The barbarians' return - Mircea Dinescu

In December 1989, Dinescu was liberated from house arrest by a large crowd in Bucharest who carried him triumphantly to the national television building. There he announced to his country and the world (with actor Ion Caramitru) that the dictator had fled. Romania changed almost overnight from communist to capitalist, but Dinescu carried on doing what he'd always done: writing necessary poems that challenge all systems. He was only 21 when he won the Union of Writers' Debut Prize for his ?rst volume, when hewas burdened by literary critics with the title of 'enfant terrible of Romanian literature', a label which stuck for the next 20 years. By the late 1980s he and his work were seen as controversial and confrontational, and his ?nal book before the revolution of 1989 could only be published abroad. This is the first substantial selection of his poetry translated into English.