FIGARO CONTRE LA FÉODALITÉ EN DÉCOMPOSITION ? ENSEIGNER BEAUMARCHAIS DANS LA ROUMANIE COMMUNISTE
Études balkaniques (Sofia) 2025, N 3, pp. 745 – 763 , DOI: https://doi.org/10.62761/645.EB.LXI3.12
Dragos JIPA 
University of Bucharest, Romania
Abstract: (FIGARO AGAINST DECAYING FEUDALISM? TEACHING BEAUMARCHAIS IN
COMMUNIST ROMANIA) The teaching of Beaumarchais at the University of Bucharest during the Communist era depended on the degree of autonomy of literary studies from the influences of the political regime. The first period, the 1950s, marked by Valentin Lipatti’s Marxist reading, for whom Figaro was a precursor of the French Revolution and of the contemporary political regime, was followed by a second period, that of Irina Bădescu (the 1970s-1980s), who proposed a new reading of Beaumarchais and saw Figaro as a conformist, an ally of the Count against Cherubino. The article shows how each professor negotiated his room for maneuver with the institution during a period that is far from uniform in terms of political influence.
Keywords: Beaumarchais, teaching, university, communism, Valentin Lipatti, Irina Bădescu