Viaţa Basarabiei
Encyclopedia
Viaţa Basarabiei
Viaţa Basarabiei (Romanian
for "Bessarabia
's Life", ˈvjat͡sa basaˈrabi.ej) is a Romanian-language periodical from Chişinău
, Moldova
. Originally a literary
and political magazine
, published at a time when Bessarabia region was part of Romania
, it was founded in 1932 by political activist Pan Halippa
and writer Nicolai Costenco
. At the time, Viaţa Basarabiei was primarily noted for rejecting the centralism
of Greater Romania
n governments, to which they opposed more or less vocal Bessarabian regionalist
demands and a nativist
ethos.
Declaring itself to be a traditionalist venue, interested in preserving local specificity in the cultural field, Viaţa Basarabiei was in effect a voice for cultural innovation and a host to modernist
writers such as Vladimir Cavarnali, Bogdan Istru
or George Meniuc
. After the Soviet Union
's 1940 annexation of Bessarabia, the editorial board split, and Halippa revived the magazine at a new location in Bucharest
. It was published there for most of World War II
, and was eventually disestablished. Its editors were subject to persecution in both Soviet territory and Communist Romania
. The magazine was revived in 2002 by Mihai Cimpoi
, being printed under the auspices of both the Romanian Writers' Union and the Moldovan Writers' Union
.
and activist of the National Moldavian Party
, outlined and pledged to follow a set of political and cultural ideals. The name adopted by Halippa's publication was homonymous with that of two other press organs: a newspaper published in 1907; and a daily of the National Peasants' Party
, published from 1930 to 1944. The name was also equivalent in translation to those of non-Romanian Bessarabian papers: the Russian-language
Besarabskaya Zhizn (published around 1917) and the Yiddish
Dos Besaraber Lebn (1918-1940).
The new magazine was, according to Romanian literary critic Ion Simuţ, a "regional adaptation" of the Moldavia
n-based journal Viaţa Românească
. According to Moldovan writer and researcher Călina Trifan, the connection between these two platforms was the theory of "national specificity" in Romanian culture
, first elaborated by Viaţa Românească before World War I
, and resurrected into an "evidently regionalist" ideology by Halippa and Costenco (see Poporanism
). Himself a member of the Viaţa Românească circles, Romanian literary historian George Călinescu
spoke of Viaţa Basarabiei and other cultural platforms of the day as proofs that Bessarabia manifested "great interest in literature." The popularization of literature in the 1930s, Călinescu noted, meant that "even the hospitalized people of the sanitarium
in Bugaz
had their own [literary periodical]".
(Cuget Moldovenesc, Bugeacul, Poetul, Itinerar). However, Viaţa Basarabieis anti-centralist political bias, evident after Nicolai Costenco's arrival as managing editor (1934), was described by various researchers as proof of extremism, bordering on Moldovenism
and anti-Romanian sentiment. Simuţ writes: "During the '30s, N. Costenco was promoting an exclusive and aggressive, hardly imaginable form of regionalism [...]. [His was] the most dangerous political way of thinking for the Bessarabian 'nation', whose logic leads into euphoric isolationism
, that is to say a form of enclavization, [...] an aberrant form of defense." According to scholar Alexandru Burlacu, Costenco was an "ideologist of nativism pushed to the point of absurdity". Moldovan essayist and critic Eugen Lungu, who suggested that such reactions may be traced back to a "parochial complex", also noted of Costenco: "He promoted [by means of Viaţa Basarabiei] a ferocious nativism, sometimes to the point of degenerating into anti-Romanianism. An animator and aesthete of cultural regionalism, convinced in his romantic
frenzy of an ultraspecial genius of 'the populace', he exulted a rambunctious messianism
of Slavic
inspiration." By then, Costenco and some of his fellow contributors to the magazine also had leftist
sympathies, making them critics of the right-wing trends in Greater Romanian politics.
In his column pieces for the magazine, Costenco repeatedly stipulated the existence of a Bessarabian ethnicity
, displaying "spiritual superiority" when compared to Romanians
, and suggested that all of Greater Romania's historical regions
had "particular, exclusive national consciousnesses". Another one of his ideas, outlined in ideological articles such as the 1937 piece Necesitatea regionalismului cultural ("The Need for a Cultural Regionalism"), was that Romanian immigrants into Bessarabia, or venetici ("newcomers"), were to locals what sparrow
s are to nightingale
s. Costenco also argued that the area's history as a part of the Russian Empire
, and its consequent familiarity with Russian culture
, were marks of both dissimilarity and excellence: "The culture of those who can speak Russian is overwhelmingly superior in its august silence, when compared with the old kingdom
's culture, with its chatty and insolent representatives. [...] By combining [the] two cultures, the Slavic and... the Latin
one, tomorrow's Bessarabia shall become, from a spiritual point of view, a chain of mountains, the tops of which will be glowing in full splendor over the times and borders."
Costenco's stance mirrored the attitudes of some other Viaţa Basarabiei contributors. The magazine published some of the last political texts by the old anarchist
Zamfir Arbore
, who stated his bitter rejection of Romanian society. Although a lifelong supporter of unionism, the Romanian Orthodox
priest and writer Vasile Ţepordei, who was a regular contributor to Viaţa Basarabiei and other regional reviews, spoke of Romania having treated Bessarabia as an "African colony
", creating opportunities for "adventurers" and "nonentities" from the other historical regions. Halippa's own pronouncements of the period expressed his disappointment with centralist policies, leading to accusations that he himself had become anti-Romanian.
Various commentators have noted that Viaţa Basarabiei partly shaped the negative perception of Romanian authorities, as embraced by many locals. Literary critic Dan Mănucă notes that this cultural and political phenomenon, later exacerbated by Soviet historiography
, was in fact also an answer to the Romanian government's assignment of incompetent officials at a local level. However, Moldovan philologist Alina Ciobanu-Tofan notes, there was a separation between "the provocative statements" made by Viaţa Basarabiei editors and actual interwar accomplishments: "cultural regionalism has stood as the fundamental prerequisite in maintaining the Bessarabian spiritual phenomenon afloat, it being the only way for accomplishing the actual unification of Romanian spirituality, the synthesis of all creative contributions". The regionalist platform continued to tolerate contributions from Romanian men of letters who did not identify with such policies. One such case was that of Constantin Ciopraga, a literary critic who made his debut in the magazine's pages, and who, according to Mănucă, was most likely interested in "supporting Romanianism in the land between the Prut
and the Dniester
[that is, Bessarabia]."
side of the Romanian literary environment
. In articles for the magazine, Costenco offered praise to the publications issued by the nationalist
thinker and historian Nicolae Iorga
, from the defunct Sămănătorul
(the coagulant factor of Romanian traditionalism) to the neo-Sămănătorist Cuget Clar. The Bessarabian journalist merged his rejection of Romanian modernism into his discourse on the regional issue, arguing: "We, as Bessarabians, are pleased that the Bessarabian folk is impervious to the poisoned heat radiating from present-day Romanian culture." According to Burlacu, the use of traditionalist rhetoric is also observable in those articles which speak of Bessarabia's identity, in the magazine's critique of modernist poet Tudor Arghezi
, and in poet Sergiu Matei Nica's Orthodox statements of devotion.
In practice, Viaţa Basarabiei was more open to modernism than its editorial policies dictated. The paradox was underlined by Burlacu, who noted that Costenco himself was beginning to incorporate poetic traits from Symbolism
, a literary form that Iorga had equated with sickness. The magazine therefore played host to Bogdan Istru
, George Meniuc
and other writers who illustrated the final developments of Romania's Symbolist movement
, and whose work also adopted some avant-garde
characteristics. After 1935, Viaţa Basarabiei employed as a member of the editorial staff the modernist poet and communist
sympathizer Alexandru Robot
, whose articles covered such political issues as the trial of Romanian Communist Party
member Petre Constantinescu-Iaşi.
