Short

It was the month of June, 1821. Tudor Vladimirescu had risen from the darkness of Oltenia's forests; he had carried from Cernetzi all the way to Bucharest the light of his prophetic claims and he had set down like the sun, somewhere between Goleshti and Targovishte,

Chapter IVexcerpts The doorbell rang earnestly. I had noticed, during my long career as an art scholar, that all of my doorbells manifested a sort of unexpected zeal, an eagerness that suggested that these tiny technical devices strove to reach the condition of an animate

excerpts THE UNHAPPINESS OF KINGSCONSTANTINE THE LOST THE FIRST. CHILDHOOD AND ADOLESCENCE He was called Constantine the Lost for he was first seen and found on Horse Island with no known parents, and without his being able to tell whence he came or what he was doing in

A Great Man is one of the short stories that has haunted me since adolescence when I accidentally found it on one of the shelves in my bookcase, in a volume of short stories by Eliade. I was intrigued by the title and I chose to read it first. Its reading brought in front

I had known Cucoanesh as far back as the first high school years, but we had never made friends. In university, I lost touch with him. I only learnt that he entered the PolytechnicUniversity. Meeting him, by accident, in a tobacconist's, he told me that he had graduated

It so happened that I lived for a while in Polynesia, and this extends the story up to the Antipodes. I had recently come back from the countries of the South Pacific, from the Polynesian islands. I was bringing with me the brain tomographies of a Maori minister, the file

excerpts Let me tell you about Sergiu:What for?He had been in love, like any other 18-year old young man, with an older woman. Using all her charms, she easily seduced him, turned him into a man, then she accepted to move in together for a week, act happy, and finally left

I have lived a short lifeNo time to fulfill all the good I had promised mankindPut my feet up on the table in front – yesPut my feet up with a bang on the table in front – yesOffend and run wild and then start all over again – yes yes yes I've been messing up

ArgumentI have always regretted the lack of raw erotic detail in the most remarkable works of fiction. This frustration is by no means compensated for by the high availability of lurid, pornographic books. When reading fiction, I do not look for arousal, but for precision.

excerpt When I first met her, she said she adored Pablo Neruda's poetry and La Fontaine's erotic fables, which are un petit secret délicieux and, once a month, she would listen to a fragment of Le Petit Prince, interpreted by Gérard Philippe. She also told me

Bertrand had descended on our little town as if from a film: long-haired, with a beard that was still fluffy but nevertheless impressive in comparison with our teenage fuzz, and dressed in a T-shirt with Che Guevara on it. Besides, he was smoking Gauloises and was an anarchist.

Dies estexcerptsHe would kiss her and caress her breasts clutching them (as if her breasts were mere rubber balls), and he couldn't figure out just how much cheap male instinct, and how much true passion, was hiding behind his gestures. Those were the gestures of a