page_title: A. de Herz
section_title: Breakthrough
hierarchical_section_title: A. de Herz / Biography / Breakthrough
caption_attribution_description: Alexandru Davila and Ion Luca Caragiale. Part of a set of photographs taken at a Davila Troupe session, Bucharest, 1909. Caragiale, who was living in Berlin, made occasional returns to Romania - this was one such trip. See Momente, schiţe, amintiri II (Paulian edition), Scrisul Românesc, Craiova [n. y.].
context_page_description: Adolf Edmund George de Herz, commonly shortened to A. de Herz, also rendered as Hertz and Herț, was a Romanian playwright and literary journalist, also active as a poet, short story author, and stage actor. He was the scion of an upper-class assimilated Jewish family, with its roots in Austria-Hungary. His grandfather, Adolf Sr, was a controversial banker and venture capitalist, while his father, Edgar von Herz, was noted as a translator of Romanian literature. Adolf had a privileged childhood and debuted as a poet while still in high school, producing the lyrics to a hit romance. In his early work for the stage, Herz was a traditionalist inspired by Alexandru Davila and the Sămănătorul school, but later veered toward neoclassical literature and aestheticism. His "salon comedies", staged by the National Theater Bucharest, borrowed from various authors, including Roberto Bracco, Henri Lavedan, and Haralamb Lecca, peaking in popularity in 1913, with Păianjenul. By the start of World War I, Herz was also a writer of revues.
  Controversy followed Herz during the early 1910s, when his writing raised suspicions of plagiarism.
context_section_description: Several of these texts were staged by the National Theater Bucharest, which was led by Eliade, then by Davila and Ioan Bacalbașa. In January 1909, it produced Domnița Ruxandra, marking the first-ever performance of a Herz play. Directed by the professional actor Ion Livescu, it was unusual for having an all-amateur cast, comprising only high-school students. At the Romanian Academy, Maiorescu rejected the play, which was competing for the Năsturel Award. In later years, however, he granted occasional sponsorship to Herz. The latter praised Maiorescu as his adviser and moral benchmark, assuring him of his "undying devotion". Biruința was accepted by Davila in May 1911 and registered accolades. It was also taken up for production by Iași's state theater in November, but did not play to a full house. Writing at the time, reviewer Corneliu Carp alleged that the local public preferred sensationalism and melodrama to Herz's "tame, normal, simple" text. Also taken up by the National Theater Bucharest, Noaptea Învierii "failed to catch on", and is described by Lovinescu as very similar to his own earlier play, De peste prag. Când ochii plâng was first shown at a provincial venue, the National Theater Craiova, with Agatha Bârsescu as a lead.
  Herz returned to Bucharest with Păianjenul, which was an "unparalleled" or "great success" on its premiere. According to Livescu and critic Ioan Massoff, it became an absolute triumph for both the author and the lead actors, Maria Giurgea and Tony Bulandra. In Păianjenul, a widow pretends to be "debauched" so as to seem more fashionable. According to Călinescu, the theme and layout prefigure Luigi Pirandello, but also reinstate old favorites of the public. Likewise, Lovinescu suggests that Păianjenul is largely a copy of Roberto Bracco's Perfetto amore, but mutated into the realm of comedy. The result, however, is superior, and itself a "model for salon comedies".
  Lovinescu's hypothesis about Bracco and Herz was at the center of a plagiarism scandal. Other writers maintained favorable opinions of Păianjenul: Livescu finds in it both of Herz's faces, "the poet and the humorist", joined with "clear precision in creating scenarios and a technique that is anything but banal"; while Massoff sees it as "the first and perhaps the best of Romania's salon comedies". The same is argued by theatrologist Vera Molea, who proposes that Păianjenul remains "the most accomplished writing by the prolific A. de Herz."
  As noted by scholar Mircea Popa, Herz was a renowned journalist in his time, but also had significant contributions to the development of Romanian theatrical life, through both his magazines and the plays he wrote. This verdict is contrasted by another historian, George Călinescu, who views Herz as mainly a "theatrical industrialist" and "frank sentimentalist", with only Păianjenul and Bunicul emerging as more lasting contributions. In writing Bunicul, Herz was apparently inspired by Henri Lavedan's Marquis de Priola, similarly depicting an aging seducer, Manole Corbea, trying and failing to win the favors of a much younger woman. The scenario is seen by Călinescu as a collection "of trifles, sometimes tedious", but nonetheless "trifles assembled with skill." Contrarily, Lovinescu describes Bunicul as "weak" and "incoherent", with jocular phrases that "do nothing to disperse its banality." Shortly after the premiere, Luceafărul reported that the "much-touted play" was a flop, noting that its "talented author" had "chiseled away a piece of glass, [rather than] a diamond." Reviewers for both Flacăra and Opinia saw Bunicul as a lifeless text, arguing that Herz had taken "two steps back". "The Baron" was still not validated by critics with Cuceritorul: a reviewer at Universul Literar called the play "incoherent", and alleged that Herz had only written it because Bulandra wanted him to.
  Herz was a founding member of the Romanian Writers' Society (SSR), a literary secretary at the National Theater Bucharest, and an editor-in-chief of the literary magazine Făt-Frumos. In 1910–1911, he visited the Romania
caption: Herz's patron Alexandru Davila (left), with the senior playwright Ion Luca Caragiale, in 1909
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