Leonard Oprea (; born December 16, 1953) is a Romanian novelist, poet, and essayist. In the late 1980s, he wrote two books of fiction that were banned by the Communist regime and gained him repute among dissidents. Following the 1989 Revolution, the books were published but did not attract significant notice during the political upheaval of the time. He left Romania for the United States in 1999, after which the pair of previously banned works was once again released. In the 2000s, he wrote the fictional series Theophil Magus, and by 2020 this series included 17 separate titles. Piero Scaruffi considers his work "Cele Nouă Învățături ale lui Theophil Magus despre Magia Transilvană/ The Nine Teachings Of Theophil Magus On Transylvanian Magic" (2000) among the ten best novels in the Romanian language. Biography Origins and early career Born in Prejmer, Brașov County, Oprea attended Andrei Șaguna High School in Brașov before undertaking his studies at the Transilvania University of Brașov. He also holds a specialization in mass media from California State University, Chico, obtained in 1990. Prior to the Romanian Revolution of 1989, Oprea wrote Domenii Interzise, published in 1984, a collection of fantasy short stories and novellas. Following publication, he penned a lengthy analysis of the works of Nicolae Steinhardt in the Iași magazine Opinia studențească, which led to a ban on writing by the Communist regime, in particular its Securitate secret police. He also wrote the short prose collection Radiografia clipei ("The X-ray of an Instant") and the novel Cămașa de forță ("The Straitjacket"), as well as publishing several short stories in cultural magazines, and won a number of national literary prizes. His two full-length works were banned by the regime and circulated in samizdat form. Due to this censorship, critic Tudorel Urian says that in the 1980s his name was much better known in dissident circles than his work. Oprea was a participant in the Brașov Rebellion of 1987. Since 1989 Radiografia clipei, which was banned in 1987, was published in 1990, subsequent to the fall of the regime, and Cămașa de forță in 1992, but according to Urian, both went nearly unnoticed. The latter states that in that period, forthright expression had come into fashion, and stories told in parables, such as Oprea's, were no longer favored. In 1999, Oprea emigrated to the United States, following which his novels began to meet with greater success in