First edition - Romania Press, Bucharest, 2007.
NOTE: This book is in Romanian.

Comments: Petre Ţuţea, who was sixty-nine years old at the time this book was written (1972), introduces Aurel-Dragoş Munteanu's personality, then proceeds to describe and comment his dialogues with the young writer and essayist. The main theme of the book is european man and european culture.

Edited by Tudor B. Munteanu, who also wrote a short Preface, the chapter descriptions and notes. This first edition contains an unpublished letter describing the book, and an article on Petre Ţuţea at 80, both written by Aurel-Dragoş Munteanu in 2003 and 1982, respectively. More information can be found here.

Contents:   Preface by Tudor B. Munteanu Aurel-Dragoş Munteanu's letter to Doina Florea  §1. Introduction: art and knowledge. Man, as a complete being. Greek spirit and subjectivity. Classical realism and modern constructivism. The cult of heroes. §2. Forms of subjectivity. Pitoresque and pure in the arts; Ion Barbu's poetry. European man, an integral perspective. The framework of our discussion: thought and experience, real and imaginary, order and liberty. Further methodological considerations.   §3. Types of men: the saint and the artist. Art is a "secund game". The interior way, in Proust's case. The psychological novel and the analytical spirit, as opposed to lyrical purity. The European cultural climate.   §4. The spiritual genealogy of european individualism: greek sophists. The real and the fictional ego in modern philosophy. Radical humanism. Human society seen aristocratically, and a sudden reversal of this point of view.   §5. Exceptional individuals: Kierkegaard. The relationship between man and the divine. Comparison with Socrates and Maimonides: the awakening of consciousness and stages of initiation into a virtuous existence. The role and proper place of paradox; philosophy of peculiar individuals ("cases"). Desire and participation: the genius and the saint.    §6. Structures of the a priori. Systems of thought. Categorial order in the philosophy of Lucian Blaga; a short presentation of his "abysmal categories". The Unconscious and its critique: Blaga's metaphysical approach.   §7. Blaga's anthropology. The concepts of pure, concrete and real being as applied to man. Aspects of Blaga and Kant's doctrine of categories; their cultural, scientific and philosophical relevance today.   §8. Closing comments: Blaga's personality and his oeuvre in the framework of Romanian and universal culture. Considerations regarding a future discussion on heroism.   A philosopher of nuances, by Aurel-Dragoş Munteanu