Bacaloglu's editorial debut was in 1903, when Editura Socec published her monograph "Despre simbolizm și Maeterlinck" ("On Symbolism and Maeterlinck"). Together with the essays of Alexandru Bibescu (1893) and Izabela Sadoveanu-Evan (1908), it constitutes an early Romanian attempt to define the limits of Symbolism, Decadence and modernity. In Bacaloglu's interpretation, Symbolism and Decadentism were the two sides of a coin: while the Decadents gave voice to the late-19th-century "degeneration" of the Latin race, the Symbolists epitomized the Latin "revival", a triumph of mysteries and metaphysics. Straddling these two eras were Maeterlinck's "Hothouses", which she was the first to discuss from a Romanian perspective. According to literary historian Angelo Mitchievici, "Despre simbolizm" tackles the literary critic's perspective as a "participatory-impressionistic formula, not lacking in refinement".