Reporting from the Moon
by Péter Esterházy

In May of this year, Jürgen Habermas published an essay, co-signed by Jaques Derrida, urging the development of a common European foreign policy, led by the "core states" who should draw in the states on the periphery. The novelist Péter Esterházy was one of those who responded to Habermas.
"Central Europe can only be understood from Central Europe. But being Central European means that we don't understand ourselves."

Journals
From 1943-1944 and 1945-1947
by Sándor Márai

Already successfully established as a novelist and dramatist in Hungary, Márai started to keep a journal (always intended for publication) in 1943 and continued to do so until his death in California in 1989. The extracts reveal a man imbued with the values of European literature; included here are his observations and reflections in 1944 as the Red Army closed in inexorably on a Budapest where Hungarian Nazis ran rampant, on the end of the war itself and, above all, his abiding faith in literature.

Reel (Poem)
by George Szirtes

A celebration and meditation on Budapest by the Anglo-Hungarian author and poet.

As Through the Land of England Once He Passed
by Bernard Adams

The translator writes on Márton Szepsi Csombor, the author of Europica varietas, the first book-length travelogue ever written in Hungarian, concerning his journey through Europe in 1620. We also publish the chapter on England in this issue.

England 1620
by Márton Szepsi Csombor

"... I asked for an icce of beer and they, incredibly, set before me three icces simply so that I should have more to pay for, and as I was very tired and it was almost six in the evening I wished to stay there, but luck played me false, because the innkeeper's maid, a very foolish person, big of hand and squat of body, came to me as if to pity me in my tiredness and long absence from home and began to squeeze my hand and caress my head and kiss me frequently, to which ceremony I, a Hungarian, was unaccustomed; I understood clearly to what end such caresses were directed, bethought me that I would rather be alone, roused my tired limbs and set off again ..."

This chapter shows all the charm and virtues of Szepsi Csombor's Europica varietas, the first traveller's book to be written in Hungarian. The author, who had gone to pursue his theological studies in Germany, took the opportunity to travel on a thin purse through several countries in 1618. The chapter on England shows the book's delightful mélange of travel diary, personal reactions and reminiscences. Here is his brief account of the history of England, his somewhat awestruck response to London (he complains about the residents' ignorance of Latin) and his arrival in Canterbury (on the mistaken impression he was in Cambridge, the bastion of Protestantism he so wanted to visit).

How the Prince of Wales Spent His Time at the School of Life in Pest
by Gyula Krúdy

No writer has contributed more to our view of the Hungary and Budapest of the belle époque before the First World War than this great Hungarian novelist (who made his living from journalism). This is his version, now passed into Budapest legend, of the several sojourns of the Prince of Wales (later Edward VII), en garcon, in the twin capital of the Monarchy.

The Prince of Wales Incognito
by Géza Buzinkay

" The politicians, and especially the Hungarian press, who commented on Edward's visits, believed that he came back to this country because he had grown fond of the Hungarians and because they felt that their love for the English was reciprocated. Essentially as a result of Count István Széchenyi's reform programme, from the 1830s Britain's political system, its public administration structure and some areas of its civilisation became models for the Hungarian political elite. Based on the British example Széchenyi established horse racing to stimulate horse breeding; founded the National Casino patterned after English clubs; sought to advance the capital-weak Hungarian economy by creating financial sources of credit as in England; and even introduced the English style of dress. Hungary was a friend of all things English and welcomed Edward accordingly. However, the idea that he came because he could revel here to his heart's content and-as Krúdy would have it-call on particular ladies, belonged to the realm of legends and their literary treatment."

Géza Buzinkay, who has published extensively on Budapest history, thus describes the warmth of the reception given to the heir apparent on his five visits between 1873 and 1891. He details the visits and the legends that arose around them (notably through the pen of the great novelist Gyula Krúdy). The first visit set the tone, with its exhausting social round and delighted press reactions (especially the clothes worn by that epitome of fashion), the aristocratic circles he moved in, the ambiguity of the Prince's comments as printed in the press (comparing the Magyars with the Sikhs) and the Hungarian hopes (mainly on the part of high society) pinned on his rather sparse visits. The article is accompanied by contemporary photographs and caricatures.

To Comply with English Tastes
The Making of The Hungarian Quarterly 1934-1944
by Tibor Frank

The abiding issue pursued by Hungarian governments and public opinion between the two world wars was to achieve a revision of the frontiers Hungary was confined to by the Treaty of Trianon of 1920. It was largely with this in mind that caused the former pime minister Count István Bethlen ("probably the most talented statesman of interwar Hungary") to take the initiative to follow his La Nouvelle Revue de Hongrie with an equally prestigious English-language journal aimed at influencing those who were considered to be important opinion-makers in the United Kingdom.
One of the leading historians on Hungary's British and American contacts, Tibor Frank here sets the background, the financing and, above all, the role of József Balogh, its co-editor and later editor. His predilection for the British peerage, his briefs (and occasionally complete artcles) written for the nominal British authors are described. Also discussed are the reservations expressed by some on the double-bind of seeking British sympathy in tandem with support from the Axis powers. The Hungarian Quarterly eventually folded after Hungary's declaration of war on Britain and the United States (though it still managed to bring out an anthology in 1944), Bethlen died in Soviet captivity, Balogh was murdered by the Nazis.

Between Heaven and Earth
The Tapestries of Zsuzsa Péreli
by Gabriella Kernács

In 2001 Zsuzsa Péreli was the first foreign artist to be given a solo exhibition at the Musée de la Tapisserie in Aubusson, the acknowledged world capital of tapestry.
The award-winning art historian Gabriella Kernács, in this richly illustrated article, describes the work and working methods of a unique artist ("a painter and tapestry weaver in one" in the words of the Aubusson director), who unusually weaves her own designs herself.