Writing for the magazine, Costenco himself offered much praise to the lyrical work of Vladimir Cavarnali, whose style was by then incorporating influences from Russian Symbolism
, Expressionism
or Futurism
over a generic Symbolist framework. One of Costenco's essays, published by Viaţa Basarabiei in 1937, stated: "the poet is a hero, a titan
—the multitudes should follow him, so that, once in communion with his songs, they may build themselves a future without any lies". The critic encouraged Cavarnali to pursue this tendency, in order to provide his readers with "the Great Poem of the native, Bessarabian, soul". Costenco was also a promoter of Robot's Somnul singurătăţii ("The Slumber of Solitude", 1936)—an avant-garde volume which he positively reviewed for Viaţa Basarabiei.
In 1939, George Meniuc used Viaţa Basarabiei to express his thoughts about the similarity between the condition of a poet and that of a shipwreck
victim: "The creative soul, tormented in so many ways, finds itself in continuous disorientation. Creation is merely the [...] proof of one's search for support, search for certitudes". He argued in favor of a poetry that based itself primarily on musicality, and, aligning himself with Symbolist and Expressionist principles, urged poets to seek inspiration in both "the starlit sky" and "the dumpster". Also published in Viaţa Basarabiei, Meniuc's review of Cavarnali's 1939 volume Răsadul verde al inimii stelele de sus îl plouă ("The Heart's Green Seedbed Is Rained upon by the Stars Above") expressed an enthusiasm similar to Costenco's. Meniuc argued that Cavarnali had foreseen the arrival of a new age, "perhaps the new Middle Ages
", adding: "the arrival of this new epoch is seen by [Cavarnali] as ruin, devastation. The modern city [...] scares him. Everything that is not in touch with the primitive life of yesteryear is inscribed within the prosaic sign of mechanicism. This new rumor casts darkness over his rest and his reverie".
-themed works by Halippa and Sergiu Grossu
. Other noted works hosted by Viaţa Basarabiei were the prose writings of Dubăsari
native Dominte Timonu. Having had his work reviewed by Sergiu Matei Nica in a 1937 issue, Timonu was featured with the novella
s Fiica domnului primar, ("Mr. Mayor's Daughter"), La comisariat ("At the Commissioner's Office"), Lalea ("A Tulip"), Albăstrele ("The Bullweed Flowers") and Un pictor de peisaje ("A Landscape Painter"), printed in various issues between 1937 and 1942. Other modernist or traditionalist poetry and prose authors who contributed to the Bessarabian review were: Ion Buzdugan
, Radu Gyr
, Teodor Nencev, Liuba Dumitriu, Sergiu Grossu
, Nicolae Spătaru, Petru Ştefănucă, Vasile Luţcan, Octav Sargeţiu, Anton Luţcan, Iacov Slavov, Andrei Tibereanu, Magda Isanos and Alexandru Lungu.
According to Alina Ciobanu-Tofan, "for 13 years, [Viaţa Basarabiei] has had a fruitful activity (without equivalent in its epoch) in the area of Romanian culture in Bessarabia, discovering talents, generating and propagating unprecedented values". She notes that the progresses registered by Halippa and Costenco's tribune, "the most prestigious publication in 1930s Bessarabia", were significant in a context were the "blood-stained prints" of 19th century Russification
were still observable.
Beyond its literary agenda, Viaţa Basarabiei had a role in circulating academic studies on various subjects. According to one author's assessment, it published, before 1944: "3,232 articles, sources, reviews, information pieces on the most recent problems of Romanian language
and literature, the history of the Romanians, philosophy, psychology, Christian ethics
, sociology, statecraft and law, economy, natural sciences, agriculture, education, arts etc." Among the noted social scientists who contributed to Viaţa Basarabiei at the time were Halippa himself, Zamfir Arbore
, Vasile Harea, Gheorghe V. Madan and Liviu Marian.
In addition to chronicling Bessarabian and nation-wide developments, Viaţa Basarabiei was interested in the life of Romanian-speakers within the Soviet Union, particularly those in the neighboring Moldavian ASSR
(Transnistria
), where, due to permanent border tensions, cultural contacts had been much reduced. The journal's 1933 notice on the literary life of Transnistria, at a time when the region was being reshaped by Marxism-Leninism
, interested Romanian novelist and journalist Liviu Rebreanu
, who then published ample but partly erroneous deductions about the number of Romanian writers there.
, the Romanian capital. It was published there throughout the Ion Antonescu
regime's participation in the Axis
-led war on the Soviet Union
(see Romania during World War II
). The paper continued featuring articles endorsing Romania's participation in the war, and making negative assessments about the impact of Imperial Russian and Soviet rule. It notably featured articles by the senior Bessarabian politician Ion Pelivan
, who argued: "The Russians have plundered, robbed, humiliated us [Bessarabian Romanians], defiled our spirit, destroyed our language, stole our land, colonized it with other plundering populations, and they have murdered our Romanian being". Pelivan's essay reflected on the impact of Russification and its conflict with unionism, all the way back to the Crimean War
.
Before and after the Axis invasion
, Viaţa Basarabieis legacy in the newly created Moldavian SSR
(covering most of Bessarabia) was contested by local Soviet officials. The successive deportations to the Gulag
affected several former affiliates of the magazine, including Costenco (who had chosen to remain behind after the 1940 occupation) and Vasile Ţepordei. Having stayed behind in Soviet territory after 1940, Alexandru Robot
adopted the tenets of Socialist Realism
and mysteriously disappeared shortly after the Axis attack. His praise of Soviet power, concentrated in lyrical pieces such as A înflorit Moldova ("Moldova Has Blossomed"), is believed by researcher Iurie Colesnic
to have masked his secret disappointment with the Soviet regime. In what has been described as a highly unusual occurrence, Robot had continued to publish articles in Viaţa Basarabiei between its relocation to Bucharest and the outbreak of war.
Discussing the manner in which the Soviet takeover had effected both cultural separation and the promotion of Moldovenism, Ion Simuţ writes about the ensuing paradoxes: "N. Costenco would become a victim of this blockage, enduring 15 years of [Soviet] detention specifically because of his earlier 'nationalism'. His exclusive and rigid regionalism of the '30s was one thing, and Moldovan Sovietism
of the Stalinist
years quite another. Still, they had many things in common, among which dogmatism, an anti-Romanian attitude and a cultural disaster were the most important." Lungu, who writes about Costenco's failed attempts at reaching a compromise with the Soviet authorities, finds that the Bessarabian author came to reconsider his stance on regionalism, during and after his time in Soviet camps. Halippa had a special situation: a political prisoner
of the Romanian communist regime
, he was also handed out to the Soviets and sent to the Gulag, and then again held in Romanian custody. A committed devotee to the cause of unionism, he refused proposals to resettle in the Moldavian SSR, and spent his final years in Romania.
The identification of the regionalist venue with nationalism and fascism
, centered on allegations about Halippa and Meniuc's wartime attitudes, was notably argued by communist poet Emilian Bucov. In a 1959 address to the Communist Party of the Moldavian SSR
, he suggested that Meniuc's renewed literary activity in Soviet territory posed a political threat: "Some of our writers, for example G. Meniuc, have begun to raise up, like some sort of banners, the shreds of some reactionary
magazines that used to be printed in Romania and Bessarabia up to 1940 and during the latest war, Viaţa Basarabiei or Gândirea
. Why should we now extend amnesty to these reactionary magazines [...]? After all, all Bessarabian people know that Viaţa Basarabiei magazine has been promoting a shameless campaign, riddled with lies and innuendo, against the Land of the Soviets, against the revolutionary communist movement in Bessarabia." Meniuc, who faced these and other political charges, was removed from his editorial offices upon the end of the investigation.
