1. An author whose career spanned five decades, Mihail Sadoveanu was an early associate of the traditionalist magazine Samanatorul, before becoming known as a Realist writer and an adherent to the Poporanist current represented by Viata Romaneasca journal.
Mihail Sadoveanu wrote in favor of the Soviet Union and Stalinism, joined the Society for Friendship with the Soviet Union and adopted Socialist realism.
Mihail Sadoveanu was Grand Master of the Romanian Freemasonry during the 1930s.
The father of Profira and Paul-Mihu Mihail Sadoveanu, who pursued careers as writers, he was the brother-in-law of literary critic Izabela Mihail Sadoveanu-Evan.
Literary historian Tudor Vianu believes this contrast of regional and social identities played a part in shaping the author, opening him up to a "Romanian universality", but notes that, throughout his career, Mihail Sadoveanu was especially connected with his Moldavian roots.
Mihail Sadoveanu was spending his vacations in his mother's native Verseni.
Shortly after this episode, the young Mihail Sadoveanu left to complete his secondary studies in Falticeni and at the National High School in Iasi.
In 1896, when he was aged sixteen, Mihail Sadoveanu gave thought to writing a monograph on Moldavian Prince Stephen the Great, but his first literary attempts date from the following year.
Mihail Sadoveanu started writing for Ovid Densusianu's journal Vieata Noua in 1898.
Mihail Sadoveanu's contributions, featured alongside those of Gala Galaction, N D Cocea, and Tudor Arghezi, include another sketch story and a lyric poem.
Mihail Sadoveanu was however dissatisfied with Densusianu's agenda, and critical of the entire Romanian Symbolist movement for which the review spoke.
Mihail Sadoveanu ultimately began writing pieces for non-Symbolist magazines such as Opinia and Pagini Literare.
Mihail Sadoveanu left for Bucharest in 1900, intending to study law at the University's Faculty of Law, but withdrew soon after, deciding to dedicate himself to literature.
Mihail Sadoveanu began frequenting the bohemian society in the capital, but, following a sudden change in outlook, abandoned poetry and focused his work entirely on Realist prose.
In 1901, Mihail Sadoveanu married Ecaterina Balu, with whom he settled in Falticeni, where he began work on his first novellas and decided to make his living as a professional writer.
Mihail Sadoveanu was the father of eleven, among whom were three daughters: Despina, Teodora and Profira Sadoveanu, the latter of whom was a poet and a novelist.
Mihail Sadoveanu later credited Iorga, Maiorescu, and especially so the cultural promoter Constantin Banu and Samanatorul poet George Cosbuc, with having helped him capture the interest of the public and his peers.
Mihail Sadoveanu continued to publish at an impressive rate: in 1906, he again handed down for print four separate volumes.
In parallel, Mihail Sadoveanu pursued his career as a civil servant.
Mihail Sadoveanu returned to his administrative job in 1907, the year of the Peasants' Revolt.
Mihail Sadoveanu resigned his office within the Writers' Society in November 1911, being replaced by Garleanu, but continued to partake in its administration as a member of its leadership committee and a censor.
Mihail Sadoveanu was a leading presence at Minerva newspaper, alongside Anghel and critic Dumitru Karnabatt, and published in the Transylvanian traditionalist journal, Luceafarul.
Mihail Sadoveanu was again called under arms during the Second Balkan War of 1913, when Romania confronted Bulgaria.
Mihail Sadoveanu was joined by Topirceanu, who had just been released from a POW camp in Bulgaria, and with whom he founded the magazine Insemnari Literare.
Mihail Sadoveanu subsequently settled in the Iasi neighborhood of Copou, purchasing and redecorating the villa known locally as Casa cu turn.
In 1921, Mihail Sadoveanu was elected a full member of the Romanian Academy; he gave his reception speech in front of the cultural forum two years later, structuring it as a praise of Romanian folklore in general and folkloric poetry in particular.
Mihail Sadoveanu's house was by then host to many cultural figures, among whom were writers Topirceanu, Gala Galaction, Otilia Cazimir, Ionel and Pastorel Teodoreanu, and Dimitrie D Patrascanu, as well as conductor Sergiu Celibidache.
