A Library-Like Volume

Abstract

The present review aims to present a volume published is 2022, the completion of a project launched nearly three decades earlier: The Dictionary of the 20th Century Central-European Novel (Iasi, Polirom Publishing, 755p.), compiled from 255 novel reading notes, coordinated by Adriana Bebeti, who is also the author of the extensive introductory study, which could have formed a book in itself. The members of the ‘Third Europe’ foundation (name which refers to an intermediary space between the East and the West, based on intersections and the recognition of constancies), literary researchers in Timisoara, as well as prominent figures of the national and international academic world participated in creating the dictionary. Central Europe appears as a cultural space with a chequered history, an unsettled world ruled by instability and devoid of security, but enriched by multiculturalism and multilingualism. The Dictionary of the 20th Century Central-European Novel may be regarded as a natural sequel to the anthology volumes in the ‘Third Europe’ series, coordinated bv Adriana Babeți and Cornel Ungureanu: Central Europe. Neuroses, Dilemmas, Utopias (1997) and Central Europe. Memory, Paradise, Apocalypse (1998). By its scientific rigour and compelling style, the dictionary proves to be not only a useful working tool for academics, researchers and students, but also a possible handbook for any student of literature.