Between Censorship and Literary Self-Censorship in Romania: An Odyssey of an Intimate Journal during the Communist Era
The purpose of our paper is to study manifestations of censorship and self-censorship in Paul Miclău’s journal written and initially translated during the period of communist totalitarianism in Romania. This journal has had a fascinating story. It was written in French in 1985. In order for it to be published under the communist regime in 1989, the author self-translated it into Romanian and censored it. The uncensored Romanian version appeared later, in 1994, and the original French version was printed in France in 1995. Miclău explains that repressive censorship contributed to diminishing his authority as the author of his work. On his own initiative or on the advice of others, he had to suppress words or passages of variable length from the original text so that his work could be published. Censorship concealed political, social, economic, religious or sexual realities through attenuation, deletion of words and expressions, even the cutting of entire paragraphs. Comparing the original French and uncensored Romanian text with the first Romanian self-translation reveals that Paul Miclău’s journal was no longer the unique product of his literary self-expression, rather it had been rewritten in light of the censorial context that allowed it to be published. Yet, his personal stamp had not been obliterated.