“I recommend wholeheartedly Mircea Ionescu-Quintus’ The Devil’s Grinder. It is a poignant work, testament to the cruelties and injustices of communism. Beyond this, its central quality, the compilation of poems, letters and other materials moves the reader to the core in its expression of human emotion, sounded from the depths of desperation and agonizing conditions.
“My own beloved grandfather, now deceased, Ioan D. Popescu, born on March 3, 1900, had also been incarcerated under Gheorgiu Dej’s regime for “undermining the socialist establishment”. His “crime”, that of having expressed to a work colleague that the Soviet aspirations to conquer space would be dampened by American superiority in technology, in 1958 earned him a ten year jail sentence as a political prisoner, of which he had served seven. Needless to say, Mr. Ionescu-Quintus’ work resonates loud and clear in our neck of the woods.
The poetry, deceptively simple and easy to read at first glance, soon yields to the thought provoking complexities of the message it ultimately delivers, with a punch. Great read for anyone interested in history, Romanian language speaker or not.”
Robert S. Popescu, Esq.
Attorney At Law
Popescu Law Group
New York – New Jersey – Romania – Italy