Author Bruce Benderson was sent to Hungary in 1999 to write an investigative report on male brothels for an online magazine. But he came back with a love story, along with a hatred for Celine Dion and soccer.
On the first page of his new book, “The Romanian: Story of an Obsession,” Benderson recounts his strategy for writing the brothel report: “Planning to grope my way through the job by sheer instinct and horniness, with little knowledge of the city’s history or present, I left the hotel without even checking a map. My rationale was that my own libido was enough to carry me into the unconscious of the place.”
Instead his libido guided him to the much younger Romulus, a 24-year-old Romanian who didn’t consider himself gay. Benderson met Romulus on the streets of Budapest at 3 a.m. just two days after arriving in Hungary.
“He started talking to me, and we went back to my hotel, and that was the beginning of the whole thing,”
Benderson said in a telephone interview while promoting his new book in Santa Barbara, Calif., last week.
And the brothel report? It wasn’t to be.
“When I came back to New York, I said (to my editor), ‘Well, I have something much better. It’s a story about a Romanian named Romulus,’” Benderson said.
“But I sent you to Hungary,” the editor responded.
“Wait ’till you read it,” Benderson replied.
The editor liked it so much that he sent Benderson back to Romania for a second installment. Originally posted on a Web site, “The Romanian” was released in the United States this month.
Benderson will be at Borders bookstore at the Oakway Center in Eugene – one of 17 cities across the country he’ll be visiting – at 7:30 p.m. on Feb. 20. The author will talk about his new book, read excerpts, answer questions and sign books.
The author describes the book as “a memoir (that) covers a nine-month period in Romania in which I underwent a sexual obsession for a Romanian. – It’s a journey of self-understanding and a journey into the meaning of romantic love.”
“The Romanian” is much more than a love story, though. Benderson’s book is a travelogue of Romania and the surrounding area as well as a historical account that details the love affair of King Carol II, the last king of Romania, and his Jewish lover, Lupescu.
Benderson also recounts taking care of his ailing mother back home.
“I would say it was to both entertain and inform,” Benderson said regarding his new book.
The memoir reads like a novel.
“I was a novelist up to now. I wanted to tell a story of this adventure in literary terms,” Benderson said. “The novel is totally true. The conversations are verbatim. Everything that happened really happened.”
The author only changed the sequence of events, he said.
The book, which took a total of five years to write, was written using a journal Benderson kept and by recounting his experience at a later time.
“Essentially, I was already taking notes the morning after the night we met. I knew it’d lead to some writing,”
Benderson said, who added that he didn’t anticipate the journal evolving into a book.
Benderson formed a close relationship with Romulus, a hustler who was raised during Communist rule in a poor, broken family. The Romanian left home at age 17 and became involved in petty crime and prostitution while sneaking across borders.
“He was also a soccer player who could have been a professional soccer player, but his mother got sick. He was slender, muscular, athletic, smoked two packs of cigarettes a day,” Benderson said. Romulus’ obsession with the sport took time away from Benderson.
“I’m less of a soccer fan now. He would be watching soccer seven hours a day,” he recalled.
However, the popular Romanian sport did open Benderson’s eyes to cultural differences surrounding soccer in Romania and the United States.
“One amazing moment was when Romania won a soccer game – the entire city of Bucharest celebrated. That was an incredible experience. It was like a solemn procession,” he said.
Benderson’s relationship with Romulus was risky at the time because of Romania’s political climate. Romanian law prohibited any kind of sex act thought to be a “public scandal.”
“That was such a vague law, it allowed (the government) to do whatever when they wanted. They could raid a gay bar, or if you influenced someone that previously didn’t have a gay experience, or if you left the window shade open,” Benderson said. “That was a scary situation at the time. I wasn’t thinking about those risks; I was just thinking about Romulus. Perhaps unconsciously, maybe that made the adventure more exciting.”
To support the pair, Benderson, also a translator, had to find work – even if it meant translating Celine Dion’s autobiography.
“I never did like (Celine Dion), but I had to find a way to support us. I couldn’t get any work there. I’m not a resident, and it’s a very impoverished country. The average salary is $100 a month,” Benderson said.
Benderson said he struggled with the job of translating the music star’s life story.
“It wasn’t exactly a profound text. It was an annoying job,” Benderson said.
He recalled working through a heat wave, in temperatures of more than 100 degrees, sometimes for 12 to 14 hours a day.
Benderson also ran the risk of getting bitten by wild dogs while walking the streets. When Ceausescu – the leader of Communist Romania from 1965 until right before his death in 1989 – bulldozed parts of Bucharest for his new palace, families became homeless and released their pets onto the streets.
“Romania was crawling with hostile dogs,” Benderson said.
Although Romulus still lives in Romania and Benderson is back in the United States, Benderson said they still see each other occasionally.
“We’re still very close. We went through some important experiences, so we’re very strongly bonded. He considers me the only real friend he’s ever had in his life,” Benderson said.
The author said that during his travels he became intrigued by the culture of Romania.
“I learned a great deal. I realized later that many of the qualities that attracted me to Romulus were cultural traits. I wasn’t just in love with him, I was in love with Romania,” he said.
Benderson said he was attracted to the Slavic country because of its Latin flavor.
“They have more in common with Italy (or) France versus Russia – another Slavic country,” he said.
Benderson was captivated by the rural parts of Romania, which are comparable to Oregon in geographical size. “Several regions have not changed since late medieval times. People are still using oxen; there are no cars,” Benderson said. “It was an incredibility fascinating culture – one we never think about. It was like a journey into the dark past. It’d be hard to find a cash machine, hotels were run down, taxis would break down while you were in them. It wasn’t easy to navigate.”
Benderson, originally from Syracuse, N.Y., acknowledged that he’s had a cult following in the United States since his release of “User” in the mid-1990s. In France, however, he is widely acclaimed and was the first American to win the Prix de Flore, a French literary prize, since its inception in 1994. Benderson won the prize for “The Romanian” in 2004.
He thinks the contrast between the way American and French readers responded to his work has more to do with writing style than content.
French writers “are the people that shaped my writing, so the French could easily relate to the way I write,” Benderson said.
With the release of “The Romanian,” the author hopes to appeal to American audiences.
The book “definitely has changed my career here already; 90 percent of the reviews have been good, and wherever I go I’ve been selling books,” he said.
In “The Romanian,” Benderson gives readers a lot of insight into his personal life, even if it means presenting himself in a negative light.
“(Readers are) amazed a
t how honest I am. – I’ve been a self-reflective person,” he said. “I enjoy being honest. – If you pretend to be something or someone you’re not, it’s not as interesting as when you reveal your true self.”
Benderson often writes about the dark, underground part of society, and he typically shies away from the mainstream. He said this is because of his sexual orientation and his upbringing.
“Long before gay identity became mainstream, it was natural for us to be associated with others of the underground,” he said. “You’d have to share with lesbians, petty criminals – anybody who hung out downtown. We were all illegal. That’s what made me interested in these subcultures.”
Benderson said because the political climate and attitude toward gays has been more embracing in the United States, this type of underground is disappearing.
“I totally support political rights for gays and anti-discrimination. I think the mainstreaming of homosexuals has been a mistake because homosexual isn’t an identity (anymore). It seemed like once it was rejected, you had to group together.”
