Academician Eugen Simion died

Academician Eugen Simion died today, at the age of 89, the president of the Romanian Academy, Ioan-Aurel Pop, told AGERPRES. “He was hospitalized at the Elias Hospital. Immobilized”, declared Pop.

Critic, literary historian and essayist, academician Eugen Simion was born on May 25, 1933, in Chiojdeanca commune, Prahova county.

He attended the “Petru și Pavel” High School in Ploiesti, where he was a colleague of Nichita Stănescu, and graduated from the Faculty of Philology of the University of Bucharest (1952-1957), where he had Tudor Vianu, Iorgu Iordan, Alexandru Graur as teachers. In 1969, he became a doctor in philological sciences with a thesis on “Eugen Lovinescu, the saved skeptic”, with Şerban Cioculescu as his scientific supervisor.

For a period, between 1970-1973, he was a professor at the University of Paris IV (Sorbonne), where he taught courses on Romanian culture and civilization. The experience he had in France can be found in two of his books: “The time of living, the time of confession. Parisian Journal’ (1977, in 2014 the 6th edition appeared; in 1983 it was translated into Hungarian) and ‘The Return of the Author’ (1981, translated in the USA and in France, 1996). In 1992, he was visiting professor at Ecole Normale Superieure de Paris (Fontenay-aux-Roses).

He debuted with an article about “Caietele Eminescu”, in the pages of “Tribune” (1958), later collaborating with most magazines, where he held permanent columns: “Literary magazine, “Romania literară”, “Contemporanul”, “Flacăra”, ” The writer’ (since 1991).

Academician Eugen Simion has published over 3,000 articles and studies in literary and cultural magazines. At the same time, he is the author of a prodigious work, which includes fundamental titles for Romanian literature and Romanian culture.

He is also the author of some editions, introductory studies and anthologies. He prefaced numerous editions of the writings of Tudor Arghezi, Blaga, George Călinescu, Marin Preda, Ilarie Voronca, Geo Dumitrescu, Constanța Buzea, etc.

Some of his works were also translated into foreign languages: “Elmenyek kora, vallom asok kora. Parizsi nablo” (1983); “Imagination and Meaning. The Scholarly and Literary Worlds of Mircea Eliade” (1984, in collaboration); “Die Mitte Der Aufszatza zu Mircea Eliade” (1994, in collaboration); “The Return of the Author” (1996); “Mircea Eliade: A Spirit of Amplitude” (2001).

On March 9, 1991, Eugen Simion was elected a corresponding member of the Romanian Academy, and on March 12, 1992, a full member. Then vice-president (February 1, 1994 – January 16, 1998), interim president (October 15, 1997 – January 16, 1998) and president of the Romanian Academy, elected on January 16, 1998, re-elected on February 11, 2002. He held this position until April 20, 2006 .

As president of the Romanian Academy, Simion initiated a series of important cultural projects: the continuation and completion of the “Thesaur Dictionary of the Romanian Language” (started by BP Hasdeu, in 1884), the “General Dictionary of Romanian Literature”, the “Etymological Dictionary of Romanian Languages”, “Orthographic, Orthoepic and Morphological Dictionary” (DOOM), “Romanian Language Grammar”, “Small Academic Dictionary”. Also, an important cultural achievement was the editing of Mihai Eminescu’s manuscripts: the poet’s 45 notebooks, totaling 14,000-15,000 pages, were scanned and printed in 38 volumes and transposed onto CDs. Another far-reaching cultural project of Eugen Simion is the Fundamental Works Collection, in Pléiade format, which includes the most important Romanian authors.

Source: Agerpres / Photo: unsplash.com