N. D. Cocea

Who was N. D. Cocea?

N. D. Cocea was a Romanian journalist, novelist, critic and left-wing political activist, known as a major but controversial figure in the field of political satire. The founder of many newspapers and magazines, including Viaţa Socială, Rampa, Facla and Chemarea, collaborating with writer friends such as Tudor Arghezi, Gala Galaction and Ion Vinea, he fostered and directed the development of early modernist literature in Romania. Cocea later made his name as a republican and anticlerical agitator, was arrested as an instigator during the 1907 peasant revolt, and played a leading role in regrouping the scattered socialist clubs. His allegiances however switched between parties: during World War I, he supported the Entente Powers and, as a personal witness of the October Revolution, the government of Soviet Russia, before returning home as a communist.

During the interwar period, Cocea was elected to Romanian Parliament as an independent socialist, campaigned for the outlawed Romanian Communist Party, and found his press banned by the authorities on several occasions. In 1923, he was found guilty of lèse majesté. Cocea, although kept under constant surveillance, was rumored to have been an opportunistic double dealer, and his personal life was a matter of public scandal. His novels, the vast majority of which are samples of erotic literature, fueled innuendo about his sexual exploits, which also resulted in his sentencing for statutory rape. After World War II, Cocea was again close to the Communist Party and, from 1948, rose to prominence as an official writer for the communist regime.