Mihail Sadoveanu was close to a minor socialist poet and short story author, Ioan N Roman, whose work he helped promote, to the aristocrat and memoirist Gheorghe Jurgea-Negrilesti, and to a satirist named Radu Cosmin.
Mihail Sadoveanu was charmed in particular by the sights he discovered during a 1927 visit to the Transylvanian area of Aries.
Mihail Sadoveanu's popularity continued to grow: in 1925,1929 and 1930 respectively, he published his critically acclaimed novels Venea o moara pe Siret.
In 1926, after a period of indecision, Mihail Sadoveanu rallied with the People's Party, where his friend, the poet Octavian Goga, was a prominent activist.
Mihail Sadoveanu then rallied with Goga's own National Agrarian Party.
Under Nicolae Iorga's National Peasants' Party cabinet of the period, Mihail Sadoveanu was President of the Senate.
Mihail Sadoveanu was by then affiliated with the Freemasonry, as first recorded by the organization in 1928, but was probably a member since 1926 or 1927.
Mihail Sadoveanu was publishing new works at a regular rate, culminating in the first volume of his historical epic Fratii Jderi, which saw print in 1935.
The scandal prolonged itself over the following years, with Mihail Sadoveanu being supported by his friends in the literary community.
Mihail Sadoveanu withdrew from politics in the late 1930s and early 1940s, as Romania came to be led by successive right-wing dictatorships, he offered a measure of support to King Carol II and his National Renaissance Front, which attempted to block the more radically fascist Iron Guard from power.
Mihail Sadoveanu was personally appointed a member of the reduced corporatist Senate by Carol.
Mihail Sadoveanu kept a low profile under the Iron Guard's Nazi-allied National Legionary regime.
Later that year, the 40th anniversary of Mihail Sadoveanu's debut was celebrated with a special ceremony at the academy and Tudor Vianu's speech, offered as a retrospective of his colleague's entire work.
Mihail Sadoveanu was at the time residing in Ciorogarla, having been awarded a villa previously owned by Pamfil Seicaru, a journalist whose support for fascist regimes had made him undesirable, and who had moved out of Romania.
The decision was viewed as evidence of political corruption by the opposition National Peasants' Party, whose press deemed Mihail Sadoveanu the "Count of Ciorogarla".
In 1948, after Romania's King Michael I was overthrown by the BPD-member parties and the communist regime officially established, Mihail Sadoveanu rose to the highest positions ever granted to a Romanian writer, and received significant material benefits.
Mihail Sadoveanu kept his seat at the academy, which at the time was undergoing a communist-led purge, and, with several other pro-Soviet intellectuals, was voted in the Academy Presidium.
Mihail Sadoveanu represented Romania to the World Peace Council, and received its International Peace Prize for 1951.
Mihail Sadoveanu died there at 9 AM on 19 October 1961, and was buried at Bellu cemetery, in Bucharest.
Cornis-Pope writes that Sadoveanu's epic is a continuation of "the national narrative" explored earlier by Nicolae Filimon, Ioan Slavici and Duiliu Zamfirescu, while literary historians Vianu and Z Ornea note that Sadoveanu took inspiration from the themes and genres explored by Junimist author Nicolae Gane.
In Vianu's assessment, Mihail Sadoveanu's work signified an artistic revolution within the local Realist school, comparable to the adoption of perspective by the visual artists of the Renaissance.
However, Mihail Sadoveanu was well received by Lovinescu's adversaries within the modernist camp: Perpessicius and Contimporanul editor Ion Vinea, the latter of whom, in search for literary authenticity, believed in bridging the gap between the avant-garde and folk culture.
Recognized, like his epigramist colleague Pastorel Teodoreanu, as a man of refined culinary tastes, Mihail Sadoveanu cherished Romanian cuisine and Romanian wine.
The lifestyle choices were akin to his literary interests: alongside the secluded and rudimentary existence of his main characters, Mihail Sadoveanu's work is noted for its imagery of primitive abundance, and in particular for its lavish depictions of ritualistic feasts, hunting parties and fishing trips.
