Constantin Gane

Constantin Gane (March 27, 1885 – April 12, 1962) was a Romanian novelist, amateur historian, biographer and memoirist.

Born into an old boyar family in Botoșani, Constantin was the son of Ștefan Gane, related to Postelnic Matei Gane and writer-politician Nicolae Gane. He graduated from the local A. T. Laurian High School in 1903 and went on to study law in Germany, obtaining a doctorate from the University of Rostock in 1910. After returning home, he worked as a lawyer for some fifteen years, both in his native town and in the national capital Bucharest. In the early 1910s, his prose was hosted in Viața Romînească magazine. In 1913, Gane took part as a volunteer in the Second Balkan War, and also fought in the campaigns of World War I from 1916. His combat experience was recorded in Amintirile unui fost holeric ("The Recollection of a Former Cholera Patient", 1914; Romanian Academy prize) and Prin viroage și coclauri ("Through Ravines and Boondocks", 1922). This was followed in 1923 by a family history, Pe aripa vremei ("On the Wing of Time").

Gane was passionate about history, traveling domestically and abroad, rifling through archives and libraries, visiting museums and artistic monuments and researching oral tradition. He published prose (especially of a historical character), articles, notes and reviews, correspondence, travel accounts, plays and novel fragments in Epoca, Universul Literar, Curentul, Cele Trei Crișuri, Politica, Revista Fundațiilor Regale, Luceafărul and Flacăra, and Convorbiri Literare, serving for a while in 1926 as the latter's editor. He returned in 1927 with the notes of Întâmplarea cea mare ("Major Occurrence"), followed by a series of historical novels and tracts: Trecute vieți de doamne și domnițe ("Bygone Lives of Queens and Princesses", 3 volumes, 1932–1939); Farmece ("Charms", 1933); Acum o sută de ani ("One Hundred Years Ago", 2 volumes, 1935); P. P. Carp și locul său în istoria politică a țării ("P. P. Carp and His Place in the Country's Political History", 2 volumes, 1936); Domnița Alexandrina Ghica și contele D'Antraigues ("Princess Aleandrina Ghica and the Count D'Antraigues", 1937); Dincolo de zbuciumul veacului ("Beyond the Fretting of an Era", 1939). He also held conferences and, between 1929 and 1937, a series of radio lectures on historical, cultural and literary themes, including the first trial of Mihail Kogălniceanu, Dimitrie Cantemir, and the novels of Stefan Zweig. He joined the Romanian Writers' Society in 1934, and, in 1937, founded and led the Bucharest-based Sânzana magazine.

Politically, Gane gravitated toward the far-right, and joined the Iron Guard before 1938. This made him a target for repression by the rival National Renaissance Front: its regime prevented political suspects from working and, according to the diaries of Victor Slăvescu, Gane "had no means to support himself." When banks refused to loan Gane any money, Slăvescu offered him gifts, which Gane promised to repay with books from his own collection. By September 1939, civil war had erupted between the Front and the Guard. Gane was arrested alongside many other Guardists, but was soon released following pleas from Petre P. Panaitescu and Radu R. Rosetti. In 1940–1941, the Iron Guard took over government and established the "National Legionary State". Promoted in that interval, Gane returned to radio journalism, producing propaganda for the Guard's social service, Ajutorul Legionar. He served as ambassador to the Kingdom of Greece; while there, he advocated on behalf of the Aromanians.

Returning to Romania for the rest of World War II, Gane also put out a 1943 sequel to Trecute vieți..., tiled Amărâte și vesele vieți de jupânese și cucoane ("Bittersweet Lives of Dames and Boyaresses"). His final work was a historical novel, Rădăcini ("Roots", 1947). Prosecuted by the new communist regime for his involvement with the Guard, he was sentenced in 1949. He died in Aiud prison thirteen years later, after illness and mistreatment, and was buried in an unmarked grave. Trecute vieți de doamne și domnițe was reissued by Editura Junimea in 1971-1973, albeit touched by communist censorship; Humanitas published an unabridged edition in 2014. This was followed in 2016 by a reprint of Amărâte și vesele vieți..., at Editura Corint.

Gane's debut was as a humorist—a talented one, according to fellow writer-historian Nicolae Iorga. The war memoirs were noted for their sincerity and patriotic emphasis. His first book featured a detailed description of his bout with cholera, which he contracted while fighting in Bulgaria. It was among the first literary records of the Second Balkan War in Romania—alongside works by Iorga, Al. Lascarov-Moldovanu, and Haralamb Lecca. Întâmplarea cea mare is a more subtle travel account where the author digresses into meditations on Romanian and foreign history. The artifacts of ancient Egypt and especially Greece lead him to literary and mythological reflections. He also describes these countries' present-day realities, sometimes in a humorous tone.

When writing about Romanian history, his historic and literary talents combined to produce evocative social and political portraits. Pe aripa vremei traces his family's genealogical tree up to the foundation of Moldavia, while Acum o sută de ani recounts the main events that occurred in the Danubian Principalities a century earlier (1834–1835). His interest in the human character was explored in Farmece, an account of Despot Vodă; and in Dincolo de zbuciumul veacului, which selects grandiose and tragic figures from the turbulent Middle Ages. Rădăcini did not have much impact, although it was favorably reviewed by Perpessicius; his one play, Phrynea, remains in manuscript form.

Gane's historical accounts suffer from minute genealogies, an excess of documentary detail, polemical interventions and confusing or incoherent passages. The literary scholar George Călinescu ridiculed Ganea for passing trivial facts about his own family into his works. Gane responded that there was nothing commonplace about his family. The works also earned praise from professional historians such as Iorga, and, later, Lucian Boia, who referred to Gane as "an 'amateur' historian, but quite professional with the amplitude of his documentation and his unfaltering narration". Gane's 1936 homage to Petre P. Carp is noted for its "hagiographic" defense of the statesman, including against assessments that Carp was wrong not to nationalize the oil industry; some of the chapters, such as the one devoted to Junimea society, are of documentary interest.

Gane's masterpiece remains Trecute vieți de doamne și domnițe, volume I of which was granted a prize by the Romanian Academy. As noted by critics, the subjects are unusual and captivating, revealed in stories full of color, recounted in a language of archaic vigor. Writer Gheorghe Grigurcu calls it "one of the essential books of my childhood [...], with its rich literary savor pulsating within the arteries of complicated historical reconstructions". According to literary critic Ioan Milică, Gane reused classical storytelling formulas recalling Ion Budai-Deleanu and Ion Creangă in creating portrait-caricatures—for instance, that of the sailor-prince Nicholas Mavrogenes.

The book features a vast array of noble ladies from the time of the first voievods until the union of the Principalities, against the backdrop of chaotic historical events. Among the more memorable figures are Doamna Chiajna and Elisabeta Movilă, and the tragic end of Ruxandra Lupu has drawn praise. Love stories, abductions and releases, spectacular executions (such as those of Constantin Brâncoveanu and his sons), rises and falls succeed one another in a steady rhythm that recreates the atmosphere of the periods it depicts. As noted by reviewer Sorin Lavric, Amărâte și vesele vieți... is a counterweight, indirectly showing the relative emancipation of women under the Regulamentul Organic regime, but also the "baseness" of life in the post-aristocratic age.