Young Adult: influențe asupra apariției genului în România
Young Adult: Influences on the Emergence of the Genre in Romania

Summary/Abstract: Over the past 20 years or more, the reading audience among teenagers and young adults in Romania has known different trends, and the apparition of the young adult genre in our country has been brought into the attention of publishing houses and critics. Young adult literature, as its name suggests, is targeted for a young audience with the age between 15 and 24 (as UNESCO defines youth), and it is a separate category from children’s literature. Young adult novels first came into existence in the US in the middle of the 20th century and the genre has been a top selling category. Thus, the genre is analyzed by the American critics ever since. Moreover, some of the contributing factors to the success of young adult novels are the creation of literary awards aimed at young adult authors (for example the Michael L. Pritz award meant for the best young adult novel judged on literary merit since 2000) or the successful film adaptations. There are many subgenres of young adult in English literature, the most popular being fantasy, romance, realistic fiction, or dystopias. Along with the translation of young adult novels, such as Harry Potter, The Hunger Games or Twilight phenomenon, the young adult genre is treated as a different genre by some of the publishing houses in Romania. We consider that translating young adult literature as seen in the American literature critic has shaped the apparition of the genre in our literature. The precursors of the autochthon young adult genre could be considered Cireșarii by Constantin Chiriță, or Toate pânzele sus by Radu Tudoran, but since the apparition of these adventure books, the young adult genre has come a long way: punklit, chicklit or fantasy are popular subgenres for our national young adult audience. For instance, Romanian writers such as Cristina Nemerovschi or Irina Binder became very popular among its targeted audience.

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