Vintilă Corbul signing autographs at the office of newspaper and publishing house Adevărul
Vintilă Corbul (full name: Vintilă Dumitru Corbul Economu Popescu; b. 26 May 1916, Bucharest - d. 30 January 2008, Paris) was a Romanian novelist and scenarist, one of the best-selling authors of the Communist and contemporary period. His first novel, Babel Palace, was published in 1939. The historical novel Căderea Constantinopolelui (1976, two volumes) was his best-seller - solely the first edition was sold in almost 200,000 copies. After having written the scenario for the blockbuster movie Nea Mărin miliardar (1979), he left Romania and settled in France with Eugen Burada (the two writers have co-authored several novels). His books have continued to enjoy success after 1989. The newspaper Adevărul opened its collection of books in 2007 by editing the complete works of Vintilă Corbul in a luxurious but mass-edited hardcover collection.