Costi and by the peasant Vasile Brebu—in the end, overwhelmed by jealousy, Brebu kills the object of his affection. George Călinescu writes that the good reception was not fully deserved, claiming that the novel is "colorless", that it was merely based on the writer's early stories, and that it failed in its goal of depicting "crumbling boyardom". Written in just 30 days on the basis of previous drafts, Vitoria's sheer determination is the central aspect of the volume. Călinescu, who ranks the book among Sadoveanu's best, praises its "remarkable artistry" and "unforgettable dialogues", but nonetheless writes that Lipan's "detective like" search and a "stubbornness" are weak points in the narrative. Crohmălniceanu declares Baltagul one of the "capital works" in world literature, proposing that, on its own, it manages to reconstruct "an entire shepherding civilization"; Cornis Pope, who rates the book as "Sadoveanu's masterpiece", also notes that it "restated the theme of crime and punishment". also attention for its sympathetic depiction of the Hutsuls, a minority Slavic speaking population, as an ancient tribe threatened by cultural assimilation. Sadoveanu's other travelogues include the reportage Oameni și locuri ("People and Places") and an account of his trips into Bessarabia (Drumuri basarabene, "Bessarabian Roads"). Călinescu saw the text as a "fantastic vision of the entire aquatic universe", merging a form of pessimism similar to Arthur Schopenhauer's with a "calm kief" (cannabis induced torpor), and as such illustrating "the great joy of participating in the transformations of matter, of eating and allowing oneself to be eaten." One of Sadoveanu's main conclusions is that Holland lacks in "true and lively wonders". a book about the Second Balkan War (44 de zile în Bulgaria, "44 Days in Bulgaria"), and the account of years in primary school, Domnu Trandafir. Despite his temptation for destroying all raw personal notes, Sadoveanu wrote and kept a large number of diaries, which were never published in his lifetime. The home of mysterious Asiatic peoples, Sadoveanu's Scythia is notably the background to his novels Uvar and Nopțile de Sânziene. The former shows its eponymous character, a Yakut, exposed to the scrutiny of a Russian officer. According to Tudor Vianu, the 1933 fantasy novel Creanga de aur ("The Golden Bow") takes partial inspiration from Byzantine literature, and is evidence of a form of Humanism found in Eastern philosophy. Marcel Cornis Pope places it among Sadoveanu's "mythic poetic narratives that explored the ontology and symbolics of history." The writer himself acknowledged that the esoteric nature of the book was inspired by his own affiliation to the Freemasonry, whose symbolism it partly reflected. and, as "the last Deceneus", is a treasurer of ancient secret sciences mastered by the Dacians and the Ancient Egyptians. The novel is often interpreted as Sadoveanu's perspective on the Dacian contribution to Romanian culture. Sadoveanu's series of minor novels and stories of the interwar years also comprises a set of usually urban themed writings, which, Călinescu argues, resemble the works of Honoré de Balzac, but develop into "regressive" texts with "a lyrical intrigue". Sadoveanu depicts the cultured but bored boyar Lai Cantacuzin and his growing affection for a modest young woman, Daria Mazu. In Cazul Eugeniței Costea ("The Case of Eugenița Costea"), a civil servant kills himself to avoid prosecution, and his end is replicated by that of his daughter, brought to despair by her stepfather's character and by her mother's irrational jealousy. Demonul tinereții ("The Demon of Youth"), believed by Călinescu to be "the most charming" in this series, has for its protagonist Natanail, a university dropout who has developed a morbid fear of women since losing the love of his life, and who lives in seclusion as a monk. Written in 1938, the short story Ochi de urs ("Bear's Eye") introduces its hero Culi Ursake, the toughened hunter, into a bizarre scenery that seems to mock a human's understanding. During the period, Mihail Sadoveanu also wrote children's literature. His most significant pieces in this field are Dumbrava minunată ("The Enchanted Grove", 1926), Măria sa Puiul Pădurii ("His Highness the Forest Boy", 1931), and a collection of stories adapted from Persian literature (Divanul persian, "The Persian Divan", 1940). Măria sa Puiul Pădurii is itself an adaptation of the Geneviève de Brabant story, considered "somewhat highbrow" by George Călinescu, In 1909, Sadoveanu also published adapted version of two ancient writings: the Alexander