A work which views Hekate from the perspective of Mircea Eliade's archetypes and substantiates its claims through cross-cultural comparisons.

Daniel Dubuisson singled out Eliade's concept of homo religiosus as a reflection of fascist elitism, and argued that the Romanian scholar's views of Judaism and the Old Testament, which depicted Hebrews as the enemies of an ancient cosmic religion, were ultimately the preservation of an antisemitic discourse.

Moreover, the connection between mythology and politics differs for each of the mythologists in question: in Eliade's case, Ellwood believes, a strong sense of nostalgia (" for childhood, for historical times past, for cosmic religion, for paradise "), influenced not only the scholar's academic interests, but also his political views.

Various critics have traced links between Eliade's fiction works and his political views, or Romanian politics in general.

After completing his primary education at the school on Mântuleasa Street, Eliade attended the Spiru Haret National College in the same class as Arşavir Acterian, Haig Acterian, and Petre Viforeanu ( and several years the senior of Nicolae Steinhardt, who eventually became a close friend of Eliade's ).

Eliade's scholarly works began after a long period of study in British India, at the University of Calcutta.

Eliade's articles before and after his adherence to the principles of the Iron Guard ( or, as it was usually known at the time, the Legionary Movement ), beginning with his famous Itinerar spiritual (" Spiritual Itinerary ", serialized in Cuvântul in 1927 ), center on several political ideals advocated by the far right.

It was attended by 1, 200 people, and included a public reading of Eliade's text in which he recalled the epiphany of his childhood — the lecture was given by novelist Saul Bellow, Eliade's colleague at the University.

According to Eliade's interpretation, religious man apparently feels the need to live not only near, but at, the mythical Center as much as possible, given that the Center is the point of communication with the Sacred.

Even Wendy Doniger, Eliade's successor at the University of Chicago, claims ( in an introduction to Eliade's own Shamanism ) that the eternal return does not apply to all myths and rituals, although it may apply to many of them.

The other characters, standing for Eliade's generation, all seek knowledge through violence or retreat from the world — nonetheless, unlike Anicet, they ultimately fail at imposing rigors upon themselves.

Mircea Eliade's earliest works, most of which were published at later stages, belong to the fantasy genre.

Eliade's Iphigenia was again included in theater programs during the late years of the Nicolae Ceauşescu regime: in January 1982, a new version, directed by Ion Cojar, premiered at the National Theater Bucharest, starring Mircea Albulescu, Tania Filip and Adrian Pintea in some of the main roles.

Mircea Eliade's novel, Noaptea de Sânziene ( translated as The Forbidden Forest ), includes references to the folk belief about skies opening at night, as well as to paranormal events happening in the Băneasa Forest.

For instance, Eliade's The Sacred and the Profane partially builds on Otto's The Idea of the Holy to show how religion emerges from the experience of the sacred, and myths of time and nature.

However, Eliade's understanding of Judaeo-Christian eschatology can also be understood as cyclical in that the " end of time " is a return to God: " The final catastrophe will put an end to history, hence will restore man to eternity and beatitude ".

In Eliade's view, traditional man sees time as an endless repetition of mythical archetypes.

In Ellwood's view, Eliade's nostalgia was only enhanced by his exile from Romania: " In later years Eliade felt about his own Romanian past as did primal folk about mythic time.

" Literary historian Paul Cernat argued that part of the volume is " a masterpiece of its time ", while concluding that some 700 pages were passable for the " among others " section of Eliade's bibliography.

Cătălin Avramescu defined this conclusion as " whitewashing ", and, answering to Alexandrescu's claim that his uncle's support for the Guard was always superficial, argued that Jurnal portughez and other writings of the time showed Eliade's disenchantment with the Legionaries ' Christian stance in tandem with his growing sympathy for Nazism and its pagan messages.

One of Eliade's earliest fiction writings, the controversial first-person narrative Isabel şi apele diavolului, focused on the figure of a young and brilliant academic, whose self-declared fear is that of " being common ".

Summarizing Eliade's statements on this subject, Eric Rust writes, " A new religious structure became available.

* Some authors insist on Zalmoxis ' relation with Pythagoras, stating that he has founded a mystical cult ; partly this theory may be found in Eliade's work ;

Mariana Klein, who became Şora's wife, was one of Eliade's female students, and later authored works on his scholarship.

Eliade's understanding of religion centers on his concept of hierophany ( manifestation of the Sacred )— a concept that includes, but is not limited to, the older and more restrictive concept of theophany ( manifestation of a god ).

Anthropologist Alice Kehoe is highly critical of Eliade's work on Shamanism, namely because he was not an anthropologist but a historian.

French researcher Daniel Dubuisson places doubt on Eliade's scholarship and its scientific character, citing the Romanian academic's alleged refusal to accept the treatment of religions in their historical and cultural context, and proposing that Eliade's notion of hierophany refers to the actual existence of a supernatural level.

Many of Mircea Eliade's literary works, in particular his earliest ones, are noted for their eroticism and their focus on subjective experience.

" A specific aspect of this focus on experience is sexual experimentation — Călinescu notes that Eliade's fiction works tend to depict a male figure " possessing all practicable women in given family ".

Polemically, Călinescu proposed that Mircea Eliade's supposed focus on " aggressive youth " and served to instill his interwar Romanian writers with the idea that they had a common destiny as a generation apart.

The notion was in turn linked to Eliade's own thoughts on transcendence, and in particular his idea that, once " camouflaged " in life or history, miracles become " unrecognizable ".

One of Eliade's best-known works, the novel Maitreyi, dwells on Eliade's own experience, comprising camouflaged details of his relationships with Surendranath Dasgupta and Dasgupta's daughter Maitreyi Devi.

Allan himself stands alongside Eliade's male characters, whose focus is on action, sensation and experience — his chaste contacts with Maitreyi are encouraged by Sen, who hopes for a marriage which is nonetheless abhorred by his would-be European son-in-law.

Eliade's 1934 novel Întoarcerea din rai (" Return from Paradise ") centers on Pavel Anicet, a young man who seeks knowledge through what Călinescu defined as " sexual excess ".

Eliade's fantasy novel Domnişoara Christina, was, on its own, the topic of a scandal.

Paul Cernat notes that Eliade's statement includes an admission that he " counted on support, in order to get back into Romanian life and culture ", and proposes that Eliade may have expected his friend to vouch for him in front of hostile authorities.

In August 1954, when Horia Sima, who led the Iron Guard during its exile, was rejected by a faction inside the movement, Mircea Eliade's name was included on a list of persons who supported the latter — although this may have happened without his consent.

Based on Mircea Eliade's admiration for Gandhi, various other authors assess that Eliade remained committed to nonviolence.

Andrei Oişteanu, who proposed that Eliade's critics were divided into a " maximalist " and a " minimalist " camp ( trying to, respectively, enhance or shadow the impact Legionary ideas had on Eliade ), argued in favor of moderation, and indicated that Eliade's fascism needed to be correlated to the political choices of his generation.

Three years later, Eliade's political activities were brought into discussion as he was getting ready to publish a translation of his Techniques du Yoga with the left-leaning Italian company Giulio Einaudi Editore — the denunciation was probably orchestrated by Romanian officials.

As one of the figures in the Criterion literary society ( 1933 – 1934 ), Eliade's initial encounter with the traditional far right was polemical: the group's conferences were stormed by members of A. C. Cuza's National-Christian Defense League, who objected to what they viewed as pacifism and addressed antisemitic insults to several speakers, including Sebastian ; in 1933, he was among the signers of a manifesto opposing Nazi Germany's state-enforced racism.