A monk who became a poet
He lived in an Orthodox monastery in youth and then left.
Andrei Stroe — CC BY-SA 3.0 ro · Anonymous (writer)Unknown author — Public domain · Anonymous (writer)Unknown author — Public domain · Anonymous (writer)Unknown author — Public domain
The house of the Romanian poet Tudor Arghezi in southern Bucharest, where he lived for forty years, turned into a museum after his death in 1967. Arghezi (1880–1967) is among Romania's most important twentieth-century poets. His life was unusual: he was an Orthodox monk in his youth and then left the monastery, worked in journalism and was imprisoned twice — once accused of collaboration with the German occupation in the First World War, and once during the Second World War over an article attacking the German ambassador. His poetry brought into Romanian what he called fitting words: coarse, colloquial and religious vocabulary together, in a mixture that had not been acceptable before him. His major collection, Fitting Words, appeared in 1927. The house, named Mărțișor, holds his library, desk, manuscripts and furniture as he left them, surrounded by a large garden he planted himself, holding his grave and his wife's. Hours are limited and the visit is ticketed.
He lived in an Orthodox monastery in youth and then left.
He brought coarse, colloquial and religious vocabulary into Romanian poetry together.
It surrounds the house and holds his grave and his wife's.
Mărțișor, southern Bucharest
Mărțișor is a Romanian and Balkan tradition celebrated on the first of March: a braided red and white thread with a small flower or trinket is given as a gift, worn on the chest until the end of the month and then tied to a tree. The symbol means the arrival of spring, the red and white representing winter and summer together. The tradition is on the UNESCO intangible heritage list. Arghezi named his house and garden after it, and the whole district came to be known by it.
The city has a network of writers' and artists' houses turned into small museums: the poet Ion Minulescu's house, and the composer George Enescu's in the Cantacuzino Palace — the grandest among them and worth visiting for its architecture alone. Most are small, cheap and rarely crowded, with labels mostly in Romanian.
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