He returned to Romania in 1910, and published works in Via?

a Romneasca, Teatru, R
ampa, and N. D. Cocea's Facla and Via?a Sociala, as well as editing the magazine
Cronica in collaboration with Galaction; his output was prolific, and a flurry
of lyrics, political pamphlets and polemical articles gained him a good measure
of notoriety among the theatrical, political and literary circles of the day.[9]
Cocea contributed to his early fame by publishing one of Arghezi's first influe
ntial poems, Ruga de seara ("Evening Prayer").[10]
During the period, Arghezi also became a prominent art critic, and engaged in th
e defense of ?tefan Luchian, a painter who was suffering from multiple sclerosis
and was facing charges of fraud (based on the suspicion that he could no longer
paint, and had allowed his name to be signed to other people's works).[11]
He became a regular presence at the Bucharest Kbler Caf, where a Bohemian circle o
f artists and intellectuals was being formed it included the writers Ion Minules
cu, Liviu Rebreanu, Eugen Lovinescu, Victor Eftimiu, Mihail Sorbul and Corneliu
Moldovanu, as well as the painters Iosif Iser, Alexandru Satmari, Jean Alexandru
Steriadi, the composer Alfons Castaldi, and the art collector Krikor Zambaccian
.[12] According to Zambaccian, Arghezi was more rarely seen at Bucharest's other
major literary venue, Casa Cap?a.[12] By that time, he was also an associate of
the controversial political figure and art patron Alexandru Bogdan-Pite?ti, and
, with Galaction, Cocea, Minulescu, Adrian Maniu and various visual artists, he
regularly attended a circle hosted by Bogdan-Pite?ti on ?tirbey-Voda, nearby the
Ci?migiu Gardens.[13] He authored a small poem in honor of Bogdan-Pite?ti.[13]
After the outbreak of World War I, Arghezi wrote against the political camp led
by the National Liberals and the group around Take Ionescu, both of whom aimed t
o have Romania enter the conflict on the side of the Entente (as an attempt the
conquer Transylvania from Austria-Hungary); instead, he was a supporter of Bessa
rabia's union with the Romanian Old Kingdom, and resented the implicit alliance
with Imperial Russia.[14] In 1915, he wrote: