Războiul – O temă frecventă în romanele lui D. R. Popescu
War – A frequent theme in the novels of D. R. Popescu

Summary/Abstract: At first glance, literature and war have little in common. Literature is about creating something; war is the most destructive activity in which human beings engage. Writing usually requires order, quietness, and solitude; war is chaos and noise, and requires an enemy. However, given that war has been a nearly constant facet of human existence, it would be surprising if writers did not attempt to capture some of the reality of war within their works. In addition, many literary texts derive from pain, anger and despair more than from joy, and war is the source of pain, anger and despair on an immense scale. The twentieth century was tormented by great conflagrations, by terrible wars. The two Great Wars were not a “sources of energy” for the humanity, but they were definitely sources of destruction, pain, despair. Therefore, on a symbolic level, they also were sources of inspiration for writers. The war, with its multitude of facets (fair or unfair, civil war or cold war, the war between the generations, the war between ordinary people), represents either destructive, cruel and dehumanizing experiences or passions stronger than reason. As a result, the traumatic experiences on the battlefields became a great source of inspiration for all the writers. During the interwar period, many writers lived directly the experience of war. One of them was Camil Petrescu. This historical phenomenon was not depicted only by Romanian writers such as Mircea Eliade, Mihail Sebastian, Liviu Rebreanu, Cezar Petrescu, Hortensia Papadat Bengescu etc., but also by writers who belong to universal literature, the so called “lost generation”: Ernest Hemingway, Ring Lardner, Francis Scott Fitzgerald, Gertrude Stein. A writer who used the war and its devastating implications as a theme in his novels is also D. R. Popescu. Such novels as Cei doi din dreptul Ţebei, Întoarcerea tatălui risipitor, Oraşul îngerilor, Iepurele şchiop deal with themes like the absurd conflict of chauvinism, the adverse consequences of war, the conflict between people during harsh times. The present paper comes to prove that war, as an evil force, does not have the power to destroy the entire humanity, the man being able to find the right way through the maze of life.

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