Emil Constantinescu: My life experience taught me that reality can never have the glow and the inspiration of hope

100 years after the 1918 Great Union, no one can deny that Romania’s participation in World War I was a response to a burning desire of the Romanians in the Old Kingdom and in the provinces under foreign domination and that the New State generated an imperious economic and social development.But when we read over the literature of the time, we notice the bitter disappointment of the intellectual elite of that age, reflecting, beyond the satisfaction of victory, the deep traumas caused by human losses on the battle field, the corruption and political division of the post-war period, which would lead to serious totalitarian deviations.

If we want to find the true image of a tragic century in our history, we will have to remember not only victories and progress, but also defeats, political mistakes, national betrayals, collective and individual compromises.

It is only such an approach that can reveal to as, in a cynical and confused globalized world, not only the national identity, but also the national dignity we dream of, in order to rise from what we are, to what we want to be.

My life experience taught me that reality can never have the glow and the inspiration of hope. But if you do not dare to descend into the mud of the trenches, hope remains just a beautiful and ever distant dream.