In the Shadow of the Apocalypse

Author: Dinu Pillat (1921-1975)

Translator: James Christian Brown

Introduction: George T. Sipos

Afterword: Monica Pillat

Cover Design: Eliza Claudia Filimon

Book Editor: Jessica Busch Sipos

Layout: Rodica Teişi

ISBN (print): 979-8985744705

ISBN (ebook): 979-8985744712

Pages: 320

A captivating story of interwar Romania, fascist extremism, and revolutionary youth!  An exploration of the psychology and mysticism behind the rise of a violently nationalistic and anti-Semitic extreme right movement in interwar Romania, In the Shadow of the Apocalypse is a fictionalized account of an actual historical organization, the Legion of the Archangel Michael, also known as the Iron Guard (the Heralds, in the novel), responsible for heinous crimes against the Jewish population as well as anyone who opposed their views. Written in cinematic sequences, the novel captures the intensity of an inter-generational struggle between parents complacent in their comfortable lives and children eager to change the world, but whose high ideals are hijacked and twisted by extremist ideological propaganda. 

Completed in 1948, the novel played its own part in Romania's postwar history, as it became the chief evidence for the prosecution in a famous 1960 trial staged by the communist authorities against the author Dinu Pillat and a number of other intellectuals. Accused of "the crime of having plotted against the social order" on the basis of a distorted reading of the novel, Pillat was sentenced to 25 years of forced labor and 10 years of deprivation of civil rights and liberties. He was freed from prison in 1964 only to succumb to cancer in 1975, but the manuscript was not found until 2010 when it was finally recovered from the archives of the former Romanian communist secret service, the Securitate and published. 

A story with its own twisted history, In the Shadow of the Apocalypse is not only an engrossing adventure, a subtle dive into the human psyche, and a powerful testimonial against the damage and dangers of extremisms of all kinds, but also a must-read warning for our own times! 

The English translation is based on that manuscript, as issued in Romanian by publisher Humanitas.

Born in 1921, the son of traditionalist poet Ion Pillat and of painter Maria Pillat-Brateş, Dinu Pillat is one of the writers whose destiny is part and parcel of Romania's postwar history. 

Celebrated novelist and literary scholar during the postwar period, Pillat was targeted by the communist regime for his status and origins as a descendent of one an illustrious political family that contributed to the very formation of modern Romania, the Brătianus. The completion of the novel Aşteptând ceasul de apoi (In the Shadow of the Apocalypse) in 1948, and the writer’s attempts to publish it in the late 1950s represented the perfect opportunity to falsely accuse him of fascist sympathies, and sentence him in 1960. He served five years of a 25-year prison sentence, before being released in 1964 and allowed to return to his work as a researcher in literary history. He died in 1975.  

In addition to In the Shadow of the Apocalypse, Pillat wrote two other novels, Tinereţe ciudată (Strange Youth, 1943) and Moartea cotidiană (Everyday Death, 1946), as well as a diary and several volumes of literary criticism and essays.  

James Christian Brown, originally from Scotland, has lived in Romania since 1993 and teaches at the University of Bucharest. 

His translations from Romanian into English include works by Lucian Boia (History and Myth in Romanian Consciousness and Romania: Borderland of Europe, 2001), Gianina Cărbunariu (Mihaela, The Tiger of Our Town, 2016), Alexandru Dragomir (The World We Live In, 2017), Gabriel Liiceanu (The Păltiniș Diary, 2000), Răzvan Petrescu (Small Changes in Attitude, 2011), and Doina Ruști (The Book of Perilous Dishes, 2022).

Ebook and print versions of this book are available on Amazon.com, as well as on numerous other online bookstores around the world.