Bucharest–Berlin, 1852–1912
Ion Luca Caragiale died in 1912, in Berlin, but his characters never left the committee room: Cațavencu demands the floor, Farfuridi demands the revision, and the Drunken Citizen has been asking since 1884: “who am I voting for?” The answer sits in the National Theatre premieres, in Mitică's beer hall, and in eight quotations set face to face.
He invented nothing: he minuted his age. A Stormy Night put the Bucharest mahala on the National Theatre stage on 18 January 1879; A Lost Letter premiered on 13 November 1884, 158 days after the revision law cut the electoral colleges from four to three; the 1901 Momente gave Bucharest its mirror, Mitică; and the Berlin years (1904–1912) ended with a pamphlet on 1907 and a funeral that drew thousands. The law came from the Chamber, the lines from the Letter — and 142 years on, nobody can tell which is which any more.
Birth date: 1 February old style / 13 February new style 1852 (the RO form); some EN sources give 30 January — disputed.
The centerpiece
The theatre, the beer hall, the tram, the Athenaeum, the church and the cemetery — six dated stops in Caragiale's Bucharest. Schematic map, not to scale: the dots are placed illustratively, the dates are not.
Pick a dot to see its story.
Teatrul cel Mare (1852), renamed National under Odobescu (1875–1876): both premieres happened here — the Night (18 January 1879) and the Letter (13 November 1884). The Calea Victoriei building was destroyed in the German bombing of August 1944.
Beer hall since 1879 on Calea Victoriei (Ion Căbășanu, then the Mircea nephews); the neo-gothic house at Stavropoleos 5, from 1899. Mitică-era beer hall — opened 22 years before the Momente.
Horse-drawn trams: concession 1871, running from 1872; electric from 9 December 1894, Obor–Cotroceni. Caragiale's Bucharesters rode both tractions.
The funeral cortege left for Bellu from here on 22 November 1912, with Vlahuță, Sadoveanu and Gârleanu among thousands of Bucharesters.
Caragiale read his own pieces here from 1898; he sat on the Athenaeum's committee.
Șerban Vodă: the end of the road on 22 November 1912, after the cortege's loop past the National Theatre.
Four chapters
I
18 January 1879 · National Theatre, Bucharest
At 26, on the evening of 18 January 1879, Caragiale stands in the wings of the National Theatre and hears the house recognize its own speech: jupân Dumitrache, constable Ipingescu and Rică Venturiano — filing clerk, lyric poet, “contributor to the newspaper The Voice of the National Patriot”, columnist and law student. The theatres' director general was Ion Ghica.
The premiere is a success; at the second performance, though, part of the house, evidently put up to it, protests at the jibes against the Civic Guard. Bucharest was discovering its own speech on stage — and not everyone liked what they heard.
“...Rică Venturiano, filing clerk..., lyric poet, contributor to the newspaper The Voice of the National Patriot, columnist and law student...” (our translation of the act II, scene II self-introduction)
II
13 November 1884 · National Theatre, Bucharest
On the evening of 13 November 1884 the masterpiece comes at 32: from the stalls, Caragiale hears a lost love letter, an electoral blackmail and the whole county fauna — Cațavencu the lawyer-demagogue, venerable Trahanache, Farfuridi and Brânzovenescu, policeman Pristanda, the Drunken Citizen. The play had been read at Iași, to the Junimea circle, in October 1884, and at the Palace on the eve of the premiere.
The stage direction states the whole programme: the action takes place “in the capital of a mountain county, in our own days”. No historical fable — the minutes of the present.
“In the capital of a mountain county, in our own days.” ...“Two on 11 February square...” — Pristanda counts the electoral flags (our translation).
III
1901 · Momente și schițe
After the theatre, the print shop: the Moftul român office (1889–1902, with interruptions) smells of fresh ink while Caragiale fits galley proofs between Epoca literară and the Notițe critice in Universul. The sketches gathered in Momente beget Mitică — the average Bucharester raised to allegory, the man who talks his way out of anything serious.
From 27 September 1899 the Notițe critice in Universul gather the material of the Momente, and at the Romanian Athenaeum, on whose committee he sat, Caragiale reads his pieces to the public. Two years later the volume sealed the type: Mitică is the mirror in which Bucharest recognizes itself and laughs — at itself.
“The national spiritist review, organ for spreading the occult sciences in Trajan's Dacia” — the masthead of Moftul român (our translation).
