Alex Drace-Francis is Associate Professor of the Literary and Cultural History of Modern Europe at the University of Amsterdam.

'An enormously erudite study... for anyone interested in the origins of modern Romanian literary production and education in the context of the Enlightenment, modernization, and state-formation this is an indispensable book.' Irina Livezeanu, Associate Professor of History, University of Pittsburgh. 'Alex Drace-Francis has produced a highly accurate and often outstandingly subtle piece of research. This British scholar observes things that his Romanian colleagues, being too familiar with them, have tended to overlook.' Ovidiu Pecican, Professor of History, Babes-Bolyai University, Romania. 'Solid and extremely well informed, Alex Drace-Francis's book not only brings together a great mass of information and hypotheses, but also asks important questions about a cultural legacy whose investigation is still plagued by stereotypes.' Mircea Anghelescu, Professor of Literature, University of Bucharest, Romania.

• IntroductionPART ONE: 1700-18292.Politics and Social Change3.Public Images and Projections4.Writing and Literacy5.Education and the Public Sphere6.Printing and Book Production7.Literature, Nation, EuropePART TWO: 1829-18488.‘The Great European Family’9.Education, part 1: Wallachia10.Education, part 2: Moldavia11.Books, Printing12.The Periodical Press, 1829-4813.Romania, Literature, Nation14.RevolutionPART THREE: 1848-189015.Education16.Printing, Publishing17.The Periodical Press18.Literature, Society, Nation: The Maiorescu-Gherea polemicConclusions