Forest of the Hanged (novel) explained

Forest of the Hanged
Author:Liviu Rebreanu
Title Orig:Pădurea spânzuraților
Country:Romania
Language:Romanian
Subject:World War I
Genre:War novel
Historical fiction
Psychological fiction
Publisher:Cartea Românească
Pub Date:1922
English Pub Date:1930
Pages:328

Forest of the Hanged (Romanian; Moldavian; Moldovan: Pădurea spânzuraților) is a novel by Romanian writer Liviu Rebreanu. Published in 1922, it is partly inspired by the experience of his brother Emil Rebreanu, an officer in the Austro-Hungarian Army hanged for espionage and desertion in 1917, during World War I.[1]

The novel was made into a film in 1965.[2] The film was directed by Liviu Ciulei, who won the award for Best Director at the 1965 Cannes Film Festival.[3] Composer Carmen Petra Basacopol created in 1988–1990 an opera titled Apostol Bologa, op. 58, which was inspired by this novel.

Plot

The protagonist is Lieutenant Apostol Bologa, who was born and raised in Parva - then Párva, Beszterce-Naszód County, Transylvania, Kingdom of Hungary. Although he was enrolled in the Philosophy Faculty of the University of Budapest, and he had not been conscripted into the army since he was a widow's son, Bologa volunteers into the Austro-Hungarian Army at the start of World War I. He does that both from a youthful ambition to prove his bravery in front of his fiancée, Marta Domșa, who was enchanted by the military uniforms of the Hungarian officers, as well as from the social views he had acquired in Hungarian schools. After attending artillery school, he is sent to the front. He fights valiantly in Italy and Galicia; wounded twice in the next two years, he is promoted to the rank of lieutenant and decorated three times. Bologa contributes (by his vote in court) at the sentencing to death of a Czech officer, second lieutenant Svoboda, who had deserted the Austro-Hungarian army.

The novel follows his soul metamorphosis, under the influence of the Czech captain Otto Klapka, who seeds in his heart the hatred against the Austrian empire and the love for the Romanian nation. Sent on the Romanian front, in the Eastern Carpathians, the thought of desertion becomes an obsession for him. Being forced again to take part in a military tribunal, to judge a Romanian peasant for espionage, Apostol Bologa starts in the night towards the Romanian lines, to get to his blood brothers. He is caught and hanged, in much the same way as the Czech that he had helped condemn. At the gallows, his confessor recites, "Receive, o Lord, the soul of Thy servant Apostol".

Editions and translations

References

Notes and References

  1. Bianca Sara, "Cum și-a transformat Liviu Rebreanu execuția fratelui său de pe front într-un roman tradus în opt limbi", Adevărul, 1 November 2013; Retrieved 15 December 2013
  2. Web site: Padurea spânzuraților (1965). IMDb. 16 March 1965. 21 December 2013.
  3. Web site: Festival de Cannes: Forest of the Hanged . www.festival-cannes.com.

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