The Life and Opinions of Zacharias Lichter

"One would say: a Baal Shem Tov seen by Sterne." --E.M. Cioran

"A literary jewel of eccentricity seen as an ethical provocation, which created an unforgettable shock at a time when the mental stereotype imposed by the dictatorship was dimly trying to find the first slits for a breakthrough..."
"The writer summons, in an artistic undertaking that is ever vigorous and vibrant, the fundamental questions of existence, the ephemeral and the transcendent stimulating each other in a dynamic exchange of energy, with original and seductive accords of lasting resonance." --Norman Manea

"He lives from today to tomorrow, from whatever he is given, from whatever drops into his lap, you wonder how. He works by fits and starts, occasionally, when and if the opportunity arises. He spends most of his time in prison or in work camps, sleeps wherever he happens to be. He wanders. He would not enter the system for anything in the world, would not take even the lowest, miserable, temporary job... Such a person, at the margins of society, is also immune: they have no way to put pressure on him, nothing to take from him, nothing to offer him. They can always put him behind bars, harass him, despise and mock him: but he escapes them.... He makes a credo out of poverty, distrust, disobedience; he resembles a wild animal, a scrawny beast, a highway brigand. He is Stendhal's Ferrante Palla. He is Matei Calinescu's Zacharias Lichter. He is a laic 'holy fool,' a traveler never bored (for what name does Wotan carry when he descends on earth? Der Wanderer), a Wandering Jew. And he speaks his mind too freely, doesn't shut up, voices the most dangerous tales, knows no respect, looks down on everything, says whatever comes to his mind, speaks truths that others do not dare whisper. He is the child from Andersen's the Emperor Without Clothes. He is King Lear's fool. He is the wolf from the fable--another bold work--of La Fontaine: has no idea of a leash. He is free, free, free." --N. Steinhardt