. The new series entered print in 2002, under the direction of literary historian and politician Mihai Cimpoi
, and placed under the patronage of both the Romanian Writers' Union and the Moldovan Writers' Union
. This custody was also shared by the Moldovan Writers' Union with the Romanian Cultural Institute
.
Its creation followed a split within the editorial board of Basarabia journal: Cimpoi and part of the editorial staff voted in favor of the transformation, while poet Nicolae Popa contested the decision and continued to publish Basarabia as a separate periodical. As of 2003, Prut Internaţional publishing company manages the publication process.
The first issues listed as the editorial staff writers from Moldova (Alexandru Burlacu, Emilian Galaicu-Păun, Ion Hadârcă
, Dumitru-Dan Maxim) and Romania (Ana Blandiana
, Constantin Ciopraga, Victor Crăciun, Eugen Simion). Other noted contributors were Romanian critic Eugen Uricaru, Bessarabian-born novelist Paul Goma
(who serialized here his narrative, also titled Basarabia), and Moldovan author Andrei Strâmbeanu
. The magazine was also noted for publishing posthumous works by authors from several cultures, among them Marin Preda
and Konstantin Paustovsky
.
The magazine faced several problems, including irregular circulation. According to a December 2005 article by cultural journalist Larisa Ungureanu, Viaţa Basarabiei only published eleven issues over three years, none of which had been published during that year. She also notes that Cimpoi's paper, like all other Moldovan literary reviews, was largely inaccessible at newsstands in Chişinău and in public libraries all over the country. Ungureanu also opines that, among this section of the Moldovan media, Viaţa Basarabiei and Literatura şi Arta
stand out for their conservative approach to publishing, as opposed to the more modern Contrafort
, Revista Sud-Est and Semn. Writing for Revista Sud-Est, poet and novelist Leo Butnaru criticized Cimpoi and Viaţa Basarabiei for not maintaining the same editorial standard as Semn or Contrafort: "is it not symptomatic [...] that, even in the very first issue of Viaţa Basarabiei, presided upon by an obviously apt literary critic, Mihai Cimpoi, no room could be found for at the very least simple bibliographies, reviews or axiological
commentary?"
)
Viaţa Basarabiei (Romanian
Romanian language
Romanian Romanian Romanian (or Daco-Romanian; obsolete spellings Rumanian, Roumanian; self-designation: română, limba română ("the Romanian language") or românește (lit. "in Romanian") is a Romance language spoken by around 24 to 28 million people, primarily in Romania and Moldova...
for "Bessarabia
Bessarabia
Bessarabia is a historical term for the geographic region in Eastern Europe bounded by the Dniester River on the east and the Prut River on the west....
's Life", ˈvjat͡sa basaˈrabi.ej) is a Romanian-language periodical from Chişinău
Chisinau
Chișinău is the capital and largest municipality of Moldova. It is also its main industrial and commercial centre and is located in the middle of the country, on the river Bîc...
, Moldova
Moldova
Moldova , officially the Republic of Moldova is a landlocked state in Eastern Europe, located between Romania to the West and Ukraine to the North, East and South. It declared itself an independent state with the same boundaries as the preceding Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic in 1991, as part...
. Originally a literary
Literary magazine
A literary magazine is a periodical devoted to literature in a broad sense. Literary magazines usually publish short stories, poetry and essays along with literary criticism, book reviews, biographical profiles of authors, interviews and letters...
and political magazine
Political journalism
Political journalism is a broad branch of journalism that includes coverage of all aspects of politics and political science, although the term usually refers specifically to coverage of civil governments and political power....
, published at a time when Bessarabia region was part of Romania
Romania
Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...
, it was founded in 1932 by political activist Pan Halippa
Pan Halippa
Pantelimon "Pan" Halippa was a Bessarabian and later Romanian journalist and politician. One of the most important promoters of Romanian nationalism in Bessarabia and of this province's union with Romania, he was president of Sfatul Ţării, which voted union in 1918...
and writer Nicolai Costenco
Nicolai Costenco
Nicolai Costenco was a writer from Moldova. He was managing editor of Viaţa Basarabiei and was deported to Siberia în 1941.-Biography:...
. At the time, Viaţa Basarabiei was primarily noted for rejecting the centralism
Centralized government
A centralized or centralised government is one in which power or legal authority is exerted or coordinated by a de facto political executive to which federal states, local authorities, and smaller units are considered subject...
of Greater Romania
Greater Romania
The Greater Romania generally refers to the territory of Romania in the years between the First World War and the Second World War, the largest geographical extent of Romania up to that time and its largest peacetime extent ever ; more precisely, it refers to the territory of the Kingdom of...
n governments, to which they opposed more or less vocal Bessarabian regionalist
Regionalism (politics)
Regionalism is a term used in international relations. Regionalism also constitutes one of the three constituents of the international commercial system...
demands and a nativist
Nativism (politics)
Nativism favors the interests of certain established inhabitants of an area or nation as compared to claims of newcomers or immigrants. It may also include the re-establishment or perpetuation of such individuals or their culture....
ethos.
Declaring itself to be a traditionalist venue, interested in preserving local specificity in the cultural field, Viaţa Basarabiei was in effect a voice for cultural innovation and a host to modernist
Modernist literature
Modernist literature is sub-genre of Modernism, a predominantly European movement beginning in the early 20th century that was characterized by a self-conscious break with traditional aesthetic forms...
writers such as Vladimir Cavarnali, Bogdan Istru
Bogdan Istru
Bogdan Istru, pseudonym of Ivan Bodarev was a Moldovan poet....
or George Meniuc
George Meniuc
George Meniuc was a writer from Moldova.- Biography :George Meniuc was born on May 20, 1918, in Chişinău. He graduate from the University of Bucharest; his professors were Tudor Vianu, Petre P. Negulescu, Dimitrie Gusti, Mircea Florian...
. After the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
's 1940 annexation of Bessarabia, the editorial board split, and Halippa revived the magazine at a new location in Bucharest
Bucharest
Bucharest is the capital municipality, cultural, industrial, and financial centre of Romania. It is the largest city in Romania, located in the southeast of the country, at , and lies on the banks of the Dâmbovița River....
. It was published there for most of World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, and was eventually disestablished. Its editors were subject to persecution in both Soviet territory and Communist Romania
Communist Romania
Communist Romania was the period in Romanian history when that country was a Soviet-aligned communist state in the Eastern Bloc, with the dominant role of Romanian Communist Party enshrined in its successive constitutions...
. The magazine was revived in 2002 by Mihai Cimpoi
Mihai Cimpoi
Mihai Cimpoi is a Moldovan politician.- Biography :He was a member of the Parliament of Moldova. He is a leader of the Democratic Forum of Romanians in Moldova.- External links :* * -References:...
, being printed under the auspices of both the Romanian Writers' Union and the Moldovan Writers' Union
Moldovan Writers' Union
The Writers' Union of Moldova is a professional association of writers in Moldova.Mihai Cimpoi has been the president of the Writers' Union of Moldova since 1991.- External links :* * *...
.
Creation
Viaţa Basarabiei, founded as the literary voice of Bessarabian regionalism, was first printed in January 1932. Its first issue included a foreword by Halippa, in which the latter, previously a key figure in the 1918 union with RomaniaUnion of Bessarabia with Romania
On , the Sfatul Ţării, or National Council, of Bessarabia proclaimed union with the Kingdom of Romania.-Governorate of Bessarabia:The 1812 Treaty of Bucharest between the Ottoman Empire and the Russian Empires provided for Russian annexation of the eastern half of the territory of the Principality...
and activist of the National Moldavian Party
National Moldavian Party
-History:Prior to 1917, Bessarabian intelligentsia was divided between noblemen, conservatives, democrats, and socialists. Vasile Stroescu, a rich but very modest filantop boyar, managed to persuade all major factions to leave internal fights and at four day meeting the National Moldavian Party...
, outlined and pledged to follow a set of political and cultural ideals. The name adopted by Halippa's publication was homonymous with that of two other press organs: a newspaper published in 1907; and a daily of the National Peasants' Party
National Peasants' Party
The National Peasants' Party was a Romanian political party, formed in 1926 through the fusion of the Romanian National Party from Transylvania and the Peasants' Party . It was in power between 1928 and 1933, with brief interruptions...
, published from 1930 to 1944. The name was also equivalent in translation to those of non-Romanian Bessarabian papers: the Russian-language
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...
Besarabskaya Zhizn (published around 1917) and the Yiddish
Yiddish language
Yiddish is a High German language of Ashkenazi Jewish origin, spoken throughout the world. It developed as a fusion of German dialects with Hebrew, Aramaic, Slavic languages and traces of Romance languages...
Dos Besaraber Lebn (1918-1940).
The new magazine was, according to Romanian literary critic Ion Simuţ, a "regional adaptation" of the Moldavia
Moldavia
Moldavia is a geographic and historical region and former principality in Eastern Europe, corresponding to the territory between the Eastern Carpathians and the Dniester river...
n-based journal Viaţa Românească
Viata Româneasca
Viaţa Românească, originally Viaţa Romînească , is a monthly literary magazine published in Romania...
. According to Moldovan writer and researcher Călina Trifan, the connection between these two platforms was the theory of "national specificity" in Romanian culture
Culture of Romania
Romania has a unique culture, which is the product of its geography and of its distinct historical evolution. Like Romanians themselves, it is defined as the meeting point of three regions: Central Europe, Eastern Europe, and the Balkans, but cannot be truly included in any of them...
, first elaborated by Viaţa Românească before World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
, and resurrected into an "evidently regionalist" ideology by Halippa and Costenco (see Poporanism
Poporanism
The word “poporanism” is derived from “popor”, meaning “people” in the Romanian language. The ideology of Romanian Populism and poporanism are interchangeable. Founded by Constantin Stere in the early 1890s, populism is distinguished by its opposition to socialism, promotion of voting rights for...
). Himself a member of the Viaţa Românească circles, Romanian literary historian George Călinescu
George Calinescu
George Călinescu was a Romanian literary critic, historian, novelist, academician and journalist, and a writer of classicist and humanist tendencies...
spoke of Viaţa Basarabiei and other cultural platforms of the day as proofs that Bessarabia manifested "great interest in literature." The popularization of literature in the 1930s, Călinescu noted, meant that "even the hospitalized people of the sanitarium
Sanitarium
Sanitarium may refer to:*An alternate spelling of sanatorium, a medical facility for long-term illness or a summer resort.*Sanitarium, California, in Napa County*Battle Creek Sanitarium, made famous by John Harvey Kellogg...
in Bugaz
Zatoka, Odessa Oblast
Zatoka is the town in southwestern Ukraine. It is located not far from the city of Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi of Odessa Oblast in the historical region of Budjak in southern Bessarabia. In the Ukrainian it means a bay and the town is located on the coast of the Dniester Liman right next where Dnister...
had their own [literary periodical]".
Regionalist agenda
The localist point of view was a common feature of other Bessarabian periodicals during the interwar periodInterwar period
Interwar period can refer to any period between two wars. The Interbellum is understood to be the period between the end of the Great War or First World War and the beginning of the Second World War in Europe....
(Cuget Moldovenesc, Bugeacul, Poetul, Itinerar). However, Viaţa Basarabieis anti-centralist political bias, evident after Nicolai Costenco's arrival as managing editor (1934), was described by various researchers as proof of extremism, bordering on Moldovenism
Moldovenism
Moldovenism is a political term used to refer to the support and promotion of the Moldovan identity and Moldovan culture.Some of its supporters ascribe this identity to the medieval Principality of Moldavia...
and anti-Romanian sentiment. Simuţ writes: "During the '30s, N. Costenco was promoting an exclusive and aggressive, hardly imaginable form of regionalism [...]. [His was] the most dangerous political way of thinking for the Bessarabian 'nation', whose logic leads into euphoric isolationism
Isolationism
Isolationism is the policy or doctrine of isolating one's country from the affairs of other nations by declining to enter into alliances, foreign economic commitments, international agreements, etc., seeking to devote the entire efforts of one's country to its own advancement and remain at peace by...
, that is to say a form of enclavization, [...] an aberrant form of defense." According to scholar Alexandru Burlacu, Costenco was an "ideologist of nativism pushed to the point of absurdity". Moldovan essayist and critic Eugen Lungu, who suggested that such reactions may be traced back to a "parochial complex", also noted of Costenco: "He promoted [by means of Viaţa Basarabiei] a ferocious nativism, sometimes to the point of degenerating into anti-Romanianism. An animator and aesthete of cultural regionalism, convinced in his romantic
Romanticism
Romanticism was an artistic, literary and intellectual movement that originated in the second half of the 18th century in Europe, and gained strength in reaction to the Industrial Revolution...
frenzy of an ultraspecial genius of 'the populace', he exulted a rambunctious messianism
Messianism
Messianism is the belief in a messiah, a savior or redeemer. Many religions have a messiah concept, including the Jewish Messiah, the Christian Christ, the Muslim Mahdi and Isa , the Buddhist Maitreya, the Hindu Kalki and the Zoroastrian Saoshyant...
of Slavic
Slavic peoples
The Slavic people are an Indo-European panethnicity living in Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, North Asia and Central Asia. The term Slavic represents a broad ethno-linguistic group of people, who speak languages belonging to the Slavic language family and share, to varying degrees, certain...
inspiration." By then, Costenco and some of his fellow contributors to the magazine also had leftist
Left-wing politics
In politics, Left, left-wing and leftist generally refer to support for social change to create a more egalitarian society...
sympathies, making them critics of the right-wing trends in Greater Romanian politics.
In his column pieces for the magazine, Costenco repeatedly stipulated the existence of a Bessarabian ethnicity
Moldovans
Moldovans or Moldavians are the largest population group of Moldova...
, displaying "spiritual superiority" when compared to Romanians
Romanians
The Romanians are an ethnic group native to Romania, who speak Romanian; they are the majority inhabitants of Romania....
, and suggested that all of Greater Romania's historical regions
Historical regions of Romania
At various times during the late 19th and 20th centuries, Romania extended over the following historical regions:Wallachia:*Muntenia or Greater Wallachia: as part of Wallachia, joined Moldavia in 1859 to create modern Romania;...
had "particular, exclusive national consciousnesses". Another one of his ideas, outlined in ideological articles such as the 1937 piece Necesitatea regionalismului cultural ("The Need for a Cultural Regionalism"), was that Romanian immigrants into Bessarabia, or venetici ("newcomers"), were to locals what sparrow
Sparrow
The sparrows are a family of small passerine birds, Passeridae. They are also known as true sparrows, or Old World sparrows, names also used for a genus of the family, Passer...
s are to nightingale
Nightingale
The Nightingale , also known as Rufous and Common Nightingale, is a small passerine bird that was formerly classed as a member of the thrush family Turdidae, but is now more generally considered to be an Old World flycatcher, Muscicapidae...
s. Costenco also argued that the area's history as a part of the Russian Empire
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...
, and its consequent familiarity with Russian culture
Russian culture
Russian culture is associated with the country of Russia and, sometimes, specifically with ethnic Russians. It has a rich history and can boast a long tradition of excellence in every aspect of the arts, especially when it comes to literature and philosophy, classical music and ballet, architecture...
, were marks of both dissimilarity and excellence: "The culture of those who can speak Russian is overwhelmingly superior in its august silence, when compared with the old kingdom
Romanian Old Kingdom
The Romanian Old Kingdom is a colloquial term referring to the territory covered by the first independent Romanian nation state, which was composed of the Danubian Principalities—Wallachia and Moldavia...
's culture, with its chatty and insolent representatives. [...] By combining [the] two cultures, the Slavic and... the Latin
Latins
"Latins" refers to different groups of people and the meaning of the word changes for where and when it is used.The original Latins were an Italian tribe inhabiting central and south-central Italy. Through conquest by their most populous city-state, Rome, the original Latins culturally "Romanized"...
one, tomorrow's Bessarabia shall become, from a spiritual point of view, a chain of mountains, the tops of which will be glowing in full splendor over the times and borders."
Costenco's stance mirrored the attitudes of some other Viaţa Basarabiei contributors. The magazine published some of the last political texts by the old anarchist
Anarchism
Anarchism is generally defined as the political philosophy which holds the state to be undesirable, unnecessary, and harmful, or alternatively as opposing authority in the conduct of human relations...
Zamfir Arbore
Zamfir Arbore
Zamfir Constantin Arbore was a Bukovinan-born Romanian political activist originally active in the Russian Empire, also known for his work as an amateur historian, geographer and ethnographer. Arbore debuted in left-wing politics from early in life, gained an intimate knowledge of the Russian...
, who stated his bitter rejection of Romanian society. Although a lifelong supporter of unionism, the Romanian Orthodox
Romanian Orthodox Church
The Romanian Orthodox Church is an autocephalous Eastern Orthodox church. It is in full communion with other Eastern Orthodox churches, and is ranked seventh in order of precedence. The Primate of the church has the title of Patriarch...
priest and writer Vasile Ţepordei, who was a regular contributor to Viaţa Basarabiei and other regional reviews, spoke of Romania having treated Bessarabia as an "African colony
Scramble for Africa
The Scramble for Africa, also known as the Race for Africa or Partition of Africa was a process of invasion, occupation, colonization and annexation of African territory by European powers during the New Imperialism period, between 1881 and World War I in 1914...
", creating opportunities for "adventurers" and "nonentities" from the other historical regions. Halippa's own pronouncements of the period expressed his disappointment with centralist policies, leading to accusations that he himself had become anti-Romanian.
Various commentators have noted that Viaţa Basarabiei partly shaped the negative perception of Romanian authorities, as embraced by many locals. Literary critic Dan Mănucă notes that this cultural and political phenomenon, later exacerbated by Soviet historiography
Soviet historiography
Soviet historiography is the methodology of history studies by historians in the Soviet Union . In the USSR, the study of history was marked by alternating periods of freedom allowed and restrictions imposed by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , and also by the struggle of historians to...
, was in fact also an answer to the Romanian government's assignment of incompetent officials at a local level. However, Moldovan philologist Alina Ciobanu-Tofan notes, there was a separation between "the provocative statements" made by Viaţa Basarabiei editors and actual interwar accomplishments: "cultural regionalism has stood as the fundamental prerequisite in maintaining the Bessarabian spiritual phenomenon afloat, it being the only way for accomplishing the actual unification of Romanian spirituality, the synthesis of all creative contributions". The regionalist platform continued to tolerate contributions from Romanian men of letters who did not identify with such policies. One such case was that of Constantin Ciopraga, a literary critic who made his debut in the magazine's pages, and who, according to Mănucă, was most likely interested in "supporting Romanianism in the land between the Prut
Prut
The Prut is a long river in Eastern Europe. In part of its course it forms the border between Romania and Moldova.-Overview:...
and the Dniester
Dniester
The Dniester is a river in Eastern Europe. It runs through Ukraine and Moldova and separates most of Moldova's territory from the breakaway de facto state of Transnistria.-Names:...
[that is, Bessarabia]."
Traditionalism and modernism
Stylistically, Nicolai Costenco's review was generally committed to the traditionalist and anti-modernistModernist literature
Modernist literature is sub-genre of Modernism, a predominantly European movement beginning in the early 20th century that was characterized by a self-conscious break with traditional aesthetic forms...
side of the Romanian literary environment
Literature of Romania
Romanian literature is literature written by Romanian authors, although the term may also be used to refer to all literature written in the Romanian language.Eugène Ionesco is one of the foremost playwrights of the Theatre of the Absurd....
. In articles for the magazine, Costenco offered praise to the publications issued by the nationalist
Nationalism
Nationalism is a political ideology that involves a strong identification of a group of individuals with a political entity defined in national terms, i.e. a nation. In the 'modernist' image of the nation, it is nationalism that creates national identity. There are various definitions for what...
thinker and historian Nicolae Iorga
Nicolae Iorga
Nicolae Iorga was a Romanian historian, politician, literary critic, memoirist, poet and playwright. Co-founder of the Democratic Nationalist Party , he served as a member of Parliament, President of the Deputies' Assembly and Senate, cabinet minister and briefly as Prime Minister...
, from the defunct Sămănătorul
Sămănătorul
Sămănătorul or Semănătorul was a literary and political magazine published in Romania between 1901 and 1910. Founded by poets Alexandru Vlahuţă and George Coşbuc, it is primarily remembered as a tribune for early 20th century traditionalism, neoromanticism and ethnic nationalism...
(the coagulant factor of Romanian traditionalism) to the neo-Sămănătorist Cuget Clar. The Bessarabian journalist merged his rejection of Romanian modernism into his discourse on the regional issue, arguing: "We, as Bessarabians, are pleased that the Bessarabian folk is impervious to the poisoned heat radiating from present-day Romanian culture." According to Burlacu, the use of traditionalist rhetoric is also observable in those articles which speak of Bessarabia's identity, in the magazine's critique of modernist poet Tudor Arghezi
Tudor Arghezi
Tudor Arghezi was a Romanian writer, best known for his contribution to poetry and children's literature. Born Ion N. Theodorescu in Bucharest , he explained that his pen name was related to Argesis, the Latin name for the Argeş River.-Early life:Along with Mihai Eminescu, Mateiu Caragiale, and...
, and in poet Sergiu Matei Nica's Orthodox statements of devotion.
In practice, Viaţa Basarabiei was more open to modernism than its editorial policies dictated. The paradox was underlined by Burlacu, who noted that Costenco himself was beginning to incorporate poetic traits from Symbolism
Symbolism (arts)
Symbolism was a late nineteenth-century art movement of French, Russian and Belgian origin in poetry and other arts. In literature, the style had its beginnings with the publication Les Fleurs du mal by Charles Baudelaire...
, a literary form that Iorga had equated with sickness. The magazine therefore played host to Bogdan Istru
Bogdan Istru
Bogdan Istru, pseudonym of Ivan Bodarev was a Moldovan poet....
, George Meniuc
George Meniuc
George Meniuc was a writer from Moldova.- Biography :George Meniuc was born on May 20, 1918, in Chişinău. He graduate from the University of Bucharest; his professors were Tudor Vianu, Petre P. Negulescu, Dimitrie Gusti, Mircea Florian...
and other writers who illustrated the final developments of Romania's Symbolist movement
Symbolist movement in Romania
The Symbolist movement in Romania, active during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, marked the development of Romanian culture in both literature and visual arts...
, and whose work also adopted some avant-garde
Avant-garde
Avant-garde means "advance guard" or "vanguard". The adjective form is used in English to refer to people or works that are experimental or innovative, particularly with respect to art, culture, and politics....
characteristics. After 1935, Viaţa Basarabiei employed as a member of the editorial staff the modernist poet and communist
Communism
Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...
sympathizer Alexandru Robot
Alexandru Robot
Alexandru Robot was a Romanian, Moldovan and Soviet poet, also known as a novelist and journalist. First noted as a member of Romanian literary clubs, and committed to modernism and the avant-garde, he developed a poetic style based on borrowings from Symbolist and Expressionist literature...
