László Krasznahorkai's War and war as an apocalyptic metahistorical novel

This paper looks at a novel by László Krasznahorkai in the context of the narrative turn in history, which also stimulated a revaluation of the fictional historical narrative. War and War was one of a series of Hungarian historical novels, or mixed novel formations with a historical theme, published at the turn of the millennium, whose primary aim was not to recount a self-assured historical tale but rather to highlight, via the story, the models/schemas/shifts/blank spaces in our present-day comprehension of the past. This paper interprets the novel with reference to historic-philosophical conceptions (Löwith, Koselleck), tracks its references to the Judaeo-Christian tradition, and argues that it transforms the teleological idea of the historical process into an apocalyptic model of history.

Levels of transculturalism and bilingualism in the Hungarian literature of Slovakia

The phenomenon of transculturalism is capable of activating and generating meaning within various spaces, levels and layers of literature. The study discusses different levels of transculturalism through certain authors and texts in Slovakian Hungarian literature, along with transcultural authorial identity, the transcultural meaning-making machinery of texts, transcultural practices of the social context, and transcultural directions and gaps in reception. The purpose of the paper is to classify some of the transcultural phenomena we encounter and to unravel the relevant conceptual and interpretative levels.

Hungarian cultural and linguistic borrowings in the folk tradition of Burgenland Croats in Hungary and Slovakia

The work which forms the bulk of the present study was carried out on the basis of numerous pieces of field material collected by means of an ethnolinguistic questionnaire in villages inhabited by Burgenland Croats in Western Hungary and Southern Slovakia (where part of the Hungarian territory was annexed after World War II). The field data contain a number of latent and obvious borrowings from Hungarian folk culture. By latent borrowings we mean cultural phenomena that were initially feebly expressed in a particular tradition (and tended to be lost), but during long coexistence with a neighboring heterogeneous tradition they were eventually maintained due to the developed state of the similar phenomena in the neighboring population. We also include here cultural phenomena that are typical of both traditions and have deep roots in the universal model of the naive world view. Analyzing the popular culture and dialects of enclave villages of Burgenland Croats in Hungary and Slovakia, we show that traditional folk culture with the corresponding vocabulary nevertheless acts as an important marker of identity for the population living in a foreign language environment.

Intertextuelle Relationen in der Zeitungslandschaft des 18. Jahrhunderts: Close und Distant Reading von Ausgaben der Wiener und Preßburger Zeitung

In this article, two important newspapers of the Habsburg monarchy – the Wiener Zeitung (previously: Wien[n]erisches Diarium) and the Preßburger Zeitung – are related to each other in several aspects. After a historical overview of the context in which these periodicals were created and taking into account the research literature already available, the first step was to look for parallels in their formal design. Since both newspapers have also been digitally made accessible in full text recently, it was also possible to determine approximately how frequent direct mutual references to the other periodical occur by means of so-called distant reading procedures. Close reading methods were then used to examine and interpret the corpus-based references. This comparative approach with digital methods allows the synoptic examination of individual text passages and thus offers new insights into the complex relationship between the Wiener Zeitung and the Preßburger Zeitung in the 18th century.

Theodore Brentano – The first American minister for Hungary, 1922–1927

The history of American-Hungarian relations has enjoyed renewed interest in the past thirty years. Despite this fact, there are still many uncovered or poorly documented episodes and persons concerning this academic territory. This article wishes to shed some light on one such character and period. It was in 1922 that the United States and Hungary established official diplomatic relations for the first time. Consequently the two countries exchanged ministers; thus, a long line of American ministers began to come and reside in Hungary. The very first of them was Theodore Brentano, who served five years in Budapest, between 1922 and 1927, but who seems to have disappeared from historical memory in both countries. Since 2022 marks the centenary of establishing diplomatic relations between the two countries, this article will introduce Theodore Brentano, the first American minister for Hungary and his work there. Brentano's years coincided with momentous events in Hungary in the post-Trianon era and were a time of relatively active relations between Washington and Budapest. Using primary and secondary sources alike, this article will hopefully illustrate a sorely missed part of the history of American-Hungarian history and rekindle interest in what took place a century ago.

The case of an operetta being banned in Hungary in 1928, viewed in the mirror of contemporary press sources

In May 1928, the Andrássy Street Theatre in Budapest planned to re-stage a one-act operetta play titled The First Kiss is Mine. Its libretto was written by Jenő Heltai, and the music was composed by Albert Szirmai. The new performance started out as a resounding success. But, referring to current laws on public morality, Ministry of Interior department in charge of controlling public and cultural programmes banned the play without delay, on 18 May, and Minister of the Interior, Béla Scitovszky ordered an investigation into the matter. People referred to the event as a scandal, and the press spoke of it as an absurdity, as the theatre enterprise was endangered by the resulting loss in income. After the ban, the actors were only allowed to perform the play for a commission sent from the Ministry of Interior, and finally, on 22 May, Scitovszky permitted the program after all, with some minor changes. In my study, I reconstruct and present the events of these few days with the help of contemporary journalistic sources (reports, interviews, etc.) – Budapesti Hírlap, Esti Kurir, Magyar Hírlap, Magyarország, Pesti Hírlap, Pesti Napló, Újság, 8 Órai Újság –, the circumstances of the prohibition, the protest and opinion of the playwrights, the position of the commission, the performance for the commission, and the background of the permission for the new performance.

