32 Facts About Octavian Goga

Octavian Goga was born on 1 April 1881 in the village of Rasinari, on the northern slopes of the Southern Carpathians, in the house at 778 Ulita Popilor, the son of the Orthodox priest Iosif Goga and Aurelia, a teacher.

Between 1886 and 1890 Goga attended primary school in his native village, having Moise Fratila, a patriotic intellectual and the possible character in the poem Dascalul, as his sister Victoria, who died early, was the character in Dascalita.

The marriage broke up after 14 years, when Octavian Goga fell in love with the singer Veturia Triteanu, born Muresan.

On July 1,1902, Luceafarul, a publication for national culture and political unity of the Romanians in Transylvania, appeared in Budapest, where Octavian Goga published most of his poems.

The literary critic Ion Dodu Balan considered that Octavian Goga's volume "signifies the beginning of a new epoch for our Romanian soul", because "no one has surpassed the vigour, purity and music of our language, the richness of colours, the originality of ideas, the serenity of concepts, the candour of expressions and the healthy national background, which is concentrated in these poems".

Octavian Goga died two days later, on 7 May 1938 at 2.15 pm, aged 57.

Until the outbreak of the World War I, Octavian Goga established himself as a brilliant journalist through his articles published in Tara noastra magazine, Epoca newspaper, Adevarul, Flacara magazine and Romania magazine, his journalistic prose being stylistically and thematically comparable to Eminescu.

Octavian Goga's articles approached the value of the work of a vocational prose writer.

Octavian Goga focused his publicity on the problems of "Romanianism".

The magazine Tara Noastra, which focused on Octavian Goga's ideology, strengthened its ties with the people in the villages, advising them but helping them with their spiritual and material needs.

Octavian Goga left, as a draft, two one-act plays, the sketch Fruntasul, a dialogue article from 1911 and the translation of Imre Madach's The Tragedy of Man'.

An opponent of the Transylvanian policy of the Hungarian governments, Octavian Goga was at the same time an admirer of classical and modern Hungarian literature.

Octavian Goga studied the works of Sandor Petofi and Imre Madach from his high school years in Sibiu and later as a student at the University of Budapest, and was a close friend of Endre Ady.

George Calinescu observed that Octavian Goga's translation is done in a Romanian that approaches the perfection and beauty of Eminescu's language: "It is the language and even the style of Eminescu that is appropriate to our time and it is precisely interesting to see a classical poet who manages to be plastic through words, for the ear, not through colorism".

Two years later, in 1913, Octavian Goga was arrested again, in Seghedin.

Octavian Goga launched an extensive publicity campaign in the newspapers Adevarul and Epoca on the situation of the brothers across the Carpathians, who were subject to persecution.

Octavian Goga joined the Romanian army and fought as a soldier in Dobrogea.

When hostilities ended and the peace was signed in Bucharest, Octavian Goga was forced to leave Romania for France.

At the beginning of 1919, Octavian Goga returned to Greater Romania.

Octavian Goga was one of the leaders of the Romanian nationalist movement.

In 1926 together with Vasile Goldis, Ioan Lupas, and Silviu Dragomir, Octavian Goga left the Romanian National Party and joined General Alexandru Averescu's People's Party, a populist movement created upon the war's end.

Octavian Goga clashed with Averescu over the latter's conflict with King Carol II.

Together with Goldis, Lupas, and Dragomir, Octavian Goga founded the National Agrarian Party on April 10,1932.

The government chaired by Goga and dismissed after 44 days, was created by the National Christian Party resulting from the merger on 14 July 1935 in Iasi of the National Christian Defence League and the National Agrarian Party.

Prime Minister Octavian Goga pursued a pro-Nazi policy by intending to ally with and adopt the policies of Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy and pursued an anti-Semitic policy by denying the legal rights of the Jewish population.

Octavian Goga turned out to be a xenophobic extremist with fascist and clearly anti-Semitic views.

However, he soon abandoned Octavian Goga, preparing a coup together with the minister of the Interior Armand Calinescu, a former member of the National Peasants' Party, who acted as a guarantee for the king in the government.

The coup was likely precipitated when Octavian Goga negotiated an electoral agreement with Corneliu Zelea Codreanu, the leader of the Iron Guard, on February 8,1938, thus posing a considerable threat to the King's power.

On February 10,1938, Carol II received Octavian Goga and told him to postpone the snap elections, whereupon Octavian Goga resigned.

Octavian Goga refused to participate in the national unity government the king appointed the same day and withdrew to his estate in Ciucea, Transylvania, where he suffered a stroke on 5 May 1938.

In 1920, Octavian Goga was elected a member of the academy, his acceptance speech being entitled George Cosbuc.

In press interviews at the time Octavian Goga said the following:.