Romance (as Alexandria) and Aesop's Fables (as Esopia). His 1921 book Cocostârcul albastru ("The Blue Crane") is a series of short stories with lyrical themes. Among his early writings are two biographical novels which retell historical events from the source, Viața lui Ștefan cel Mare ("The Life of Stephen the Great") and Lacrimile ieromonahului Veniamin ("The Tears of Veniamin the Hieromonk"), both of which, Călinescu objected, lacked in originality. In contrast, his choice of themes changed, a transition which reflected political imperatives. At the end of the process, literary historian Ana Selejan argues, Sadoveanu became the most influential prose author among Romanian Socialist realists, equaled only by the younger Petru Dumitriu. Historian Bogdan Ivașcu writes that Sadoveanu's affiliation with "proletarian culture" and "its masquerade", like that of Tudor Arghezi and George Călinescu, although it may have been intended to rally "prestige and depth" to Socialist realism, only succeeded in bring their late works to the level of "propaganda and agitation materials." In contrast to these retrospective assessments, communist literary critics and cultural promoters of the 1950s regularly described Sadoveanu as the model to follow, both before and after Georgy Malenkov's views on culture were adopted as the norm. In his Lumina vine de la Răsărit, the writer built on the opposition between light and darkness, identifying the former with Soviet policies and the latter with capitalism. Sadoveanu thus spoke of "the dragon of my own doubts" being vanquished by "the Sun of the East". Historian Adrian Cioroianu notes that this literary antithesis came to be widely used by various Romanian authors who rallied with Stalinism during the late 1940s, citing among these Cezar Petrescu and the former avant garde writer Sașa Pană. He also notes that such imagery, accompanied by portrayals of Soviet joy and abundance, replicated an ancient "structure of myth", adapting it to a new ideology on the basis of "what could be imagined, not of what could be believed." Ioan Stanomir writes that Sadoveanu and his fellow ARLUS members use a discourse recalling the theme of a religious conversion, analogous to that of Paul the Apostle (see Road to Damascus), and critic Cornel Ungureanu stresses that Sadoveanu's texts of the period frequently quote the Bible. In one of these accounts, he details his encounter with Lysenkoist agronomist Nikolay Tsistsin, and claims to have tasted bread made from a brand of wheat which yielded 4,000 kilograms of grain per hectare. In a later memoir, Sadoveanu depicted his existence and the destiny of his country as improved by the communist system, and gave accounts of his renewed journeys in the countryside, where he claimed to have witnessed a "spiritual splendor" supported by "the practice of the new times". He would follow up with hundreds of articles on various subjects, published by the communist press,

Upon its publication, the political novel Mitrea Cocor, which depicts the hardships and eventual triumph of its eponymous peasant protagonist, was officially described as the first Socialist realist writing in local literature, and as a turning point in literary history. Often compared to Dan Deșliu's ideologized poem Lazăr de la Rusca, it is remembered as a controversial epic dictated by ideological requirements, and argued to have been written with assistance from several other authors. it was rated by literary critics Dan C. Mihăilescu and Luminița Marcu both as one of "the most harmful books in Romanian literature", and by historian Ioan Lăcustă as "a propaganda writing, a failure from a literary point of view". A praise of collectivization policies that some critics believe was a testimony that Sadoveanu was submitting himself and imposing his public to brainwashing, Noted among the latter is Olimbiada, a female soothsayer and healer through whose words Sadoveanu again dispenses his own perspective on human existence. The focus of the narrative is also changed: from the avenger of his brother's death in Șoimii, the pretender becomes a purveyor of folk identity, aiming to reestablish the Moldavia of Stephen the Great's times. Praised early on by Dumitriu, who believed it was proof of "artistic excellence", Nicoară Potcoavă is itself seen as a source for communist inspired political messages. According to Cornel Ungureanu, this explains why it highlights the brotherhood between Cossacks and Moldavians, supposedly replicating the official view on Soviet Romanian relations. Victor Frunză also notes that, although Sadoveanu returned to old subjects, he "no longer rises to the level he had reached before the war." In essence, Ungureanu argues, the new style that of "reportage and plain information, adapted to orders coming from above". In one such instance, censors of Baltagul removed a character's claim that "the Russian" was by nature "the drunkest of them all, [ ] a worthy beggar and singer at the fairs." In the 1910s, the anti Iorga traditionalist Ilarie Chendi recognized in Sadoveanu one of the Poporanists who promoted "the spiritual healing of our people through culture." Around that time, he formulated a ruralist and nationalist perspective on life, rejecting what he deemed "the hybrid urban world" for "the world of our national realities". During most of his World War I activity, Sadoveanu also followed the Poporanists' Russophobia and dislike of the Entente side, describing the Russian Empire's national policies in Bessarabia as far more barbaric than Austria Hungary's rule over Transylvania. In 1916, he abruptly switched to the Entente camp: his enthusiasm as propaganda officer was touched by controversy once Romania experienced massive defeats; Sadoveanu himself abandoned the Entente cause by 1918, when he was decommissioned, and resumed his flirtation with Constantin Stere's Germanophile lobby. Călinescu sees Sadoveanu, alongside Stere, as one of Viața Româneascăs chief ideologues, noting that he was nonetheless "rendered notorious by his inconsistency and opportunism." The Poporanist aspect of Sadoveanu's literature was also highlighted by Garabet Ibrăileanu in the late 1920s, when he referred to his contributions as evidence that Romanian culture was successfully returning to its specific originality. In essence, Crohmălniceanu writes, Sadoveanu was tied to Viața Românească by his advocacy of national specificity, his preference for the large scale narrative, and his vision of pristine, "natural", human beings. According to Z. Ornea, Sadoveanu's affiliation to the Freemasonry shaped not only his political "demophilia", but also his "Weltanschauung, and, through a reflex, his [literary] work." He was also a vocal supporter of international cooperation, particularly among countries in Eastern and Central Europe. Writing for the magazine Familia in 1935, 17 years after Transylvania's union with Romania and 15 years after the Treaty of Trianon, Sadoveanu joined the Hungarian author Gyula Illyés in pleading for good relations between the two neighbors. According to Marcel Cornis Pope, this cooperative vision is the background theme to Divanul persian, a book "demonstrating the value of intercultural dialogue at a time of sharp political polarization." Himself a Marxist, Ovid Crohmălniceanu suggested that, as early as the 1930s, Sadoveanu's attitudes were rather similar to the official line of communist groups.

During the 1930s, following his stint as head of Adevărul, a leftist newspaper owned by Jewish entrepreneurs, Sadoveanu was targeted by right wing voices, who claimed that he had chosen to abandon his nationalist credentials. Thus, Sadoveanu became the target of a press campaign in the antisemitic and fascist press, and in particular in Nichifor Crainic's Sfarmă Piatră and the journals connected with the Iron Guard. The former publication deplored his supposed "betrayal" of the nationalist cause. In it, Ovidiu Papadima portrayed Sadoveanu as the victim of Jewish manipulation, and equated his affiliation to the Freemasonry with devil worship, and mocked his obesity, while Crainic himself compared the writer to his own character, the treacherous Ieremia Golia. Porunca Vremii often referred to him as Jidoveanu (from jidov, a dismissive term for "Jew"), depicted him as an agent of "Judaeo communism" motivated by "perversity", and called on the public to harass the writer and beat him with stones. It also protested when the public authorities in Fălticeni refused to withdraw Sadoveanu the title of honorary citizen, and again when the University of Iași made him a doctor honoris causa, and, through the voice of novelist N. Crevedia, even suggested that the writer should use his hunting rifle to commit suicide. In 1937, Porunca Vremii congratulated ultra nationalists who had organized public burnings of Sadoveanu's works in Southern Dobruja and in Hunedoara, as well as non identified people who sent the writer packages containing shredded copies of his own volumes. In April 1937, the anti Sadoveanu campaign was met with the indignation of various public figures, who issued an "Appeal of the Intellectuals", signed by Liviu Rebreanu, Eugen Lovinescu, Petru Groza, Victor Eftimiu, George Topîrceanu, Zaharia