"If Any Harm Comes of This, I'll Kill You!"
by Miklós Vajda

In 1980, the poets János Pilinszky, Sándor Weôres, Amy Károlyi, István Vas, Ágnes Nemes Nagy and Ferenc Juhász embarked on a twelve-day three city reading tour of the United Kingdom, "bastions of evil imperialism and with the consent of higher party organs".
Miklós Vajda, now editor of The Hungarian Quarterly, was the interpreter, facilitator, presenter and factotum for the group. Here he recounts the mishaps that beset the six: a mugging (or was it?), fear of a heart attack, hotel bedroom invasions by drunken waste-paper dealers and an Irish hurling team, a whip round by the staff of a Welsh restaurant, a serenade of sentimental Soviet songs in Belgravia ... Here too are pen portraits of the poets concerned.

Ted Hughes and János Pilinszky
by Lajos Koncz

"Half the world speaks English," said Pilinszky (who didn't, they corresponded in French) in this memoir of his connection with the English poet, written by one of their go-betweens, then a young medical student in Munich.

The Common Cause of Europe
Rákoczi's War of Independence, Begun Three Hundred Years Ago
by Ágnes Várkonyi

A specialist on the period, the Professor Emeritus of Eôtvôs Loránd University sets the international context of the "Rákoczi War", which took place amid the War of the Spanish Succession. The Prince claimed that Hungary should be treated as a sovereign entity under the terms of the Treaty of Westphalia, which ended the Thirty Years War, and which had implications for Europe as a whole. The Habsburgs no longer treated Hungary as a state in its own right, hence Rákoczi's call for national independence. She describes how Transylvania became linked by confederation to the kingdom, and the English sympathy for the Hungarians as part of the "common Cause of Europe". Although this attempt was ultimately defeated, Hungarian demands were met during the Age of Reform and the 1848-49 War of Independence.

The British Dimension
by R.J.W. Evans

The Regius Professor of Modern History at the University of Oxford here sketches the period of the two states' relations and interactions from roughly the Napolonic wars to the First World War.

Remembrence of Things Past
Two Hungarian Photographers in Britain
by Károly Kincses

The author, who directs the Museum of Hungarian Photography, here outlines the work of two photographers who settled to work in Britain -- one after the 1848 Revolution, the other after the 1956 Revolution.
Iván Szabó settled in Scotland in 1849 where he learnt photography and is considered a key figure in the history of that country's photography.
Mari Mahr was thirty-two when she went to London in 1972. Trained as a photo reporter in Hungary, she took a further diploma at the Central Polytechnic and immediately was exhibiting in the prestigious Photographer's Gallery, establishing her voice through haunting montages from the very beginning.

This article is accompanied by examples of the work of the two photographers.

Personal

A True Romance
by Ádám Nádasdy

Speaking in Tongues
Péter Medgyes

Two memoirs by authors who have devoted their working lives to the English language, one as linguist and translator, the other an internationally acknowledged expert on the Teaching of English as a Foreign Language. They both describe learning English when, as the chief language of the imperialists, it received little encouragement from the authorities.

Ádám Nádasdy is a poet as well as a linguist. He describes his family's linguistic background and his early stages of learning the language he feels married to.

Péter Medgyes is Hungary's award winning course book writer and TEFL expert. He describes learning English from a private teacher who considered it a form of German gone badly wrong and sketches the tribulations of teaching English thirty years ago.

Liszt as Cultural Ambassador
by Alan Walker

In the summer of 1861 Liszt decided to leave Weimar and was "elevated to the rank of Court Chamberlain. This effectively made him a roving ambassador for the court of Weimar" writes Liszt's biographer in tracing the extraordinary vitality and generosity of the composer in his later years. Dividing his life thereafter between Weimar, Budapest and Rome, he travelled some six thousand miles annually, teaching, organising music festivals, directing the Academy of Music in Budapest, fund raising.

Eötvös and Kurtág with a Difference
by Paul Griffiths

The New York Times music critic here reviews several releases from the Budapest Music Center in which the composers figure both personally and through their music.

Homing
by Miklós Györffy

András Pályi: Megérkezés (Arrival). Kalligram, Pozsony (Bratislava), 314 pp.; László Krasznahorkai: Északról hegy, Délről tó, Nyugatról utak, Keletről folyó (A Mountain from the North, a Lake from the South, Roads from the West, a River from the East). Magvető, Budapest, 143 pp.; Péter Bíró: Hazafelé (Homing). Magvető, Budapest, 385 pp.

Our fiction reviewer highlights a new novel by László Krasznahorkai; set in Japan, it explores a thousand years of continuity in a mysterious quest for a garden which is "a final consummation of the idea of a garden."

Talking about the Politically Actual
by Tamás Koltai

Zsigmond Móricz: Rokonok (Relatives), Úri muri (Gentlemen's Fun); György Spíró: Az imposztor (The Impostor); Howard Barker: Scenes from an Execution

Móricz, the outstanding novelist of the first half of the last century, had both these novels (published in 1932 and 1938) adapted for the stage, one by his daughter, the other by himself. Their relevance to the Hungary of today seems scarcely to have been diminished with the passage of time, as these two recent productions show.
Howard Barker's 1983 play (on the artist and the powers that be) in this production too has been mined, and aptly too, for its relevance towards present day politics in Hungary.

A Lean Year
by Erzsébet Bori
The Hungarian Film Week

A lean year but "film-making in Hungary is far from being dead and buried" is the message Erzsébet Bori sends on the latest showcase for the Hungarian film, taking solace from the works offered by the young, especially Benedek Fliegauf, whose Rengeteg (Forest) is now being released in France and the United States on an unprecedently large scale.