The short-sighted adolescent is a poor schoolboy who is in love with literature, and tries to emulate the lives and works of the writers he most admires. He is also fascinated by science and history, and stays up all night reading. At the age of 17 he decides to write a novel to prove to his teachers that he is not as mediocre as his fellow pupils, and is prepared to give up everything in order to do so. The novel is written in a series of notebooks - the 'diary' of the title - but instead of achieving fame as an author, the myopic protagonist fails his exams and has to repeat the school year.
From the perspective of a schoolboy's diary of everyday life in Bucharest in the early 20th century, - his teachers, his classmates' academic and amorous rivalries, his first sexual experiences - we are introduced to the themes of religion, self-knowledge, erotic sensibility, artistic creation and otherness, subjects that would preoccupy Mircea Eliade, one of Romania's most prominent intellectuals, until the end of his life. Diary of a Short-Sighted Adolescent
Supposedly written by the young Mircea Eliade, one of Romania's and Europe's greatest writers and intellectuals, Diary of a Short-Sighted Adolescent provides a unique insight into the inchoate musings of a genius, in the form of a schoolboy's diary set against Bucharest in the 1920s.
The short-sighted adolescent is a passionate reader who takes various cultural figures as models, trying to emulate both their lives or their works. The pupil protagonist is a poor student, who likes science and reads a lot of books, sometimes staying up all night to do so. At the age of fifteen, he decides to write a novel to demonstrate to his teachers that he is not as mediocre as all the other students. Is he really prepared to give up everything he holds dear for his art?
As readable as The Catcher in the Rye, and as funny Adrian Mole, Diary of a Short-Sighted Adolescent is a playful, pioneering and refreshing addition to the epistolary novel.
