What Rosie Waldeck could not tell at that point, though, is that the fate of the inter-war generation will go hand in hand with the fate of the city: both them and it will be forced, after 1945, swept by the communist wave, into a conflict with their history, memory and tradition, setting up once again, in this endless series of rehearsals, the stage for the Romanian catastrophe.

*

The city in the title, that will never again be what it used to, does not trigger nostalgia or a longing for times past; it is fine with me to say that Bucharest will never be what it was up until 1940 or at any point before that date.

Saying that is not necessarily the confession of a regret. There is a morale to it all: the computing of the disasters undergone by this city could go on for ever. The more important thing is, I believe, its fantastic capacity of regeneration, all the more so as it never lacked mortal enemies. No matter what one might think at a first sight, the spirit .of Bucharest pulsates with an almost tangible tension; sometimes, it is a joie de vivre; most of the times, it is an obstination to live. It is this tension, rather than history, that makes one appreciate its charming, if dramatic, past and foresee for it a powerful future.

*The coordinates of the center of the capital ? at the zero kilometer in St George Square ? are 26°4?50? East longitude and 44°25?49? North latitude. (Author?s note.)

*Neighborhood situated on the outskirts of the city, known as a pretty muddy and poor area ? variously translated as ?periphery? or ?slum?. (Translator?s note.)

*Rank in the former army forces; also the name of a boulevard in Bucharest. (Tanslator?s note.)

*A spoiled, snobbish provincial child - a character in the homonymous short story by I.L Caragiale, who also made famous the fashion of taking walks on the Bucharest ?bulivar? (?boulevard?). (Translator?s note.)