, whose articles covered such political issues as the trial of Romanian Communist Party
Romanian Communist Party
The Romanian Communist Party was a communist political party in Romania. Successor to the Bolshevik wing of the Socialist Party of Romania, it gave ideological endorsement to communist revolution and the disestablishment of Greater Romania. The PCR was a minor and illegal grouping for much of the...
member Petre Constantinescu-Iaşi.
Writing for the magazine, Costenco himself offered much praise to the lyrical work of Vladimir Cavarnali, whose style was by then incorporating influences from Russian Symbolism
Russian Symbolism
Russian symbolism was an intellectual and artistic movement predominant at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century. It represented the Russian branch of the symbolist movement in European art, and was mostly known for its contributions to Russian poetry.-Russian symbolism in...
, Expressionism
Expressionism
Expressionism was a modernist movement, initially in poetry and painting, originating in Germany at the beginning of the 20th century. Its typical trait is to present the world solely from a subjective perspective, distorting it radically for emotional effect in order to evoke moods or ideas...
or Futurism
Futurism
Futurism was an artistic and social movement that originated in Italy in the early 20th century.Futurism or futurist may refer to:* Afrofuturism, an African-American and African diaspora subculture* Cubo-Futurism* Ego-Futurism...
over a generic Symbolist framework. One of Costenco's essays, published by Viaţa Basarabiei in 1937, stated: "the poet is a hero, a titan
Titan (mythology)
In Greek mythology, the Titans were a race of powerful deities, descendants of Gaia and Uranus, that ruled during the legendary Golden Age....
—the multitudes should follow him, so that, once in communion with his songs, they may build themselves a future without any lies". The critic encouraged Cavarnali to pursue this tendency, in order to provide his readers with "the Great Poem of the native, Bessarabian, soul". Costenco was also a promoter of Robot's Somnul singurătăţii ("The Slumber of Solitude", 1936)—an avant-garde volume which he positively reviewed for Viaţa Basarabiei.
In 1939, George Meniuc used Viaţa Basarabiei to express his thoughts about the similarity between the condition of a poet and that of a shipwreck
Shipwreck
A shipwreck is what remains of a ship that has wrecked, either sunk or beached. Whatever the cause, a sunken ship or a wrecked ship is a physical example of the event: this explains why the two concepts are often overlapping in English....
victim: "The creative soul, tormented in so many ways, finds itself in continuous disorientation. Creation is merely the [...] proof of one's search for support, search for certitudes". He argued in favor of a poetry that based itself primarily on musicality, and, aligning himself with Symbolist and Expressionist principles, urged poets to seek inspiration in both "the starlit sky" and "the dumpster". Also published in Viaţa Basarabiei, Meniuc's review of Cavarnali's 1939 volume Răsadul verde al inimii stelele de sus îl plouă ("The Heart's Green Seedbed Is Rained upon by the Stars Above") expressed an enthusiasm similar to Costenco's. Meniuc argued that Cavarnali had foreseen the arrival of a new age, "perhaps the new Middle Ages
Middle Ages
The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
", adding: "the arrival of this new epoch is seen by [Cavarnali] as ruin, devastation. The modern city [...] scares him. Everything that is not in touch with the primitive life of yesteryear is inscribed within the prosaic sign of mechanicism. This new rumor casts darkness over his rest and his reverie".
Pre-1940 cultural impact
Overall, the magazine was involved in promoting new voices on the Bessarabian literary scene, and had in all 120 individual contributors. Reportedly, there were 1,035 separate poems published by the journal between 1932 and 1944. In addition to the poems of Cavarnali, Costenco, Meniuc and Nica, it included, as milestones in Bessarabian poetry, Olga Cruşevan's "blue poetry", Lotis Dolenga's nostalgic pieces, as well as patrioticPatriotism
Patriotism is a devotion to one's country, excluding differences caused by the dependencies of the term's meaning upon context, geography and philosophy...
-themed works by Halippa and Sergiu Grossu
Sergiu Grossu
Sergiu Grossu was a writer and theologian from Romania.-Biography:Sergiu Grossu was born to Ion and Maria Grossu on November 14, 1920 in Cubolta. In 1927, his family moved to Bălţi, where he was a classmate of Eugen Coşeriu. He published in Viaţa Basarabiei...
. Other noted works hosted by Viaţa Basarabiei were the prose writings of Dubăsari
Dubasari
Dubăsari is a city in Transnistria, with a population of 23,650. The city is under the administration of the breakaway government of the "Transnistrian Moldovan Republic", and functions as the seat of the Dubăsari sub-district, Transnistria, Moldova.-Name:The origin of the town name is the plural...
native Dominte Timonu. Having had his work reviewed by Sergiu Matei Nica in a 1937 issue, Timonu was featured with the novella
Novella
A novella is a written, fictional, prose narrative usually longer than a novelette but shorter than a novel. The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America Nebula Awards for science fiction define the novella as having a word count between 17,500 and 40,000...
s Fiica domnului primar, ("Mr. Mayor's Daughter"), La comisariat ("At the Commissioner's Office"), Lalea ("A Tulip"), Albăstrele ("The Bullweed Flowers") and Un pictor de peisaje ("A Landscape Painter"), printed in various issues between 1937 and 1942. Other modernist or traditionalist poetry and prose authors who contributed to the Bessarabian review were: Ion Buzdugan
Ion Buzdugan
Ion Buzdugan was a Bessarabian politician.- Bibliography :*Gheorghe E. Cojocaru, Sfatul ţării: itinerar, Civitas, Chişinău, 1998, ISBN 9975-936-20-2...
, Radu Gyr
Radu Gyr
Radu Gyr was a Romanian poet, essayist, playwright and journalist....
, Teodor Nencev, Liuba Dumitriu, Sergiu Grossu
Sergiu Grossu
Sergiu Grossu was a writer and theologian from Romania.-Biography:Sergiu Grossu was born to Ion and Maria Grossu on November 14, 1920 in Cubolta. In 1927, his family moved to Bălţi, where he was a classmate of Eugen Coşeriu. He published in Viaţa Basarabiei...
, Nicolae Spătaru, Petru Ştefănucă, Vasile Luţcan, Octav Sargeţiu, Anton Luţcan, Iacov Slavov, Andrei Tibereanu, Magda Isanos and Alexandru Lungu.
According to Alina Ciobanu-Tofan, "for 13 years, [Viaţa Basarabiei] has had a fruitful activity (without equivalent in its epoch) in the area of Romanian culture in Bessarabia, discovering talents, generating and propagating unprecedented values". She notes that the progresses registered by Halippa and Costenco's tribune, "the most prestigious publication in 1930s Bessarabia", were significant in a context were the "blood-stained prints" of 19th century Russification
Russification
Russification is an adoption of the Russian language or some other Russian attributes by non-Russian communities...
were still observable.
Beyond its literary agenda, Viaţa Basarabiei had a role in circulating academic studies on various subjects. According to one author's assessment, it published, before 1944: "3,232 articles, sources, reviews, information pieces on the most recent problems of Romanian language
Romanian language
Romanian Romanian Romanian (or Daco-Romanian; obsolete spellings Rumanian, Roumanian; self-designation: română, limba română ("the Romanian language") or românește (lit. "in Romanian") is a Romance language spoken by around 24 to 28 million people, primarily in Romania and Moldova...
and literature, the history of the Romanians, philosophy, psychology, Christian ethics
Christian ethics
The first recorded meeting on the topic of Christian ethics, after Jesus' Sermon on the Mount, Great Commandment, and Great Commission , was the Council of Jerusalem , which is seen by most Christians as agreement that the New Covenant either abrogated or set aside at least some of the Old...
