ACADEMIA Letters

Lucian Blaga and the Spatial Morphogenesis. From

National Context to World Literature
Alina Bako, University of Sibiu

Writing nowadays about Blaga’s work implies a double effort, one of relating to the Romanian
literary context, but also one of being in sync with state-of-the-art research and integrating
into the new directions such as WorldLit. Leaving his imprint on the Romanian XXth century,
by means of his poetic work or his dramatic texts, the writer born in Lancrăm, was oftentimes
discussed in relation with German literature, but also with the idea of the „national”. Not at all
accidentally, the translation component of his work is one that proves his affinity for a cultural
space with which he had intense exchanges (1).
In the present paper we will deal with a discussion far from having been completed, which
is merely a pathway towards Lucian Blaga’s re-evaluation, in a larger present-day context. The
questions which arise are centred around these ideas: if Blaga is still being read, if the modern
reader, favouring contemporary literature, perverted by the mirage of opening up towards other
cultural sensitivities, can find in his poems and drama the vibration necessary to read him, or
if that reader can read Blaga the way a foreign reader, shaped by a foreign culture, would read
him? The Romanian reader’s integration into a complex web is reminiscent of what Fredric
Jameson referred to, as early as 1986, as „the Third-World Literature” (2) and the relation
with „national allegories”, which, he claimed, could be identified by representatives of „First-
World Literature” in creations belonging to other spaces than the ones associated with power.
The thesis of the present paper is connected to a set of two clues identifiable in literary
discussions of the mid XXth century: the first one is related to the hypostasis of Lucian Blaga
seen as „a German author of Romanian expression”, a characteristic self-evident in the Ger-
manic pattern of his work, where the national is being erased in favour of the universal. We
encounter this vision in an article published in 1941 which traces the history of translations
from German and of the protrusion of German culture by means of the ones who studied it:

Academia Letters, December 2021 ©2021 by the author — Open Access — Distributed under CC BY 4.0

Corresponding Author: Alina Bako, alinabako@gmail.com

Citation: Bako, A. (2021). Lucian Blaga and the Spatial Morphogenesis. From National Context to World
Literature. Academia Letters, Article 4209. https://doi.org/10.20935/AL4209.

1
„An extraordinary rebirth of German influence can be perceived in the philosophical and po-
etic work of Lucian Blaga, who has taken up a German style in thinking and writing to such
an extent that, indeed, it would not be far-fetched to even consider him a German writer of
Romanian expression” (Sân-Giorgiu, 1941: 530).
The second aspect is related to a confession made by Mircea Eliade related to the „Ro-
manianism” of Blaga’s thinking, placed antithetically in what the manner of conceiving his
work is concerned. Even though he acknowledges „an essence and a nostalgia reminiscent
of Goethe”, Eliade sees the lively encounter with German culture as a „battle” which ends in
assimilation: „Lucian Blaga is one of the rare Romanian creators who is not afraid of uni-
versal knowledge. A spirit made of essence and Goethean nostalgia, he travelled through all
climates and cultures. He created an equal steadfastness in four grand genres and we are faith-
fully waiting for him to write that long-awaited novel he promised to us. Free, brave, careless
regarding prejudice, Lucian Blaga does not shy away from introducing into his philosophical
works pathetic sentiments, artist’s grace or erudite details.
A Leonardian universal spirit, Lucian Blaga is so much a ‹Romanian› in everything he
creates, that he was forced to invent new terms in order to precisely formulate his ‹Romani-
anness› of thinking” (Eliade, 1937:1). The singularity observed by Eliade is the result of the
sublimation of two complementary phenomena: an openness towards „universal knowledge”
and, simultaneously „The Romanian character of his thinking”. It is, in fact, a judgment of
Blaga’s work from the perspective of the influence of foreign literatures, of the circuit under-
gone by ideas extracted from Goethean essences. In German Literature as World Literature,
Thomas Oliver Beebee brought up the syntagm „allseitige Ausstrahlung” in order to define
the manner in which an author or a work can be found in various national literatures. In fact,
this „light emanating in all directions” represents the natural process in which an author’s re-
ception belonging to a hyper-canon, in the sense attributed to the term by Damrosch, is done
within the boundaries of peripheral literatures.
In the previously quoted fragment, Eliade continues the discussion observing that a cul-
ture, and by extension a writer, cannot evolve without opening up to other cultures, to fruitful
dialogue with other literatures, irrespective of the manner in which this clash takes place:
„What a splendid validation of truth – often forgotten or ignored by some of our nationalists
– that the typically Romanian genius can only be fully chieved within the universal, that the
Romanian spirit should not be girdled in by the fear that it might suffer changes, be influenced,
but that it might be allowed to know, to assimilate and to fight with any other culture, with as
many spiritualities as necessary! Just like in the case of Mihai Eminescu, the Transylvanian
Lucian Blaga battled, and ended up assimilating, German thinking. In the beginning of his
activity, there were well-meaning people who feared that Blaga might be «influenced» too

