Impressions from the Iaşi Poetry Festival 2025 in Romania
VOLKAN HACIOĞLU
I participated in the world-famous poetry festival held in Iaşi, the cultural capital of Romania, between 11-18 May 2025, as a guest of the Romanian Government, representing Turkey among 70 well-known poets from 12 countries.
Such cultural events are important for the promotion of countries. In addition to being the cultural capital, Iaşi is also a university city with an intense academic life. We also held poetry readings in the city’s universities and high schools.
The 11th International Iaşi Poetry Festival started on May 11, 2025 at the “Diotima” Performance Hall of the “Mihai Ursachi” Cultural House of the Iasi Municipality.
The opening speech of the festival was made by the festival director, poet Adi Cristi.
Following a short presentation on the events that took place during the week of 12-17 May, numerous guests read poems, including Emilian Marcu, Florentin Palaghia, Laura Bilic, Marius Chelaru, Dinu Flămând, Cristina Chiprian, Varujan Vosganian, Ioana Diaconescu, Daniel Corbu, Dragoljub Firulović, Florian Silișteanu Mihai.
On Monday, May 12, the Braunstein Palace hosted the 11th edition, the first extraordinary recital of the International Festival of Poetry in Iaşi. The readers were: Nichita Danilov, Eugen Barz, Horia Gârbea, Giuseppe Iozzia, Emilian Marcu, Adrian Popescu, Radmila Popovici, Liviu Ioan Stoiciu, Indira Spătaru, Valentin Talpalaru. Moderators: Varujan Vosganian, President of the Romanian Writers’ Union, and Adi Cristi, Festival Director.
On the second day of the poetry festival, on May 12, 2025, after reading my poem “Arkadya Hotel” at the school named after Romanian poet Vasile Alecsandri, I thought a little about the question “What is happiness?” asked by the college students during the interview.
Was Abidin Dino able to paint a picture of happiness for Nâzım Hikmet?
Romanian students are really smart and hardworking. They think about poetry and philosophy. They ponder upon important artistic and aesthetic issues.
My humble self Volkan Hacıoğlu from Turkey and Jurga Žąsinaitė from Lithuania sang Eminescu poems. However, we were not aware of his journalistic activities and that Mihai Eminescu was an editor at the Timpul magazine between 1877 and 1883, and that he served as the editor-in-chief of the newspaper from February 1880 to December 1881.
On May 14, in front of Eminescu’s monument in Copou Park, the poet Maria Ivanov presented us with the Republic of Moldova’s edition of a new issue of the Romanian magazine Timpul which means ‘Time’ literally. This magazine bears the name of the historical magazine founded in 1876 and its successor, and was launched in Chisinau in May 2021, together with the writers Mihai Vacariu, Dumitru Crudu and Adriana Nazarciuc, who at that time received only printing money from StarNet, together with Alexandru Machedon and Aurelia Salicov.
Maria told us about the path she followed under the guidance of the editor-in-chief of the magazine, writer Dumitru Crudu. She told us how they formed the editorial board and how each of its members sees the magazine as their common child, whom they will soon send to school. The magazine team is quite colorful: editor-in-chief Dumitru Crudu, editor-stylist Fulga Poiată, accountant Liliana Ivanov, editorial secretary Augustina Visan, technical editor Teo Pricop, social media manager Valeria Saculțanu.
Maria presented Timpul magazine—which is shaped according to a horizontal hierarchy—to us as if she were an editor-in-chief. This fact was also confirmed by the poet Radmila Popovici, whose poems about the Ukrainian war have been featured in the pages of the magazine since 2022 and who has participated in all the magazine’s events.
On Thursday, May 15, the Iași Municipality presented the poets invited to the festival with a plaque with the inscription “Poetry in War”. The ceremony took place in the “Vasile Pogor” Hall of the Roznovanu Palace.
The City Hall of Ciurea Commune has been a reliable partner of the International Iași Poetry Festival for 5 years, and is pleased to offer the generously allocated space of the Cultural Center “Cela Neamțu” for unforgettable poetry readings.
The closing ceremony of the 11th edition of the International Iaşi Poetry Festival took place in this venue, where the visually and spiritually intense works of artist Cela Neamțu were exhibited.
The event began with the presentation of the “Poetry During Wartime” plaque to Mayor Cătălin Lupu, followed by an extraordinary poetry recital by numerous local poets and guest poets of the festival.
The poets who went on stage and read poems were: Maria Radu, Viorel Pătrașcu, Ciprian Romaniuc, Silvia Curteanu, Svetlana Kalezic-Radonjic, Petar Tchouhov, Daniel Levante, Volkan Hacıoğlu, Lauren Mendinueta, Radmila Popovici, Hanna Bota, Angela Baciu, Cristina Chiprian, Ionel Pintilii, Emilian Marcu.
We would like to thank the Ciurea Municipal Council for their efforts to bring us together, the festival director Adi Cristi and everyone who contributed to the event.
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Just after the festival ended, on a marvelous sunny Sunday in laşi, paying a visit at Galeria de Arta Europeana is the best time I ever spent..
No poet can be said so invested in talent without this experience!
