Mircea Eliade (1907–1986), a native of Bucharest, historian of religion, and writer, presents a perfect example in his novelistic fresco of how the dialectic of the sacred and the secular, which is the cornerstone of the author's phenomenology of religion, operates in the context of prose work. In the central character Ştefan Vizi's quest for absolute love while trying to break free from the present time marked by the 'terror of history,' a cosmogonic mimetism is evident, which forms the basis of his often incomprehensible actions. However, from the reader's perspective, this search is also hidden, as its main stages can hardly be distinguished from more or less ordinary events in the life of a Romanian intellectual during extraordinary historical crises (the rise of fascism, the Iron Guard's coup attempt, Marshal Antonescu's military dictatorship, World War II, Russian occupation, and the establishment of a brutal Stalinist regime).
