{"id":513087,"date":"2022-10-18T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-10-18T04:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/leregardlibre.com\/?p=513087"},"modified":"2023-06-16T16:30:13","modified_gmt":"2023-06-16T14:30:13","slug":"when-eugene-settles-accounts-with-nicolae-ceausescu","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/leregardlibre.com\/en\/literature\/when-eugene-settles-accounts-with-nicolae-ceausescu\/","title":{"rendered":"When Eug\u00e8ne settles accounts with Nicolae Ceau\u0219escu"},"content":{"rendered":"

In a letter addressed to the Romanian dictator, the author recounts his relationship with the shadow that hung over his life and his journey as a migrant. A striking testimony, somewhere between a theatrical text and an open letter.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

\u00abRelatively early on, I realized that my memories, my childhood, my whole life before that, belonged to the communist Jurassic Park, gone and buried with the idea of Yugoslavia,\u00bb wrote Velibor \u0106oli\u0107 in his account Jesus and Tito<\/em>. A native of Bosnia-Herzegovina, when it was part of Yugoslavia, Velibor \u0106oli\u0107 spent his childhood - as the title of the story suggests - surrounded by images of Tito, the Communist dictator, and Jesus, before deserting the ranks of the Bosnian army in 1992 to emigrate to France. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the hallmarks of totalitarian regimes is the establishment of a cult of personality around a charismatic leader. Indoctrination of the population, reading of texts written by dictators, propaganda posters depicting them as supermen... Manipulative tools are numerous and effective in conditioning the inhabitants of a country ruled with an iron fist. The author of Jesus and Tito<\/em>, like other writers who have lived in much the same circumstances, looks back on his past to tell how, in one way or another, the Yugoslav dictator was an integral part of his family and his life. Even as a child.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Looking back<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

In the same vein of a return to the past, more specifically an exchange with a figure who marked his life, the Vaud writer of Romanian origin Eug\u00e8ne - Eug\u00e8ne Meiltz by his full name - publishes Letter to my dictator <\/em>published by Editions Slaktine. After The Valley of Youth <\/em>(La Joie de Lire, 2007) and The mammoth and the virus <\/em>(Slatkine, 2020), the author continues to open the doors of his life by addressing an open letter to \u00abNicolae\u00bb. A man who is none other than Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceau\u0219escu, also nicknamed \u00abThe Danube of Thought\u00bb or the \u00abConduc\u0103tor\u00bb.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the time of writing, Eug\u00e8ne is 52 years old. Having arrived in Switzerland at the age of six, to join his parents who had managed to escape the Romanian Communist regime - an episode recounted in the letter - the author had built up his life, his experiences, his loves and his friendships here. But despite the temporal and geographical distance, Eug\u00e8ne has never ceased to converse with the dictator he fled, or to be assimilated into Romania. A country with which he maintains an ambiguous relationship, between attachment and strangeness, and which he visits several times at different moments in his life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The work, which takes the form of a letter, is a long address to this \u00abNicolae\u00bb, whom the author does not hesitate to use the familiar, to question, to challenge, to mock and even to thank. Under the guise of a theatrical monologue, this Letter to my dictator <\/em>incorporates other literary forms: narration of historical episodes, a telegram, dialogues, open letters, and even a short play, entitled The trial of the Ceau\u0219escu couple. Tragicomedy in one act<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But why write this book, and even more so, why now? The author begins his text with a kind of assessment (of his life, his work...). It's a cyclical review that we find, set out in greater detail, at the end of the book, and which completes and closes the narrative. At the beginning of the story, Eugene returns to the ties that bind him to Nicolae and evokes a certain \u00abdebt\u00bb he owes the dictator. For the author, this letter is a way of settling scores with the Romanian tyrant, but also a way of writing down his life's journey and linking it to history. And, ultimately, an opportunity for Eug\u00e8ne to reveal himself, like a stage actor, to readers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u00abI've become someone you probably wouldn't have liked. My stories evoke the absurdity of the world. I love irony and consider self-mockery salutary. In short, I make it a point of honor to have nothing in common with you. And yet, I owe you something. I owe you a debt. Disturbing and irritating.\u00bb<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n