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The distance of time imposes different perspectives and evaluations around human expressions, reflected in the art produced in its historical context. In the work Lectio
magistralis by Mircea Cărtărescu (Bucharest 1956), professor of Romanian literature at the University of Bucharest, held on the occasion of the annual Maxentius Literature Festival on 13 June 2018, a different view of the authors and classics is offered. Cărtărescu’s proposal goes beyond the historicist visions and comes to give relevance to the transcendence of the aesthetic and human value of the literary work which, through time, survives the canons of evaluation imposed in different historical contexts. This is the definition of “classic” for Cărtărescu. In this way, and from this point of view, Cărtărescu states that it is not the epoch (Era) that makes the author, but the author who creates the epoch. Contrary to historicist and aesthetic analyzes and studies, for Cărtărescu, a classic is not that which derives from the acceptance of institutionalized norms but rather, and following Nabokov, that which produces emotion when it is understood. It is not a question of rejecting world-famous authors, but of understanding, in the broadest sense of the term “classic”, what is the significance of the temporal transcendence of the literary work in its readers. In other words: it is a question of the full understanding of the work in its purest sense by the reader, leaving aside the distortions that historical contexts impose on subjectivity. The ideas expressed by Cărtărescu are collected in the Italian version of B. Mazzoni, which recreates the aesthetic and comparative analysis of the classics offered by the Romanian author, hinting at the emphasis of Cărtărescu’s proposal on the right to
absolute subjectivity of judgment and choice that each reader can exercise for the empathy he manages to establish with the works of those writers who have the ability to dialogue and resonate with him.