Vasile Posteucă

Vasile Posteucă (10 September 1912, Unterstanestie, Siret district, Austria-Hungary – 6 December 1972, Chicago, Illinois, USA) was a Romanian poet and a member of the Iron Guard.

In Romania Posteucă was born in Unterstanestie, Bukovina (Romanian: Stăneștii de Jos; now Nyzhni Stanivtsi, Kitsman Raion, Chernivtsi Oblast, Ukraine). He completed his high school studies in Siret (1924–1931), followed by a degree in literature at the University of Cernăuți (1931–1936).

Posteucă began to publish poetry whilst still a university student, making his literary debut in Junimea Literară, a literary magazine based in Cernăuți (now Chernivtsi, Ukraine) and edited by Ion I. Nistor. He also became involved in student politics, participating in the "Aboroasa" student union (serving as its president from 1934 to 1936) and later serving as vice-president of the Student Centre of Cernăuți (Centrul studențesc din Cernăuți), which was organised primarily around ultranationalist politics. He helped to organize the first Congress of Bukovinian Students (Congres al Studențimii Bucovinene, 1936). He was closely involved in organising the fascist Legionary Movement (or Iron Guard) in Bukovina, serving as "commandant" of Hotin County. In the 1937 Romanian general elections, he ran as a candidate for the Iron Guard in Hotin.

During the interwar period he collaborated with a number of far-right, nationalist, and literary publications, amongst them Iconar (directed by Mircea Streinul and Liviu Russu), Însemnări Sociologice (directed by Traian Brăileanu), Buna Vestire (directed by Mihail Manoilescu, later Dragoș Protopopescu and Toma Vlădescu), Falanga, Glasul Bucovinei, Convorbiri literare, and Cuvântul.

Following the Legionnaires' Rebellion in January 1941, Posteucă and other Iron Guard members fled Romania to Germany. He was initially held in a camp in Rostock, later being interned in Buchenwald concentration camp. In 1944 he was recruited by Horia Sima to a propaganda commission as part of the Romanian government-in-exile sponsored by the NSDAP and based in Vienna.

In exile Posteucă immigrated to Canada, where he completed a Master of Arts in 1953 and his doctoral studies at the University of Toronto in 1962.

Later life and death Posteucă spent several years suffering from cancer, Vasile Posteucă died shortly thereafter, on 6 December 1972, at the age of 60. He was buried in Jackson, Michigan.

Publications

Carte de cântece românești (Madrid: R. Nieto, 1953) Poeme fără țară (with N. S. Govora, Nicolae Novac) (Madrid: Editura "Carpații", 1954) În marea și'n mormintele din noi (Madrid: Editura Revistei Drum, 1967) Poeme din închisori (with Nicolae Novac) (Madrid: Editura Drum, 1970) Desgroparea Căpitanului (Madrid: Editura Mișcării Legionare, 1977) Icoane de dor. Poeme (Lugoj: Editura "Dacia Europa Noua", 1997)