Academia Letters, December 2021 ©2021 by the author — Open Access — Distributed under CC BY 4.0

Corresponding Author: Alina Bako, alinabako@gmail.com

Citation: Bako, A. (2021). Lucian Blaga and the Spatial Morphogenesis. From National Context to World
Literature. Academia Letters, Article 4209. https://doi.org/10.20935/AL4209.

2
much by German expressionism. An absurd fear. Nowadays, with maturity, we can realize
how true to himself, how «Romanian» the spirit of Blaga’s work is” (Eliade: 1).
The studies in which Blaga voices his attachment to Goethe are well known, and we could
refer here to „The phenomenon of origins” (1925), „Goethe and the philosophy of history”,
„Spinoza and Goethe”, both part of the „Daimonion” (1926), and the translation of Faust
represents a further affirmation of this self-confessed direction. Mircea Popa claimed in an
article published in the „Viața Transilvaniei” (Transylvanian Life) magazine that „The echo of
this superb work of cultural recovery was passed on to the intellectual community both through
the author’s famous conference, Întâlniri cu Goethe (Encounters with Goethe), and, curiously,
also through reports written by the Securitate, such as the one from April 18, 1956, in which
the leadership was alerted through considerations such as: «The recent translation of the work
Faust written by the classicist German author L.W.Goethe by Lucian Blaga brought about a
certain state of mind in Transylvania, a very pronounced nationalism; all the intellectual circles
commented vividly the fact that Lucian Blaga not only produced an extraordinary translation,
but proved that he did not meddle with political, social-communist writings, and for this reason
the resistance is putting him up as an example” (Popa, 2012: 4). We can observe here the
emphasis placed on the idea of „nationalism”, referring to the writer’s being a Transylvanian.
Blaga’s translations, produced over a long period of time, with interventions, reports which
showcase an important pressure and becomes a form of „annexation”. If Blaga was once
considered to be, as we have shown, „a German writer of Romanian expression”, we can
notice that according to his vision, Goethe could be „annexed”, by means of translating his
work into Romanian, to Romanian culture (Blaga, 1977: 98).
A Romanian Goethe is a perfectly viable option in this context, and the discussion of
Blaga’s work reiterates this idea. Considered to be „the most Goethe-like personality of our
literary world” (Șt. Aug. Doinaș), an embodiment of Der faustische Mensch (Liviu Rusu),
not at all accidentally Goethe’s personality (about which Noica stated that it helped humanity
„to gain freedom and self-expression”) had a decisive influence on Blaga’s imaginary. When
he writes in Oglinda (The Mirror): „I know that in the depths mothers from times long gone
/ hold up to me the mirror, the world’s eyes”, Blaga implicitly reminds us of Goethe’s Faust
and his journey towards the mothers, in search of the feminine ideal.
A prototype of the „original phenomena” of Goethe, the mothers are a common link be-
tween Blag and the creator of Faust. For Blaga, the influences of other cultures are, as we all
know, presented in the study Influențe modelatoare și catalitice (Shaping and catalytical influ-
ences). The central point this study makes is related to the belonging of Romanian culture to a
network of „European determinants”. We are thus dealing with a concrete perception of inte-
gration into the European space through „acceptance” and osmosis. What is interesting is the

Academia Letters, December 2021 ©2021 by the author — Open Access — Distributed under CC BY 4.0

Corresponding Author: Alina Bako, alinabako@gmail.com

Citation: Bako, A. (2021). Lucian Blaga and the Spatial Morphogenesis. From National Context to World
Literature. Academia Letters, Article 4209. https://doi.org/10.20935/AL4209.

