Anton Pann: la repentance d’un débauché – un poème occulté

Abstract

We show in this study that a purported edition of a manuscript from 1648 by Paisie Lambru, a monk from the Romanian Skete of Prodromos (Mount Athos), published in Bucharest in 1905, is in fact the reproduction of a forgotten poem belonging to Anton Pann (1790-1854): Pocăinţa omului dezmerdat sau Vorbire între suflet şi trup / The Repentance of the Debauched Man, or Conversation between Soul and Body, which was published by the author in his typography in 1849 and republished just before his death in 1854 (the title in French – La repentance de l’homme débauché, ou Entretien entre l’âme et le corps, versifié et édité par A. Pann – was noted by the romanist Émile Picot, who acquired a copy in Romania in 1885, which has since entered the collections of the BNF). Excluded from all editions of Anton Pann’s works, and therefore unknown even to specialists, this poem is inspired by a body-soul dialogue in prose included in Pensées de M. le Comte Oxenstirn sur divers sujets, avec les Réflexions morales du même auteur (Count Oxenstierna’s Thoughts on Various Subjects, together with the Moral Reflections of the same author), by the Swedish moralist Johan Thuresson, count of Oxenstierna (1666- 1733). Written in French and frequently reprinted for more than a century since its first publication in 1721, this work, stylistically belonging to the late religious baroque, was partially translated into Romanian in the second half of the eighteenth century and had a large influence, including on the great poet Mihai Eminescu (1850-1889), who possessed the oldest manuscript of this translation.