Mircea Cărtărescu


Mircea Cărtărescu is a Romanian novelist, poet, short-story writer, literary critic and essayist.

Biography

He is a graduate of Cantemir Vodă National College. During his school years, he was a member of literary groups led by Nicolae Manolescu and Ovid S. Crohmălniceanu. His first poetry was written in 1978.
Later, he studied at the University of Bucharest's Faculty of Letters, Department of Romanian Language and Literature. He graduated in 1980 with a thesis that later became his book on poetry The Chimaeric Dream. That same year, some of his works were published by Cartea Românească.
Between 1980 and 1989 he worked as a Romanian language teacher, then worked at the Writers' Union of Romania and as an editor at Caiete Critice magazine. In 1991 he became a lecturer at the Chair of Romanian Literary History, part of the University of Bucharest Faculty of Letters. As of 2010, he is an associate professor there. Between 1994–1995 he was a visiting lecturer at the University of Amsterdam and currently holds the same position at the University of Stuttgart. In 2012, he received the International Literature Award for his novel The Body.
He is married to the poet. His works have been translated into most European languages.

Work

His debut as a writer was in 1978 in România Literară magazine.

Poetry

Testament – Anthology of Modern Romanian Verse second edition – bilingual version English/Romanian. Daniel Ioniță – editor and principal translator, with Eva Foster, Daniel Reynaud and Rochelle Bews. Minerva Publishing House. Bucharest 2015.