I. C. Vissarion

Iancu Constantin Vissarion (February 2, 1879–November 5, 1951) was a Romanian prose writer.

Born in Costeștii din Vale, Dâmbovița County, his father was a merchant of Greek origin, not officially married to his mother Ilinca. After he attended primary school in his native village from 1886 to 1891, his mother died. He subsequently moved to Titu and then to his grandfather's home in Bucharest, where he learned the shoemaker's trade from 1892 to 1895. He briefly worked as a clerk at the sub-prefectural office in Titu. In 1898, he married Gheorghița; the couple would have ten children. For a few months in 1901, he served as mayor of Costeștii din Vale. Working as a farmer, he took part in the 1907 peasants' revolt; arrested and sentenced to death, he was freed upon the intervention of Ion G. Duca. He was a health inspector in 1907-1908, 1913 and 1919, and a school inspector in 1920. During World War I, he was employed as a military censor.[1]

Vissarion's first book was a collection of folk tales, Draci și strigoi (1899). His work appeared in România muncitoare, Rațiunea, Flacăra, Sburătorul and Viața Românească. In 1913, he was an editor at Rampa and Facla. He held several patents for inventions, including an airplane, ventilated shoes and a wheelchair. From 1932 to 1935, he edited Steluța magazine; its contributors included Gala Galaction and Al. T. Stamatiad. In 1918, he was awarded the Romanian Academy's Adamachi Prize for his 1916 short story collection Florica și alte nuvele. Other volumes included Nevestele lui Moș Dragoman (1913), Privighetoarea neagră (1916) and Ber-Căciulă (1920); these were the product of what Eugen Lovinescu termed an "inexhaustible memory", the author "melted into the anonymous mass of the people".[1]