3
fact that from the very beginning Romanian cultures was perceived as „rather diluted”, thus
being a proper medium for impregnation by stronger cultures. Blaga mentions three such cul-
tures which permeated, either by process of dilution, or by shaping personalities, other cultural
spaces: the Italian, French and German one. „Our integration into the network of European
determinants was done through the categorical, sometimes even downright programmatic, ac-
ceptance of a set of Western ideas believed to be of superior nature. Some of them have come
down to us in the name of ancestral memories from Roman realms; in the beginning isolated
ones from Italy, then complex, massive, overwhelming ones from France. Other such influ-
ences have reached using the form of messages from Germanic countries. These have fulfilled
their aim, sometimes through osmotic interference, from one neighbour to another (the strand
is not all that long), sometimes due to the sustained efforts of people who had been educated
in the Western spirit” (Blaga, 2011: 45)
In Blaga’s vision, analysing Eminescu, influences (he had identified Schopenhauer and
Buddhism here) do not become „constitutive”, but remain „overlapping elements of con-
sciousness”. Similarly, he identifies various types of „human ideals”: with the Americans,
the figure of the Indian, the leader of the tribe, with the Romanians and other Balkan peoples,
the figure of the outlaw. Blaga’s tirade of rhetorical interrogations, regarding Spengler’s per-
ception of space across various cultures in Cultură și spațiu (Culture and space) is a matter of
common knowledge (we may call to mind in ancient culture: the isolated body, in Western
culture: the tridimensional infinity, in Arab culture: the cave (the vault), in Egyptian cul-
ture: the labyrinth, in Chinese culture: the pathway through nature, in Russian culture: the
endless plane, and to these Blaga adds Babylonian culture: the twin space, in Chinese cul-
ture: the circular space, in Greek culture: the globe-like space, in Arab culture: the veiled
space, in Romanian popular culture: the undulating space). Nevertheless, Blaga’s solution is
constructed within the theory of cultural morphogenesis: „Spatial vision has to be (…), the
reflection of spiritual depths, or a certain emission on the imaginary plane of our first spiritual
horizon” (Blaga 2011: 68). Relating to space construction is thereby done by starting out
from the identification of an essential trait of a nation’s spirituality.
In Blaga’s poems the graveyard as a funeral space is associated to a pathway, identified as a
pattern containing the idea of life’s continuity through death: „This is how Romans conceived
of the graveyard:/a pathway running in between two silences. / This is Roman metaphysics: a
Road. / A road winding past the dead, not the living. (Cimitirul roman / The Roman cemetery)
or „I saw in Pompeii that Roman dog” (Cânele din Pompei/ The Dog of Pompeii). Blaga’s po-
etic obsessions are tied to mediating spaces, which facilitate communication, bridge spaces,
with the option of thresholds: „just like with a house at the threshold of which /the road stops,
just to re-emerge să/ at the other end anew,/ ancient road - in the world/ just like the codex

Academia Letters, December 2021 ©2021 by the author — Open Access — Distributed under CC BY 4.0

Corresponding Author: Alina Bako, alinabako@gmail.com

Citation: Bako, A. (2021). Lucian Blaga and the Spatial Morphogenesis. From National Context to World
Literature. Academia Letters, Article 4209. https://doi.org/10.20935/AL4209.

4
envisions it - /left to itself to commence./ Armies have passed through here during centuries,
sand Radu the Handsome, / sealed wheels, kingly slaves, treasures and tears, / Mots carry-
ing pails, herds, winds,/ the defeated and the victorious, flags, sufferings” (Pod peste Mureș/
Bridge over the Mures). „Ancient road – in the world” emphasizing the idea of intersection,
of civilisations meeting, in reality contains the basic, stable element, the native background
and what history added to it, by means of vivid contact with other cultures. Blaga’s vision
gives rise to a plethora of meanings and influences, thereby forming a unique system.
Other poems also evince a multitude of insertions made up of exogenous and endogenous
elements, in a process of essential sublimation: „If one bends over gravestones/ one can hear
scarabs kissing ancient clay soils, / our branches lost in the depths, / in bitter cold realms
/. If one presses their ear to tombs, / one hears the worms, / gone down the path of time
noisily / receiving communion from our flesh / successively for nine Sundays” (În preajma
strămoșilor /In the proximity of the forefathers). The reversed, catalase movement, is perceived
in a distinct, clear, monotonous manner. That sublimation of influences and the preservation
of national details is self-evident in these lines, which shift attention from the outside to the
human condition of finitude.
We can thus identify a clear integration of Blaga’s work in the global literary system,
advanced first by the hypostasis related to the confession made by the author regarding his
mentor, Goethe, an influence we can encounter both in the construction of his philosophi-
cal system, and in several poems, and in the idea of the network of European determinants.
Furthermore, the spatial morphogenesis thought out by Blaga advances spaces which interact
and are created as an emanation of the spirituality of a people, and also bridges between the
various cultures of the world.