, sociology, statecraft and law, economy, natural sciences, agriculture, education, arts etc." Among the noted social scientists who contributed to Viaţa Basarabiei at the time were Halippa himself, Zamfir Arbore
Zamfir Arbore
Zamfir Constantin Arbore was a Bukovinan-born Romanian political activist originally active in the Russian Empire, also known for his work as an amateur historian, geographer and ethnographer. Arbore debuted in left-wing politics from early in life, gained an intimate knowledge of the Russian...
, Vasile Harea, Gheorghe V. Madan and Liviu Marian.
In addition to chronicling Bessarabian and nation-wide developments, Viaţa Basarabiei was interested in the life of Romanian-speakers within the Soviet Union, particularly those in the neighboring Moldavian ASSR
Moldavian ASSR
The Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic , shortened to Moldavian ASSR or, less frequently, Moldovan ASSR, was an autonomous republic of the Ukrainian SSR between 12 October 1924 and 2 August 1940, encompassing modern Transnistria The Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic...
(Transnistria
Transnistria
Transnistria is a breakaway territory located mostly on a strip of land between the Dniester River and the eastern Moldovan border to Ukraine...
), where, due to permanent border tensions, cultural contacts had been much reduced. The journal's 1933 notice on the literary life of Transnistria, at a time when the region was being reshaped by Marxism-Leninism
Marxism-Leninism
Marxism–Leninism is a communist ideology, officially based upon the theories of Marxism and Vladimir Lenin, that promotes the development and creation of a international communist society through the leadership of a vanguard party over a revolutionary socialist state that represents a dictatorship...
, interested Romanian novelist and journalist Liviu Rebreanu
Liviu Rebreanu
Liviu Rebreanu was a Romanian novelist, playwright, short story writer, and journalist.- Life :Born in Târlișua , Transylvania, then part of Austria-Hungary, he was the second of thirteen children born to Vasile Rebreanu, a schoolteacher, and Ludovica Diuganu, descendants of peasants...
, who then published ample but partly erroneous deductions about the number of Romanian writers there.
World War II, communism and disestablishment
After Bessarabia's annexation by the Soviets in 1940, Viaţa Basarabiei ceased its publication, only to resurface a year later in BucharestBucharest
Bucharest is the capital municipality, cultural, industrial, and financial centre of Romania. It is the largest city in Romania, located in the southeast of the country, at , and lies on the banks of the Dâmbovița River....
, the Romanian capital. It was published there throughout the Ion Antonescu
Ion Antonescu
Ion Victor Antonescu was a Romanian soldier, authoritarian politician and convicted war criminal. The Prime Minister and Conducător during most of World War II, he presided over two successive wartime dictatorships...
regime's participation in the Axis
Axis Powers
The Axis powers , also known as the Axis alliance, Axis nations, Axis countries, or just the Axis, was an alignment of great powers during the mid-20th century that fought World War II against the Allies. It began in 1936 with treaties of friendship between Germany and Italy and between Germany and...
-led war on the Soviet Union
Eastern Front (World War II)
The Eastern Front of World War II was a theatre of World War II between the European Axis powers and co-belligerent Finland against the Soviet Union, Poland, and some other Allies which encompassed Northern, Southern and Eastern Europe from 22 June 1941 to 9 May 1945...
(see Romania during World War II
Romania during World War II
Following the outbreak of World War II on 1 September 1939, the Kingdom of Romania officially adopted a position of neutrality. However, the rapidly changing situation in Europe during 1940, as well as domestic political upheaval, undermined this stance. Fascist political forces such as the Iron...
). The paper continued featuring articles endorsing Romania's participation in the war, and making negative assessments about the impact of Imperial Russian and Soviet rule. It notably featured articles by the senior Bessarabian politician Ion Pelivan
Ion Pelivan
Ion Gheorghe Pelivan was a Moldovan politician.- Biography :In 1898, Ion Pelivan graduated from the Teological Seminary in Chişinău and in 1903 he graduated from Dorpat University...
, who argued: "The Russians have plundered, robbed, humiliated us [Bessarabian Romanians], defiled our spirit, destroyed our language, stole our land, colonized it with other plundering populations, and they have murdered our Romanian being". Pelivan's essay reflected on the impact of Russification and its conflict with unionism, all the way back to the Crimean War
Crimean War
The Crimean War was a conflict fought between the Russian Empire and an alliance of the French Empire, the British Empire, the Ottoman Empire, and the Kingdom of Sardinia. The war was part of a long-running contest between the major European powers for influence over territories of the declining...
.
Before and after the Axis invasion
Operation Barbarossa
Operation Barbarossa was the code name for Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II that began on 22 June 1941. Over 4.5 million troops of the Axis powers invaded the USSR along a front., the largest invasion in the history of warfare...
, Viaţa Basarabieis legacy in the newly created Moldavian SSR
Moldavian SSR
The Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic , commonly abbreviated to Moldavian SSR or MSSR, was one of the 15 republics of the Soviet Union...
(covering most of Bessarabia) was contested by local Soviet officials. The successive deportations to the Gulag
Gulag
The Gulag was the government agency that administered the main Soviet forced labor camp systems. While the camps housed a wide range of convicts, from petty criminals to political prisoners, large numbers were convicted by simplified procedures, such as NKVD troikas and other instruments of...
affected several former affiliates of the magazine, including Costenco (who had chosen to remain behind after the 1940 occupation) and Vasile Ţepordei. Having stayed behind in Soviet territory after 1940, Alexandru Robot
Alexandru Robot
Alexandru Robot was a Romanian, Moldovan and Soviet poet, also known as a novelist and journalist. First noted as a member of Romanian literary clubs, and committed to modernism and the avant-garde, he developed a poetic style based on borrowings from Symbolist and Expressionist literature...
adopted the tenets of Socialist Realism
Socialist realism
Socialist realism is a style of realistic art which was developed in the Soviet Union and became a dominant style in other communist countries. Socialist realism is a teleologically-oriented style having its purpose the furtherance of the goals of socialism and communism...
and mysteriously disappeared shortly after the Axis attack. His praise of Soviet power, concentrated in lyrical pieces such as A înflorit Moldova ("Moldova Has Blossomed"), is believed by researcher Iurie Colesnic
Iurie Colesnic
- Biography :Iurie Colesnic has been a member of the Parliament of Moldova since 2009 and has been a member of the European Action Movement since 2010...
to have masked his secret disappointment with the Soviet regime. In what has been described as a highly unusual occurrence, Robot had continued to publish articles in Viaţa Basarabiei between its relocation to Bucharest and the outbreak of war.
Discussing the manner in which the Soviet takeover had effected both cultural separation and the promotion of Moldovenism, Ion Simuţ writes about the ensuing paradoxes: "N. Costenco would become a victim of this blockage, enduring 15 years of [Soviet] detention specifically because of his earlier 'nationalism'. His exclusive and rigid regionalism of the '30s was one thing, and Moldovan Sovietism
Sovietization
Sovietization is term that may be used with two distinct meanings:*the adoption of a political system based on the model of soviets .*the adoption of a way of life and mentality modelled after the Soviet Union....
of the Stalinist
Stalinism
Stalinism refers to the ideology that Joseph Stalin conceived and implemented in the Soviet Union, and is generally considered a branch of Marxist–Leninist ideology but considered by some historians to be a significant deviation from this philosophy...
years quite another. Still, they had many things in common, among which dogmatism, an anti-Romanian attitude and a cultural disaster were the most important." Lungu, who writes about Costenco's failed attempts at reaching a compromise with the Soviet authorities, finds that the Bessarabian author came to reconsider his stance on regionalism, during and after his time in Soviet camps. Halippa had a special situation: a political prisoner
Political prisoner
According to the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, a political prisoner is ‘someone who is in prison because they have opposed or criticized the government of their own country’....
of the Romanian communist regime
Communist Romania
Communist Romania was the period in Romanian history when that country was a Soviet-aligned communist state in the Eastern Bloc, with the dominant role of Romanian Communist Party enshrined in its successive constitutions...
