In Romania, no less than 18 minorities live alongside the majority population, having more or less weight. This has favored – especially in some cases – a very interesting and significant cultural melting pot process, the birth of an extremely rich and diversified cultural life. Extremely diverse seeds and traditions have been felicitously blended with specific local elements, each component contributing to the enrichment of the whole; fortunately, however, they also preserved their own originality. Some Romanians became world famous – mostly Eugen Ionescu, Emil Cioran, and Mircea Eliade – and they have been joined by a large number of minority writers that have won a well-deserved international fame. It is enough to mention, just as examples, and not necessarily in this priority order, names like: Paul Celan, Rose Auslander, the entire group of German writers from Banat, who are now famous in Germany, or Tristan Tzara, Benjamin Fondane, and, more recently, Serge Moscovici in France, and many others who distinguished themselves in painting, music, etc. This Plural issue brings together texts form the works of five minorities, by writers who are anything but minor: Germans, Hungarians, Jews, Armenians, and Serbs. A small florilegium, a subjective one, perhaps, like any selection, but successful in mediating an idea that is as close as possible to the true cultural hierarchy of the values born in this land.
by Dumitru Hîncu
