Sighet Memorial: Room 43 - Writers in prison

As the communist system became entrenched, the Party imposed a Proletkult direction in every field. More than 8,000 titles viewed as “politically undesirable” cleared from the shelves of libraries and bookshops. Nothing could be published or performed without official approval. The first measures involved the liquidation of any connection with European and local Romanian traditions. The national character of the culture was replaced by socialist realism. Numerous cultural figures were thrown into prison, and others were banned from publishing. It was a case of cultural genocide, whose consequences persist even today in the public mentality. In this room can be viewed a number of aspects of this tragic experiment: a list of banned writers, prison records, and personal items. Lucian Blaga, Alice Voinescu, the Noica-Pillat batch, and young poet Constant Tonegaru are just some of the case studies that illustrate the intense repression of writers, ranging from censorship to imprisonment and death.