Black Sea Twilight

A Talk and Book Presentation by Domnica Radulescu Hosted by Dr Mike Phillips OBE, British novelist, historian and curator Followed by a Q&A session Thursday 21 July 2011, 19.00-21.00, The Ratiu Foundation / Romanian Cultural Centre Manchester Square, 18 Fitzhardinge Street, London W1H 6EQ; Tel. 020 7486 0295, ext 108 e-mail: bookings@romanianculturalcentre.org.uk; Entry is free but booking is essential. Romanian-born American writer Domnica Radulescu, author of best-selling Train to Trieste, is coming to London for a special talk and presentation of her most recent novel - Black Sea Twilight – ahead of its UK publication in July 2011 by Transworld Publishers – Black Swan. Domnica Radulescu will discuss some of the creative processes and sources of inspiration that lead to the creation of Black Sea Twilight in light of her experience of growing up in Romania under the dictatorship of Nicolae Ceausescu and of her experience as an émigré in the Western world. Radulescu will offer her authorial perspective on the protagonist of the novel, Nora Teodoru, an aspiring visual artist, courageous adventurer and passionate young Romanian woman, through the lens of the interconnectedness between the female body and the female creative imagination and the ways in which the latter is affected by the experience of exile. A book of carnivalesque occurrences, tragic separations, suspenseful escapes and dreams of overpowering passion, Black Sea Twilight takes even farther some of the themes developed in her first novel, Train to Trieste, and weaves them through a rich palette of wrenching emotions, fantastical visions and colorful landscapes. Excerpts from the novel will be read to illustrate the themes and notions developed in the talk. Domnica Radulescu won a national prize for a volume of short stories when she was twenty, just before she fled her native Romania during Nicolae Ceausescu’s dictatorship. She settled in the United States as a political refugee in 1983. She is a Professor of French and Italian Literature and Chair of the Women’s and Gender Studies Program at Washington and Lee University in Virginia. Her first novel Train to Trieste won the Library of Virginia Award for Best Fiction. Black Sea Twilight is her second novel. • BLACK SEA TWILIGHT by Domnica Radulescu. Black Swan, July 2011 • 432 pages • ISBN: 0552774758 RRP £7.99. Available to buy online from Amazon.co.uk and RBooks.co.uk. The book will also be available on the evening, and the author will sign copies. // // // // // // // // // // // // Dr Mike Phillips OBE is a novelist, historian and curator, consultant to various cultural organisations across Europe. Organised by The Ratiu Foundation / Romanian Cultural Centre in London. Culture Power is a programme initiated by the Ratiu Foundation, consisting of a number of presentations and constructive dialogue with an invited audience. With the support of Profusion International Creative Consultancy. Note: Images above © Courtesy of Transworld Publishers.