Mihai Eminescu, the Anglo-Saxon and German realm: influence and perception

The Romanian Cultural Institute in London celebrates the Romanian National Culture´s Day on Thursday, January 19^th, with the report ”Mihai Eminescu, the Anglo-Saxon and German realm: influence and perception”.

In the Romanian cultural calendar, January the 15th marks the National Culture´s Day of Romania. The birthday of the national poet of the Romanians, Mihai Eminescu, in 1850, has been taken as a symbol for fixing this date. Although from year to year this day represents an opportunity to promote Romanian culture in its most diverse fields, attention often returns precisely to the destiny and work of Mihai Eminescu.

Mihai Eminescu's creation, although deeply Romanian in essence, has a universal character. He has been called "the last romantic poet", but his creation reaches far beyond the spheres of poetry, his interests and in-depth research covering vast fields, from philosophy to mathematics and from history to astronomy and ancient languages. The present lecture will reveal the presence, in Eminescu's thinking and creation, of certain English figures, symbols and influences. It will also highlight a number of aspects, new for the British public, regarding the complexity of the issues addressed and cast into verse by the poet, like the theories about the origin of the universe, about the laws that govern space and time, about the idea of the curved universe and the relationship between space and time, ideas considered to anticipate the Theory of Relativity.

The materials on which the report is based come from Mihai Eminescu´s manuscripts, as well as from the documents made available by the "Mihai Eminescu" Central University Library in Iași and the Museum of Romanian Literature "Casa Pogor" in Iași, former headquarters of the "Junimea" Society, National Archives in Iași.

Also, a tribute will be paid to the most skilful and recognized English translator of the Eminescu lyric, Corneliu M. Popescu, who died at the age of 18 in the earthquake of 1977, the one whose name bears the Popescu European Poetry Translation Prize, an award which turns this year 40, being established in May 1983 by the British Poetry Society.

Prof. Univ. Dr. Marina Mureșanu Ionescu is one of the best-known Romanian specialists and researchers in the field of the Eminescu creation, author and coordinator of numerous accounts and books, in Romanian and French. A member of Romania Writer´s Union, she has been awarded in 1990 the “Lucian Blaga” Prize of the Romanian Academy, for the synthesis-work “Eminescu and the romantic intertext”.