Nefericita petrecere a vieții mele

Elena Hartulari tells her life story in this memoir. She lived in Moldavia from the 1820s through the 1860s. She writes about love and abuse within marriage. She also writes about her drive to rise in society. She wants a voice of her own. Hers is the earliest known life story by a woman in Romanian culture. The book is for readers of memoir and social history. It gives a woman’s view of a world in change.

Her father was a minor boyar, a low-ranking noble. He had ties to the Sturdza family’s network of patrons. At fifteen, she wed a poor Greek man. She portrays him as sly and without moral rules. Her story includes family plots and fights over wills. Private deals play a part, too. These show how lesser boyars grew rich and gained rank. At the time, Moldavia turned toward modern European life. Alecsandri’s comedies show this same social world, with figures like Coana Chirița. Here, Hartulari shows it through her own life. She blends old forms of speech with new words.

Constanța Vintilă edited the text, which is complete. She added a long introduction and notes. Her work checks the memoir against records of the past. For the first time, it places Hartulari’s work in the history of Romanian writing.