Tudor Vianu stressed that, unlike most of his Realist predecessors, Mihail Sadoveanu introduced an overtly sympathetic view of the peasant character, as "a higher type of human, a heroic human".
However, Calinescu argued, some of the stories in the volume were still "awkward", and showed that Mihail Sadoveanu had problems in outlining epics.
In Lovinescu's view, Mihail Sadoveanu's move toward naturalism did not imply the necessary recourse to objectivity.
In 1905, Mihail Sadoveanu published Povestiri din razboi, which compose scenes from the lives of Romanian soldiers fighting in the War of 1878.
Mihail Sadoveanu began his career as a novelist with more in-depth explorations into subjects present in his stories and novellas.
In other sketch stories, such as O zi ca altele or Cainele, Mihail Sadoveanu follows Caragiale's close study of suburban banality.
Calinescu described Soimii novel as "still awkward", noting that Mihail Sadoveanu was only beginning to experiment with the genre.
Mihail Sadoveanu invents a love story between Ruxandra and the boyar Bogdan, whose rivalry with Tymofiy ends in the latter's killing.
Mihail Sadoveanu goes to her rescue, only to find out that she had preferred suicide to a life of slavery.
In Baltagul, Mihail Sadoveanu merged psychological techniques and a pretext borrowed from crime fiction with several of his major themes.
Mihail Sadoveanu collected and commented upon the memoirs of other avid hunters.
Mihail Sadoveanu sporadically wrote memoirs of his early life career, such as Insemnari iesene, which deals with the period during which he worked for Viata Romaneasca, a book about the Second Balkan War, and the account of years in primary school, Domnu Trandafir.
The home of mysterious Asiatic peoples, Mihail Sadoveanu's Scythia is notably the background to his novels Uvar and Noptile de Sanziene.
Mihail Sadoveanu sees Noptile de Sanziene as "the novel of millenarian immobility", and its theme as one of mythological proportions.
In 1909, Mihail Sadoveanu published adapted version of two ancient writings: the Alexander Romance and Aesop's Fables.
Mihail Sadoveanu's 1921 book Cocostarcul albastru is a series of short stories with lyrical themes.
Mihail Sadoveanu thus spoke of "the dragon of my own doubts" being vanquished by "the Sun of the East".
Mihail Sadoveanu would follow up with hundreds of articles on various subjects, published by the communist press, including two 1953 pieces in which he lamented Stalin's death.
In close connection with his traditionalist views on literature, but in contrast to his career under a Conservative Party and National Liberal cabinets, Mihail Sadoveanu initially rallied with nationalist groups of various hues, associating with both Nicolae Iorga and, in 1906, with the left-wing Poporanists at Viata Romaneasca.
In Calinescu's analysis, this signifies that, like his predecessor, the conservative Eminescu, Mihail Sadoveanu believed the cities were victims of the "superimposed category" of foreigners, in particular those administering leasehold estates.
In 1916, he abruptly switched to the Entente camp: his enthusiasm as propaganda officer was touched by controversy once Romania experienced massive defeats; Mihail Sadoveanu himself abandoned the Entente cause by 1918, when he was decommissioned, and resumed his flirtation with Constantin Stere's Germanophile lobby.
The Poporanist aspect of Mihail Sadoveanu's literature was highlighted by Garabet Ibraileanu in the late 1920s, when he referred to his contributions as evidence that Romanian culture was successfully returning to its specific originality.
In essence, Crohmalniceanu writes, Mihail Sadoveanu was tied to Viata Romaneasca by his advocacy of national specificity, his preference for the large-scale narrative, and his vision of pristine, "natural", human beings.
Alongside its Humanism, Mihail Sadoveanu's nationalism was noted for being secular, and thus in contrast with the Romanian Orthodox imagery favored by nationalists on the far right.
Himself a Marxist, Ovid Crohmalniceanu suggested that, as early as the 1930s, Mihail Sadoveanu's attitudes were rather similar to the official line of communist groups.
In one of his columns, Mihail Sadoveanu replied to those organizing the acts of vandalism, indicating that, had they actually read the novels they were destroying, they would have found "a burning faith in this nation, for so long mistreated by cunning men".
