Eugen Schileru | |
|---|---|
 Schileru c. 1950 | |
| Born | Eugen Schiller September 13, 1916 Brăila, Kingdom of Romania |
| Died | August 10, 1968 (aged 51) Bucharest, Socialist Republic of Romania |
| Occupation | Critic, academic, political activist, journalist, publisher, librarian, schoolteacher |
| Period | c. 1930–1968 |
| Genre | Essay, monograph, biography, screenplay |
| Literary movement | |
Eugen Schileru or Schilleru (pen name of Eugen Schiller; September 13, 1916 – August 10, 1968) was a Romanian art, film and literary critic, essayist and translator. Born in Brăila, he was of part-Jewish descent, being often described (and, during World War II, persecuted) as a Jew. He entered literary life in the early 1930s, while enrolled at Nicolae Bălcescu High School; he then attended the University of Bucharest, specializing in aesthetics, but also taking degrees in law and pedagogy. As a student, Schilleru became involved with the outlawed Romanian Communist Party and its Union of Communist Youth. He only got his break into the mainstream after the anti-fascist coup of August 1944, when he joined the new cultural establishment—he was initially involved with the generic democratic press, including National Liberal Party's Viitorul, and wrote on a variety of topics; with time, he was exclusively employed by communist papers, and had to embrace the core tenets of Socialist Realism.
For a while after 1948, Romania's new communist regime promoted Schileru, assigning him to a publishing company, to the Romanian Academy's library, and finally to the Nicolae Grigorescu Fine Arts Institute. He was secretly opposed to Socialist Realism, and offered moral support to writers repressed under its cultural guidelines. He alternated this dissident stance with shows of obedience, and used the party's dogmas against more senior colleagues, including George Călinescu and Petru Comarnescu. This interval came to an end in 1952, when Schileru himself was repressed by an "anti-cosmopolitan campaign". Though not entirely banned by the communist censors, he was pushed outside the literary mainstream, and prevented from advancing professionally. His reputation among nonconformists was instead consolidated, and he took his teaching to informal settings, including taverns and bars.
As a corollary of de-Stalinization in the mid-to-late 1950s, Romania also began abandoning Socialist Realism, and Schileru was able to return as an approved author—initially, with film chronicles celebrating Italian neorealism. He was then primarily active as a lecturer and columnist on art and literary topics, drawing both praise, for his innovative approach, and criticism, for his lengthy digressions and lack of academic focus. He only published a few of his scholarly works, including a 1966 monograph on Rembrandt, before his death from cancer at age 51. His main series of essays, revealing his core theories on art criticism, were published in installments over the next decade.