The Interwar Intellectuals and the Romanian Extreme Right

Abstract

This paper illustrates the following ideas: The Romanian Right represented an undeniable political force, starting with the interwar period and continuing up to the end of the World War II. It appeared to be the suggestion of a moral reform at the beginning, in a context in which the Great Romania, after the Great Union, succeeded in disillusioning rather than coagulating the energies and hopes of people. The nationalist currents, providing a basis for the ideology of the Right, attracted outstanding representatives of the Romanian intellectuals in that period. Even if they cannot be called ideologists of the Legionary Movement, and even less “activists”, the respective intellectuals have been impoverished by the burden of this collaboration. Ernest Bernea can be considered such a prestigious intellectual, promoting the idea of returning to the ancestral spirituality. His work represents an interesting incursion in the Romanian traditional way of thinking.