, he was also handed out to the Soviets and sent to the Gulag, and then again held in Romanian custody. A committed devotee to the cause of unionism, he refused proposals to resettle in the Moldavian SSR, and spent his final years in Romania.
The identification of the regionalist venue with nationalism and fascism
Fascism
Fascism is a radical authoritarian nationalist political ideology. Fascists seek to rejuvenate their nation based on commitment to the national community as an organic entity, in which individuals are bound together in national identity by suprapersonal connections of ancestry, culture, and blood...
, centered on allegations about Halippa and Meniuc's wartime attitudes, was notably argued by communist poet Emilian Bucov. In a 1959 address to the Communist Party of the Moldavian SSR
Communist Party of Moldova
The Communist Party of Moldova was one of the fourteen republic-level parties that formed the Communist Party of the Soviet Union until the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991. Indeed, the PCM was the republic-level chapter of the CPSU in the Moldavian SSR from 1940 to 1991...
, he suggested that Meniuc's renewed literary activity in Soviet territory posed a political threat: "Some of our writers, for example G. Meniuc, have begun to raise up, like some sort of banners, the shreds of some reactionary
Reactionary
The term reactionary refers to viewpoints that seek to return to a previous state in a society. The term is meant to describe one end of a political spectrum whose opposite pole is "radical". While it has not been generally considered a term of praise it has been adopted as a self-description by...
magazines that used to be printed in Romania and Bessarabia up to 1940 and during the latest war, Viaţa Basarabiei or Gândirea
Gândirea
Gândirea , known during its early years as Gândirea Literară - Artistică - Socială , was a Romanian literary, political and art magazine.- Overview :Founded by Cezar Petrescu and D. I...
. Why should we now extend amnesty to these reactionary magazines [...]? After all, all Bessarabian people know that Viaţa Basarabiei magazine has been promoting a shameless campaign, riddled with lies and innuendo, against the Land of the Soviets, against the revolutionary communist movement in Bessarabia." Meniuc, who faced these and other political charges, was removed from his editorial offices upon the end of the investigation.
2002 revival
Viaţa Basarabiei was revived a decade after the fall of the Soviet Union granted Moldovan independenceIndependence of Moldova
The Independence of Moldova was officially recognized on March 2, 1992, when Moldova gained membership of the United Nations. The nation had declared its independence from the Soviet Union on August 27, 1991, and was a co-founder of the post-Soviet Commonwealth of Independent States...
. The new series entered print in 2002, under the direction of literary historian and politician Mihai Cimpoi
Mihai Cimpoi
Mihai Cimpoi is a Moldovan politician.- Biography :He was a member of the Parliament of Moldova. He is a leader of the Democratic Forum of Romanians in Moldova.- External links :* * -References:...
, and placed under the patronage of both the Romanian Writers' Union and the Moldovan Writers' Union
Moldovan Writers' Union
The Writers' Union of Moldova is a professional association of writers in Moldova.Mihai Cimpoi has been the president of the Writers' Union of Moldova since 1991.- External links :* * *...
. This custody was also shared by the Moldovan Writers' Union with the Romanian Cultural Institute
Romanian Cultural Institute
The Romanian Cultural Institute is a state-funded institution that promotes Romanian culture and civilization in Romania and abroad. The ICR was formerly set up through reorganization of the Romanian Cultural Foundation and Romanian Cultural Publishing Foundation...
.
Its creation followed a split within the editorial board of Basarabia journal: Cimpoi and part of the editorial staff voted in favor of the transformation, while poet Nicolae Popa contested the decision and continued to publish Basarabia as a separate periodical. As of 2003, Prut Internaţional publishing company manages the publication process.
The first issues listed as the editorial staff writers from Moldova (Alexandru Burlacu, Emilian Galaicu-Păun, Ion Hadârcă
Ion Hadârcă
- Biography :Ion Hadârcă was born on July 17, 1949 in Sîngerei, Sîngerei District. Between 1968-1970, he carried out the compulsory military service in the Soviet army. He wast the first president of the Popular Front of Moldova...
, Dumitru-Dan Maxim) and Romania (Ana Blandiana
Ana Blandiana
Ana Blandiana is a Romanian poet, essayist, and political figure. She took her name after Blandiana, near Vinţu de Jos, Alba County, her mother's home village.-Literary career:...
, Constantin Ciopraga, Victor Crăciun, Eugen Simion). Other noted contributors were Romanian critic Eugen Uricaru, Bessarabian-born novelist Paul Goma
Paul Goma
Paul Goma is a Romanian writer, also known for his activities as a dissident and leading opponent of the communist regime before 1989. Forced into exile by the communist authorities, he became a political refugee and currently resides in France as a stateless person...
(who serialized here his narrative, also titled Basarabia), and Moldovan author Andrei Strâmbeanu
Andrei Strâmbeanu
-References:* * * * -References:...
. The magazine was also noted for publishing posthumous works by authors from several cultures, among them Marin Preda
Marin Preda
Marin Preda was a Romanian novelist, one of the best-known post-WWII Romanian writers.Preda was born in Teleorman county, in a village called Siliştea-Gumeşti, into a family of peasants. He first studied at school in his home village, then schools in Abrud and Cristur-Odorhei...
and Konstantin Paustovsky
Konstantin Paustovsky
Konstantin Georgiyevich Paustovsky was a Russian Soviet writer nominated for the Nobel Prize for literature in 1965.-Early life:Konstantin Paustovsky was born in Moscow. His father, descendant of the Zaporizhia Cossacks, was a railroad statistician, and was “an incurable romantic and Protestant”....
.
The magazine faced several problems, including irregular circulation. According to a December 2005 article by cultural journalist Larisa Ungureanu, Viaţa Basarabiei only published eleven issues over three years, none of which had been published during that year. She also notes that Cimpoi's paper, like all other Moldovan literary reviews, was largely inaccessible at newsstands in Chişinău and in public libraries all over the country. Ungureanu also opines that, among this section of the Moldovan media, Viaţa Basarabiei and Literatura şi Arta
Literatura şi Arta
Literatura şi Arta is a weekly newspaper from Chişinău, Moldova.- History :The first edition was printed in 1977. The first editor in chief was Victor Teleucă , Valeriu Senic...
stand out for their conservative approach to publishing, as opposed to the more modern Contrafort
Contrafort
Contrafort is a magazine based in Chişinău, Moldova. It was launched in October 1994. Contrafort promotes a modern critical spirit while focusing on the contemporary literature and culture of the Republic of Moldova.- External links : *...
, Revista Sud-Est and Semn. Writing for Revista Sud-Est, poet and novelist Leo Butnaru criticized Cimpoi and Viaţa Basarabiei for not maintaining the same editorial standard as Semn or Contrafort: "is it not symptomatic [...] that, even in the very first issue of Viaţa Basarabiei, presided upon by an obviously apt literary critic, Mihai Cimpoi, no room could be found for at the very least simple bibliographies, reviews or axiological
Axiology
Axiology is the philosophical study of value. It is either the collective term for ethics and aesthetics—philosophical fields that depend crucially on notions of value—or the foundation for these fields, and thus similar to value theory and meta-ethics...
commentary?"
External links
Viaţa Basarabiei, Nr. 4/1932 (digitalized by the National Library of MoldovaNational Library of Moldova
The National Library of Moldova is on 31-August-1989 Street in Chişinău. It was founded on August 22, 1832. The Director General is currently Alexe Rău.The architect of it was A. Ambartumian...
)