2025 - Iulian Bocai

In 2024, Bocai was selected as one of the emerging Romanian authors for the European talent development programme CELA. Before going into writing, he spent a decade translating mainly novels and children’s books from English, French and German into Romanian. He has published four books of his own and dabbles both in literature and nonfiction. His debut novel, Ciudata și înduioșătoarea viață a lui Priță Barsacu (“The Weird and Endearing Life of Priță Barsacu”) won multiple national and international awards and has come out in a Dutch translation by Charlotte van Rooden in June 2025. In his next novel, Constantin, Bocai tells the story of a young student who moves from the Romanian countryside to Bucharest and witnesses a series of tragicomic events involving colourful characters.

During his residency at Passa Porta, Iulian Bocai will be working on a new novel written in the style of a journalistic dissertation about a woman that disappears. In this slightly absurd novel, he explores existential failure, what it is like being a woman in contemporary Romania, and the country's wealthy, entrepreneurial class.

photo: Gaby Jongenelen for CELA