Stancu, Demostene Botez, Alexandru Al. Philippide, Constantin Balmuș and others. According to Cornis Pope, Sadoveanu's dislike for the far right can be discovered in Creanga de aur, which doubles as "a political parable opposing an archaic peasant civilization to the growing threat of fascism." Elsewhere, stating that he was not going to take his detractors into consideration, Sadoveanu defined himself as an adversary of both Nazi Germany and any form of advocacy for a "National Socialist regime in our country". Sadoveanu's subsequent endorsement of authoritarian King Carol II and his corporatist force, the National Renaissance Front, saw his participation in the monarch's personality cult. In 1940, he offered controversial praise to the ruler through the official journal, Revista Fundațiilor Regale, which caused Carol's political adversary, psychologist Nicolae Mărgineanu, to deem Sadoveanu and his fellow contributors "scoundrels". His renewed mandate in the Senate was a favor from Carol, also granted to George Enescu, philosopher Lucian Blaga, scientists Emil Racoviță and Iuliu Hațieganu, and several other public figures. Also according to Zilber, Sadoveanu motivated his refusal by stating that the letter needed to be addressed not to Antonescu, but to King Michael I. Caleidoscop also speaks about the 1941 Iași pogrom as "our shame", and commends those who opposed it.

Following his Lumina vine de la Răsărit lecture, Sadoveanu became noted for his positive portrayals of communization and collectivization. In particular, Sadoveanu offered praise to one of the major pillars of Stalinism, the 1936 Soviet Constitution. In 1945, claiming to have been "flashed upon" by "Stalin's argumentation", he urged the public to read the document for its "sincerity"; elsewhere, he equated reading the constitution with "a mystical revelation". Adrian Cioroianu describes this as "an office assignment" from the ARLUS, at a time when the group was circulating free translated copies of the Soviet constitution. The enthusiasm of his writings also manifested itself in his public behavior: according to his ARLUS colleague Iorgu Iordan, Sadoveanu was emotional during the 1945 Soviet trip, shedding tears of joy upon visiting a day care center in the countryside. Running in the 1946 election, Sadoveanu blamed the old political class in general for the problems faced by Romanian peasants, including the major drought of that year. Criticism of Sadoveanu's moral choices also focuses on the fact that, while he led a luxurious existence, many of his generation colleagues and fellow intellectuals were being persecuted or jailed in notoriously harsh circumstances. Having tolerated the purge within the Romanian Academy, Cioroianu notes, Sadoveanu accepted being colleagues with newly promoted "secondary characters [ ] whom the new regime needed", such as poet Dumitru Theodor Neculuță and historian Mihail Roller. In his official capacity, Sadoveanu even signed several death sentences declared by communist tribunals, Later, Sadoveanu made a reference to his former colleague, the National Peasantist activist Ion Mihalache, arguing that his old Agrarianist approach to politics had made him a "ridiculous character". He is also reported to have helped George Călinescu publish the novel Scrinul negru, mediating between him and communist leader Gheorghe Gheorghiu Dej. Cioroianu sees in such statements evidence that, trying to discard his past, Sadoveanu was including himself among the socialist intellectuals "willing to let themselves be won over by the indescribable charm and the full swing of the communist utopia", but that he may in reality have been "motivated by fear". Paraphrasing communist vocabulary, Stanomir describes the writer as one of the "bourgeois" personalities who became "fellow travelers" of the communists, and argues that Sadoveanu's claim to have always leaned towards a "people's democracy" inaugurated "a pattern of chameleonism". Others have submitted that Sadoveanu's faction in the Freemasonry, which included far left advocates Mihai Ralea and Alexandru Claudian, and officially supported evolutionary socialism, was a natural partner of the communists, to the point of sanctioning its own state organized suppression. Describing the writer's "conversion to philosovietism" as "purely contextual", Other statements made by Sadoveanu also displayed a possibly studied ambiguity, as is the case with a 1952 lecture he gave in front of young writers attending the Party controlled School of Literature, where he implicitly denied that one could be created a writer unless by "God or Mother Nature".