In search of "Balaşa Cantacuzène" 1, by James O'Fee

Paddy Leigh Fermor prefaces his BETWEEN THE WOODS AND THE WATER with an 'Introductory letter to Xan Fielding'. There he expresses his gratitude to Rudolf (Rudi) Fischer, as described in Rudi Fischer, and More on Rudi Fischer.

Just before this, Paddy wrote -

Also many retrospective thanks to Balaşa Cantacuzène in translating Mioritza, in Moldavia long ago.

It's curious that the first name has a s-cedilla, unknown in English or French, while the second name has an e-grave, unknown in English or Romanian. Therefore the first name appears Romanian while the second appears French.

Earlier in the 'Introductory Letter' Paddy mentions his 'notebook covering this period, lost in Moldavia at the beginning of the war and restored a few years ago by a great stroke of luck'. And later in the body of BETWEEN THE WOODS AND THE WATER (page 59), Paddy writes -

The first volume of this story tells of a thick green manuscript book I bought in Bratislava and used as a notebook and a journal and finally, five years later, at the outbreak of war, left behind by mistake in a friend's country-house in Rumania where I was living.*

Here Paddy adds the footnote -

The house was Baleni, in the Moldavian region of Covurlui, not far from the Prut.

In the year 2000 I heard extracts read on the radio, and then read myself, BETWEEN THE WOODS AND THE WATER. In early 2001, having read the book in translation, my Hungarian friend, József Freier proposed his NEW FERMOR TOUR, to retrace the route that Paddy took through Hungary and Transylvania - see The Mystery of Old Ireland in Hungary.

In an effort to find out more about PLF, I wrote, first, to the author himself in Greece (no reply) and then to his publisher, John Murray. I received a long reply from the then owner of the house, John R. Murray, with photocopies of much interesting biographical information - see A GOOD READ. Following up on this by telephone, John R. Murray was prepared to talk to me on the subject of Patrick Leigh Fermor. He told me that, although Paddy had written some chapters of the third and final part of his account of his walk across Europe to Constantinople, the third part was unlikely to appear in full.

Shortly afterwards, in May 2002, Hodder Headline bought out the firm John Murray "the last of the traditional London publishers". John Murray became a mere imprint of HH. And John R. Murray sold the John Murray archive, including memorabilia of Lord Byron (see here) with whom Patrick Leigh Fermor has so often been compared, to the Scottish National Library for £31.2 million.

In my search for "Balaşa Cantacuzène", next time I shall turn to the book WORDS OF MERCURY, published in 2003.



BETWEEN THE WOODS AND THE WATER, new edition with an Introduction by Jan Morris, published by the New York Review of Books, 2005.

To be continued