From Praying Hands to Killing Hands: The Metaphor of the Hands in the Romanian War Novel of the Interwar Period

There is no doubt that the grim reputation of the First World War is mainly due to the immense loss of human life, but the great calamity of the 20th century involved many other developments; among them, in first place, are those of a technological nature. The tragedy of a developing world was that technology joined hands with the tide of power that was sweeping Europe from one end to the other, leading to the outbreak of a hitherto unparalleled war and, by implication, dictating the extremely brutal manner in which it was conducted. Although in figurative language the idea of power is closely linked to the hand, as a symbol of strength, determination and resistance, in the repertoire of the novels investigated, the symbolic value of the human hand has a much wider range of meanings. This is what the present study aims to highlight: not only that the hand is a word that is not absent from the vocabulary of war novels, since weapons are carried by hands, but also that the symbolism of the hand tends to eclipse the idea of force, understood as an arbitrary way of imposing oneself on the adversary. As war claims more and more victims, proving to be a colossal human error, the symbolism of the hand undergoes a commensurate transmutation. As an antithesis of the idea of power, it often suggests not only weakness, the loss of physical and mental strength, but above all the acute need for compassion and solidarity in the face of suffering.