Academia Letters, December 2021 ©2021 by the author — Open Access — Distributed under CC BY 4.0

Corresponding Author: Alina Bako, alinabako@gmail.com

Citation: Bako, A. (2021). Lucian Blaga and the Spatial Morphogenesis. From National Context to World
Literature. Academia Letters, Article 4209. https://doi.org/10.20935/AL4209.

5
References
1. See Emilia Ştefan, Influenţe germane în opera lui Lucian Blaga (German Influences in the
Work of Lucian Blaga), Universitaria, Craiova, 2013, pp.51-52.

2. Fredric Jameson, Third-World Literature in the Era of Multinational Capitalism, in „Social

Texts”, n.15, 1986: „All third-world texts are necessarily, I want to argue, allegorical, and
in a very specific way: they are to be read as what I will call national allegories, even
when, or perhaps I should say, particularly when their forms develop out of predominantly
western machineries of representation, such as the novel. Let me try to state this distinction
in a grossly oversimplified way: one of the determinants of capitalist culture, that is, the
culture of the western realist and modernist novel, is a radical split between the private
and the public, between the poetic and the political, between what we have come to think
of as the domain of sexuality and the unconscious and that of the public world of classes,
of the economic, and of secular political power: in other words, Freud versus Marx. Our
numerous theoretical attempts to overcome this great split only reconfirm its existence and
its shaping power over our individual and collective lives”, p. 69.

3. „To translate means to «annex». A people may annex another people, by translating the
latter’s literature into his own language. The annexed people lose nothing, and the one who
annexes grows and evolves” Lucian Blaga writes in Elanul insulei (The Island’s Elation).

Beebee, Thomas Oliver (ed.) German Literature as World Literature, New York: Blooms-
bury, 2014.

Blaga, Lucian, Elanul insulei (The Island’s Elation), Cluj-Napoca: Dacia, 1977.

Blaga, Lucian, Trilogia culturii (A Cultural Trilogy). Bucharest: Humanitas, 2011.

Damrosch, David, “World Literature in a Postcanonical, Hypercanonical Age.” in Haun

Saussy, ed., Comparative Literature in an Age of Globalization, Hopkins, 2006, 43-53.

Eliade, Mircea „Lucian Blaga la Academie” (Lucian Blaga at the Academy), Viața literară,
year XI, nr. 12, September 1937.

Eliade, Mircea, Meșterul Manole. Studii de etnologie și mitologie (Manole the Artisan. Stud-
ies on Ethnology and Mythology), Iași: Junimea, 1992.

Popa, Mircea, „Viața Transilvaniei” (Transylvanian Life), year VI, Nr. 1-2 (23-24) from 2012.

Academia Letters, December 2021 ©2021 by the author — Open Access — Distributed under CC BY 4.0

Corresponding Author: Alina Bako, alinabako@gmail.com

Citation: Bako, A. (2021). Lucian Blaga and the Spatial Morphogenesis. From National Context to World
Literature. Academia Letters, Article 4209. https://doi.org/10.20935/AL4209.

6
 Sân-Giorgiu, Ion, Spiritul german în literatura română (The German Spirit in Romanian
Literature), p.530 in „Revista Fundațiilor Regale” magazine nr. 3, year VIII, 1. March
1941).

Academia Letters, December 2021 ©2021 by the author — Open Access — Distributed under CC BY 4.0

Corresponding Author: Alina Bako, alinabako@gmail.com

Citation: Bako, A. (2021). Lucian Blaga and the Spatial Morphogenesis. From National Context to World
Literature. Academia Letters, Article 4209. https://doi.org/10.20935/AL4209.