Ion Creangă
Ion Creangă was a Moldavian-born Romanian writer, raconteur and schoolteacher. A main figure in 19th century Romanian literature, he is best known for his Childhood Memories volume, his novellas and short stories, and his many anecdotes.
Creangă's main contribution to fantasy and children's literature includes narratives structured around eponymous protagonists (Povestea lui Harap Alb, Ivan Turbincă, Dănilă Prepeleac), as well as fairy tales indebted to conventional forms (Povestea porcului, Capra cu trei iezi, Soacra cu trei nurori).
Like Swift or Mark Twain, Creangă is more than a story-teller for children or simply a humorist. His work is a human and social document of the ways of thinking and the life of a Romanian village in the nineteenth century. It may seem of restricted interest, owing to the local peasant setting, as well as to the language in which it was written; it carries nevertheless all the joy and pathos of a book of universal significance. Creangă's Memories symbolically picture the destiny of every child walking the path toward maturity and experience. The work inaugurates an original formula in the art of memoir writing, and represents a monument of high spirits and verbal abundance. A jovial verbal torrent, a kind of lexical spree, generously flushes this rhapsody of perennial childhood.
“Nu ştiu alţi cum sunt, dar eu, când mă gândesc la locul naşterii mele, la casa părintească din Humuleşti, la stâlpul hornului unde lega mama o şfară cu motocei la capăt, de crăpau mâţele jucându-se cu ei, la prichiciul vetrei cel humuit, de care mă ţineam când începusem a merge copăcel, la cuptiorul pe care ma ascundeam, când ne jucam noi, băieţii, de-a mijoarca, şi la alte jocuri şi jucării pline de hazul şi farmecul copilăresc, parcă-mi saltă şi acum inima de bucurie!”