Author(s): Iudit Calinescu / Language(s): Romanian
Issue: 39/2024
This research proposes an analysis of childhood in communism, in two books that address this theme, "Good night, children!", by Radu Pavel Gheo, and "Our daily life", by Sanda Golopenția. The first is a work of fiction, a novel, and the second is based on documents from the Security archive, that are real, historical facts, that trigger the author's memories of her childhood. Although the books differ in general theme and style, they can be united by a basic idea, enunciated by both authors: beyond historical time, beyond concrete space, beyond the traumas of a social or political context, childhood represents that ideal, special place and time, in which everyone finds themselves, where they could overcome trauma. In both books, childhood is depicted from two points of view, that of the ideal childhood and that of the childhood traversed by a trauma, both filtered through the author's experiences. Sanda Golopenția recalls a childhood in Bucharest in the 1950s, at the beginning of Romanian communism, a gloomy world, full of shortages, but which the presence of parents illuminates, transforms, offering the child moments of delight and joy, in which the reader from any era can identify himself, therefore, a childhood taken towards universality. On the other hand, in the fictional world of Radu Pavel Gheo's novel, we find concrete descriptions of the communist universe of the 1980s, in the border area of Banat, as if the author wants to create an authentic map of the real atmosphere of those times and places, and on this background, the village of Teica, the only one that does not exist in reality, becomes a universal symbol of a happy childhood.
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