Elsewhere, stating that he was not going to take his detractors into consideration, Mihail Sadoveanu defined himself as an adversary of both Nazi Germany and any form of advocacy for a "National-Socialist regime in our country".
Mihail Sadoveanu's renewed mandate in the Senate was a favor from Carol, granted to George Enescu, philosopher Lucian Blaga, scientists Emil Racovita and Iuliu Hatieganu, and several other public figures.
Also according to Zilber, Sadoveanu motivated his refusal by stating that the letter needed to be addressed not to Antonescu, but to King Michael I However, and aside from its main topic, Pauna-Mica was noted as one of the few prose works of the 1940s to mention the wartime deportation of Romanian Jews by Antonescu's regime; Caleidoscop speaks about the 1941 Iasi pogrom as "our shame", and commends those who opposed it.
In particular, Mihail Sadoveanu offered praise to one of the major pillars of Stalinism, the 1936 Soviet Constitution.
The enthusiasm of his writings manifested itself in his public behavior: according to his ARLUS colleague Iorgu Iordan, Mihail Sadoveanu was emotional during the 1945 Soviet trip, shedding tears of joy upon visiting a day care center in the countryside.
In 1952, as Romania adopted its second republican constitution and the authorities intensified repression against anti-communists, Mihail Sadoveanu made some of his most controversial statements.
Later, Mihail Sadoveanu made a reference to his former colleague, the National Peasantist activist Ion Mihalache, arguing that his old Agrarianist approach to politics had made him a "ridiculous character".
Mihail Sadoveanu is reported to have helped George Calinescu publish the novel Scrinul negru, mediating between him and communist leader Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej.
Mihail Sadoveanu provided a definition of his own political transition in conversation with fellow writer Ion Biberi.
Calinescu notes that Scrisorile unui razes, an early work by novelist Cezar Petrescu, are deeply marked by Mihail Sadoveanu's influence, and that the same writer's use of the Moldavian dialect is a "pastiche" from Mihail Sadoveanu.
Ion Vinea too, while expressing admiration for Mihail Sadoveanu, defined all his disciples and imitators as "mushroom-writers from Mihail Sadoveanu's woods" and "butlers who steal [their lord's lingerie] in order to wear his blazon".
At the time, Mihail Sadoveanu was one of the writers from the interwar whose work was still made available to Romanian schoolchildren.
In later years, Profira Mihail Sadoveanu became a noted promoter of her father's literature and public image, publishing children's versions of his biography, notably featuring illustrations by Mac Constantinescu.
Also then, some of Mihail Sadoveanu's texts were rendered in Chinese by Lu Xun.
Tudor Vianu attributes the warm international reception Mihail Sadoveanu generally received to his abilities in rendering the Romanians' "own way of sensing and seeing nature and humanity", while literary historian Adrian Marino points out that, Mihail Sadoveanu and Liviu Rebreanu were exceptional in their generation for taking an active interest in how their texts were translated, edited and published abroad.
Mihail Sadoveanu's good standing in the Soviet Union after World War II made him one of the few Romanian writers whose works were still being published in the Moldavian SSR.
Mihail Sadoveanu is an occasional presence in the literary works of his fellow generation members.
Under the name Nicolae Padureanu, Mihail Sadoveanu is a character in the novel and disguised autobiography In preajma revolutiei, authored by his colleague Constantin Stere.
Mihail Sadoveanu is honored in two writings by Nicolae Labis, collectively titled Sadoveniene.
The first, titled Mihail Sadoveanu, is a prose poem which alludes to Sadoveanu's prose, and the other, a free verse piece, is titled Cozma Racoare.
Mihail Sadoveanu was the subject of a 1929 painting by Stefan Dumitrescu, part of a series on Viata Romaneasca figures.
Mihail Sadoveanu's writings made an impact on film culture, and in particular on Romanian cinema of the communist period.
Casa cu turn in Iasi, which Mihail Sadoveanu had donated to the state in 1950, went through a period of neglect and was finally set up as a museum in 1980.
Mihail Sadoveanu's memory is regularly honored in the Republic of Moldova, where, in 2005, the 125th anniversary of his birth was celebrated in an official context.