IV
November 1904 – 9 June 1912 · Schöneberg
In November 1904 the Berlin platform is cold and the Caragiale family counts its trunks: fed up with injustice and newly heir to aunt Mumuloaia, Caragiale moves house to Berlin — a provisional domicile in November, settled on 14 March 1905. From there he writes “1907, from spring to autumn”, the indictment of the peasants' revolt.
He dies at dawn on 9 June 1912 (22 June new style), aged 60. The coffin reaches Bucharest in November; on 22 November the cortege leaves from Sf. Gheorghe, loops past the National Theatre and reaches Bellu, with Vlahuță, Sadoveanu and Gârleanu among thousands of Bucharesters. Exile, but not oblivion.
“Long live the beautiful and clever Romanian tongue! May this dear charter of nobility of a nation tempered in the fire of so many trials be kept holy for ever!” (our translation of the 60th-jubilee reply)
The game
The room is in session: eight quotations on the table, four of them Caragiale's, four from real politicians. Cast your vote before the reveal — many of the real ones sound like his.
The county committee room
Score: 0/8
“Eu pentru cine votez?” (“But who am I voting for?” — our translation)
Who said it?
Answer: Caragiale — the Drunken Citizen, A Lost Letter, act I, scene vii. The popular “Eu cu cine votez?” is a paraphrase; the text reads “eu pentru cine votez?”.
“Trădare să fie, dacă o cer interesele partidului, dar s-o știm și noi!” (“Treason it shall be, if the party's interests demand it — but let us know too!”)
Who said it?
Answer: Caragiale — Tache Farfuridi, A Lost Letter, act I, scene vi.
“Industria română e admirabilă, e sublimă, putem zice, dar lipsește cu desăvârșire.” (“Romanian industry is admirable, sublime, one might say — but it is utterly missing.”)
Who said it?
Answer: Caragiale — Nae Cațavencu, A Lost Letter, act III, scene v.
“Din două una... ori să se revizuiască, primesc! dar să nu se schimbe nimica...” (“One of two things... either it gets revised, I accept! but nothing shall change...”)
Who said it?
Answer: Caragiale — Tache Farfuridi, A Lost Letter, act III, scene i.
“Să trăiți bine!” (“Live well!”)
Who said it?
Answer: A real politician — Traian Băsescu, his 2009 presidential campaign slogan.
“România lucrului bine făcut” (“The Romania of things well done”)
Who said it?
Answer: A real politician — Klaus Iohannis, his 2014 presidential programme, launched 29 September 2014.
“Mândri că suntem români!” (“Proud to be Romanians!”)
Who said it?
Answer: A real politician — Victor Ponta, his 2014 campaign slogan.
“Mihaela, dragostea mea!” (“Mihaela, my love!”)
Who said it?
Answer: A real politician — Mircea Geoană, the speech on the evening of 6 December 2009.
The numbers
Two giant numbers
Law → premiere
158
days from the revision law (8 June 1884) to the Lost Letter premiere (13 November 1884)
A summer and an autumn between the Chamber's vote and the applause in the house.
One question, three centuries
3
centuries have heard “eu pentru cine votez?”: the nineteenth, twentieth and twenty-first.
142 years between 1884 and 2026 — the same line, applauded in three centuries running.
The myths
He did not invent them — he minuted them. The play is set “in our own days”, and 158 days before the premiere the real law of 8 June 1884 had cut the colleges from four to three: Farfuridi demands the “revision” because the whole country was talking about it.
Mitică is a literary type, born in the 1901 Momente: the allegory of the average Bucharester, not his ID card. A single real-life model is not documented. Bucharest adopted him as a nickname, not a mugshot.
He died in Berlin, but not forgotten: in 1912 the country had celebrated his 60th jubilee, and on 22 November thousands of Bucharesters followed the cortege, Vlahuță, Sadoveanu and Gârleanu among them. Exile was an address, not a sentence.
The sources
Stage texts are quoted exactly from ro.wikisource (public domain); the popular “Eu cu cine votez?” does not occur in the text — the original reads “Eu pentru cine votez?”. Biographical dates come from the RO/EN Wikipedia articles, cross-checked; what could not be proven is marked “nedocumentat” (unrecorded) or “disputat” (disputed). The numbers (158 days, the ages) are computed, not approximated, and are re-verified automatically at every publish. The dramatized chapter openings are evocations — the dated facts inside them are documented in the published sources below.