Perception of the reasons for living in poverty in Hungary

The question of what are considered the causes of poverty is often neglected in the literature of this area of research. This paper analyzes the attributes of poverty in Borsod-Abaúj-Zemplén County, Hungary, which is one of the most disadvantaged areas of the country. Research was carried out in 2011 and 2019 using the method of systematic data collection, making possible the comparison of the changing perceptions of poverty over time. The research objective is to discover whether, as is common in Eastern European countries, support for explanations which blame structural conditions is dominant in the public perception of poverty. This research has made it clear, that the poor are often considered by the public to be responsible for their own vulnerable situation. With regard to the area where the research took place there is a discrepancy between reality and the public perception of poverty and the functioning of the welfare system which is thought to be generous and which is considered to offer multiple types of public aid for a wide range of recipients.

Les transformations fonctionnelles de la cour et la culture du livre dans la Hongrie royale et en Transylvanie aux XVIe ET XVIIe siècles

La cour royale de Mathias Corvin (1443–1490 ; 1458–1490) et celle des rois Jagellons jouent jusqu’au XVe siècle, dans la vie intellectuelle du royaume de Hongrie, un rôle comparable à celui des cours royales en Europe occidentale. Mais l’occupation de la capitale (Buda) par les Turcs (1541) et l’absence de souverain « national » transforment profondément le rôle des familles aristocratiques pour ce qui concerne tant l’organisation de la vie culturelle que la vie de l’Église. Parallèlement, la Réforme protestante progresse au XVIe siècle en Hongrie et en Transylvanie, cette dernière devenue une principauté pratiquement indépendante. Les nouveaux acteurs autour desquels se développe dès lors la vie culturelle dans le pays sont les grands aristocrates et les cours qu’ils réunissent à leur entour : les Bánffy, Batthyány, Nádasdy, Perényi, Rákóczi, Esterházy et quelques autres. En Transylvanie, le rôle de la cour princière reste dominant, grâce à sa richesse relative par rapport aux cours seigneuriales. Si l’aristocratie de Hongrie et de Transylvanie se convertit très majoritairement à la Réforme au XVIe siècle, la politique des Habsbourg et les progrès de la Contre-Réforme entraînent un vaste mouvement de reconversion, mais en Hongrie seulement, au XVIIe siècle. À la fin du siècle, ces territoires sont pleinement réintégrés dans les territoires des Habsbourg : dès lors, la question de la modernité se déploie de plus en plus nettement, à laquelle se joint la nouvelle problématique de l’identité collective, puis nationale.

The diplomatic relationship between South Korea and Hungary from 1948 to 1982

This thesis examines the process by which the Republic of Korea (hereafter, ROK or South Korea) and Hungary established diplomatic relations. Given the complexity of the process, the subject was be divided into two papers, the first of which concerns the period 1948 to 1982 and the second that of 1982–1988, the last year being that in which the diplomatic relationship was officially declared. Moreover, it employs the two countries' confidential diplomatic documents as primary sources. This article focused on the first part of the above period.

Ideological and political horizon shifts in Transylvanian Hungarian poetry during the communist period and after the 1989 Regime Change

Although the communist regime, in literature as well as in all areas of social life, aimed at uniformity and creating an “art” serving propaganda purposes in the entire Central and Eastern European region, the Romanian Stalinist “cultural project” differed in many respects from that of other countries, e.g. Hungary's. In this era, the discourse emphasizing revolutionary transformation and radical policy change decisively builds on the image of the enemy; and the fault-lines between past and present, old and new, and the idea of the need for continuous political struggle also prevail in both poetry and prose as eternal actualities.For the Transylvanian Hungarian community, the 1989 Regime Change was supposed to mean the end of nationalist dictatorship, of the infinitely intensified ideological/political terror, of the deliberate policy of ethnic homogenization, and the solution of minority issues as well as of internal and external conflicts. Nevertheless, after a few months of cloudless enthusiasm, in 1990, Transylvanian Hungarians had to face the rearrangement of previous power structures; they confronted national and ethnic conflicts, disguised assimilation, and economic vulnerability. This paper aims to present the ideological/political characteristics which determined Transylvanian Hungarian poetry during the Communist Dictatorship and after the 1989 Regime Change.