Radu Macri, the student “like a dull angel, who has frozen, gone into eternity”

There were several seriously ill people in the infirmary with me. What I remember with great sadness was a little boy of about 14-15 years old, or maybe less[1], whose name I remember: RADU MACRI. The son-in-law of a naval pilot from Brăila. He had double pneumonia. He had been arrested with General Franco’s group.

Around 1948 or 1949, a group of students aged about 12-13 decided to write a letter to General Franco – whom they had heard had fought against communism – expressing their indignation at the fact that they, the children, were being forced into communist associations (U.A.E.R.). Done and done. On a postcard, they expressed their feelings in a few lines, signed it as decipherably as possible and gave the address of General Franco – Madrid – which they nonchalantly put in the post box.

What followed is anyone’s guess.

General Franco’s children were named in prison.

The little boy was lying on a bed, his eyes extremely bright with fever. He flickered like a candle. A few days after my arrival, Radu stopped moving. He remained, as I would later express in the poem “Pitești”. “Like a dull angel, frozen in eternity.

I don’t remember how long I stayed in the infirmary, where I had to have my bandage changed, then I was taken away and returned to a re-education room.

(Aurel Vișovan – My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?)

[1] Radu Macri was 17 at the time. The memoirist’s lower approximation of age is due to his slender stature of only 1.52m.