Ath

The Erotic Arms Race

A young man learning of how Les Fleurs du Mal was condemned for obscenity during Napoleon III's uptight times can only be left speechless if he has happened to read Baudelaire. For the young generations of today, the poet's depiction of lesbian delights appears

Ditty

The air is bracing where your high breasts rise. Around their peaks I breathe with greater ease. Yet I descend, beloved, by degrees,Cheap bastard that I am, towards your thighs.  Your carnal hip is naked and asleep,So lily-like it makes my halo blush. I long to kiss it,

On Love And More Than Love

It is amazing how many children are begotten from the sentimental exultation that one or the other of their parents feel for a third person, another than the partner in the respective action, irrespective if the person in question be a man or a woman. Sometimes this third

The Galaxy Of Bachelors

Chapter VIII: The party on the 24th of August. Gaby and the other Sandu. Dyed. Pusha and Hippodrome. Gaby and the evil. The movie on TV. Stupid jokes. On the phone with Pusha. A letter. Fight and reconciliation with HippoLet's go back to 1963, a time in which Monica

The Wild Wine Gallery

excerpt He continued to walk towards the former Senate Square, his hand pressed against his jaw, still paralyzed from the aggression of the figurant, and the bizarre appearance of his General in that particular place. One blow after another. It was too much… It was indeed

Summer

Every summer the city on the hill is drowned in green, which explodes in the church park, at the Citadel and at the Cabin and the Grove, while the green willows of the River girdle the city. The summer of fir trees and willows flaps big, unseen wings in a fervor of lofty

Water

excerpt Paul Dunca found himself asking not what has become of the baron, which would have been an equally ludicrous question, but at least still possible at the time, but:How is the baron?The girl burst into a loud laughter and that was her only answer, and Paul Dunca understood

The Intruder

excerpt  I wasn't wrong. In every woman, more than in a man, lies a history. But I have never in my life heard a shorter one, although the events in it could very well be enough for someone, their entire life. Could Nutzi have felt that I wasn't able to listen

The Pit

excerpt They wandered about the villages around Bucharest, the old man leading the way, Paraschiv right behind him. They went to Bolintin, to Catzelu, eager for prey. They always went there on market days when the peasants were there, as these were the most likely victims

A Shortcoming

If we were to maintain that the erotic language as an independent writing mode has at present been obliterated from Romanian literature, we would, perhaps, make a serious overstatement, but not lie entirely: it might seem peculiar, but this European literature, which is

L'Abbandonata

excerpt I was half asleep in a somewhat uncertain state of mind (and of body)… A vague and – at first – terribly tortuous state of wakefulness was gently falling over me; then, the same confounded state came back floating over me, translucent, like some veils unbraided

Thermidor

Some sudden deaths in our small town, my love – I've come on purpose, just to let you know. Upon their biers, in town, for too much heat,The corpses decompose ever so slow.  The quick are in like manner decomposed,Their very dust is sweating in the heat;I can smell