Nicolae Filimon was a Wallachia

Wallachia

Wallachia or Walachia is a historical and geographical region of Romania. It is situated north of the Danube and south of the Southern Carpathians...

n Romania

Romania

Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...

n novelist and short-story writer, remembered as the author of the very first Realist

Realism (arts)

Realism in the visual arts and literature refers to the general attempt to depict subjects "in accordance with secular, empirical rules", as they are considered to exist in third person objective reality, without embellishment or interpretation...

 novel in Romanian literature, Ciocoii vechi şi noi ("The Old and the New Boyars"), which was centered on the self-seeking figure of Dinu Păturică (who drew comparisons with Stendhal

Stendhal

Marie-Henri Beyle , better known by his pen name Stendhal, was a 19th-century French writer. Known for his acute analysis of his characters' psychology, he is considered one of the earliest and foremost practitioners of realism in his two novels Le Rouge et le Noir and La Chartreuse de Parme...

's Julien Sorel

The Red and the Black

Le Rouge et le Noir , 1830, by Stendhal, is a historical psychological novel in two volumes, chronicling a provincial young man’s attempts to socially rise beyond his plebeian upbringing with a combination of talent and hard work, deception and hypocrisy — yet who ultimately allows his passions to...

). He was also a noted travel writer, folklorist

Folkloristics

Folkloristics is the formal academic study of folklore. The term derives from a nineteenth century German designation of folkloristik to distinguish between folklore as the content and folkloristics as its study, much as language is distinguished from linguistics...

, musician, and the very first musical critic in his country.

Biography

Born in Bucharest

Bucharest

Bucharest is the capital municipality, cultural, industrial, and financial centre of Romania. It is the largest city in Romania, located in the southeast of the country, at , and lies on the banks of the Dâmbovița River....

 as the son of an Eastern Orthodox

Eastern Orthodox Church

The Orthodox Church, officially called the Orthodox Catholic Church and commonly referred to as the Eastern Orthodox Church, is the second largest Christian denomination in the world, with an estimated 300 million adherents mainly in the countries of Belarus, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Georgia, Greece,...

 parish priest

Parish

A parish is a territorial unit historically under the pastoral care and clerical jurisdiction of one parish priest, who might be assisted in his pastoral duties by a curate or curates - also priests but not the parish priest - from a more or less central parish church with its associated organization...

 of the Enei Church, Filimon was a cantor

Cantor (church)

A cantor is the chief singer employed in a church with responsibilities for the ecclesiastical choir; also called the precentor....

 and an autodidact

Autodidacticism

Autodidacticism is self-education or self-directed learning. In a sense, autodidacticism is "learning on your own" or "by yourself", and an autodidact is a person who teaches him or herself something. The term has its roots in the Ancient Greek words αὐτός and διδακτικός...

. According to Ion Ghica

Ion Ghica

Ion Ghica was a Romanian revolutionary, mathematician, diplomat and twice Prime Minister of Romania . He was a full member of the Romanian Academy and its president for four times...

's Letters, he was briefly employed by theater companies after his father's death in 1830, singing in a theater choir and playing the flute

Flute

The flute is a musical instrument of the woodwind family. Unlike woodwind instruments with reeds, a flute is an aerophone or reedless wind instrument that produces its sound from the flow of air across an opening...

.

In 1852, he was chosen administrator of the Enei Church, and remained in office until his death. The same year, he became a minor public official at the Faith Department in Prince Barbu Dimitrie Ştirbei

Barbu Dimitrie Stirbei

Barbu Dimitrie Ştirbei , a member of the Bibescu boyar family, was a Prince of Wallachia on two occasions, in 1848–1853 and in 1854–1856.-Early life:...

's Chancellery.

In late 1857, Filimon made his literary debut with pieces written for the Naţionalul newspaper. During the following year, he travelled to the German Confederation

German Confederation

The German Confederation was the loose association of Central European states created by the Congress of Vienna in 1815 to coordinate the economies of separate German-speaking countries. It acted as a buffer between the powerful states of Austria and Prussia...

, and published his account as Excursiuni în Germania meridională ("Voyages to Southern Germany"), which also included the Romanticist

Romanticism

Romanticism was an artistic, literary and intellectual movement that originated in the second half of the 18th century in Europe, and gained strength in reaction to the Industrial Revolution...

 novella

Novella

A novella is a written, fictional, prose narrative usually longer than a novelette but shorter than a novel. The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America Nebula Awards for science fiction define the novella as having a word count between 17,500 and 40,000...

s Mănăstirea domenicanilor după colina Fiesole (later known as Mateo Cipriani) and O baroneasă de poronceală. His experience and relative success as a journalist and critic would serve as the basis of chapters in his novels, which actually form in-depth analyses of cultural trends; he would collaborate on journals edited by Cezar Bolliac

Cezar Bolliac

Cezar Bolliac or Boliac, Boliak was a Wallachian and Romanian radical political figure, amateur archaeologist, journalist and Romantic poet.-Early life:...

 and Ion Ionescu de la Brad

Ion Ionescu de la Brad

Ion Ionescu de la Brad , born Ion Isăcescu, was a Moldavian-born Romanian revolutionary, agronomist, statistician, scholar and writer....

.

During the period, he also published Nenorocirile unui slujnicar sau gentilomii de mahala ("The Misfortunes of a Servant or The Gentlemen on the Outskirts"; 1861), a rather typical depiction of servants and their lives, as well as his first collected fairy tale

Fairy tale

A fairy tale is a type of short story that typically features such folkloric characters, such as fairies, goblins, elves, trolls, dwarves, giants or gnomes, and usually magic or enchantments. However, only a small number of the stories refer to fairies...

s - Omul de flori cu barba de mătasă sau povestea lui Făt-Frumos ("The Flower Man with Silky Beard or The Tale of Făt-Frumos

Fat-Frumos

Făt-Frumos is a knight hero in Romanian folklore, usually present in fairy tales....

") and Omul de piatră ("The Man of Stone").

Ciocoii vechi şi noi, a novel about John Caradja, was written in 1862, and published as a volume in 1863. It became an instant success, but Filimon could not enjoy it for long after: although he continued to write for various journals, he was stricken down with tuberculosis

Tuberculosis

Tuberculosis, MTB, or TB is a common, and in many cases lethal, infectious disease caused by various strains of mycobacteria, usually Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Tuberculosis usually attacks the lungs but can also affect other parts of the body...

, and died soon after.