Eminescu

Although he'd told her he only needed a simple photo, Veronica had sent him to Popp's studio. It was like stepping into the future. In the showcase, portraits of people who seemed incredibly real. Everything covered in with paintings of famous places and sceneries. They made you feel like you were there. Had it been up to him, he wouldn't have even known what to choose. Ambrotype is an incredible technology. The photographer asked him what he needed: ID, passport or banknote. The third was the cheapest.

(Translated by Eleonora Manea / University of Bucharest, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, MTTLC, year II / Corrected by Professor Nadina Vişan)


Real Fiction is a collective project started in 2013 by Florin Piersic Jr. The concept of Real Fiction continued to exist as a Facebook group, after a volume of stories was published at Humanitas Publishing House. (In January 2021, the group has 3.000 members.) The authors write ultra-short stories, with the texts limited to 500 characters (in Romanian, so the length of the English translation might be a little different) - a flash-fiction exercise on a topic that changes every few days. The group's coordinators are Florin Piersic Jr., Gabriel Molnar, and Luchian Abel. (Drawing by Adrian T. Roman)

*Versiunea în română a acestui text se poate citi aici, în rubrica Ficțiuni Reale.