Lily's Blog

On Sunday Kati from Hungary wrote,

‘Traditional Hungarian winter weather has returned from Ireland to its homeland again …’

She sent the following photographs.

Having checked the temperature in Budapest, Denis packed appropriately. We Irish are very well up on snowy weather now.

Denis emailed this photograph from Budapest last night.

Amn’t I glad spring has arrived in Ireland.

I’m definitely spring keeping!

This is the second book I have read by Hungarian author, Sándor Márai. This book, written in 1939 was first published in English in November 2008. It was translated by English/Hungarian poet George Szirtes, who writes an interesting blog. Esther’s Inheritance is really a long short story, only 148 pages in all. It’s such an engaging read that I actually started and finished it in a night. Frances O’Rourke reviewed this book very recently in the Irish Times. Eileen Battersby in an article in the same paper, listed Esther’s Inheritance as one of her top 25 (actually 26!) reads of 2009.

Esther, an unmarried woman in her forties has been living a quiet life when one day, she receives a telegram from Lajos, the great love of her life. Lajos abandoned Esther twenty years previously, and married her sister, Vilma, now deceased. The telegram tells that he is coming to visit the next day. Esther tells Nunu, with whom she lives. Nunu’s amusing reply was “Good … I will lock away the silver”. Esther has not forgotten that Lajos is a fantasist and a liar, nor has she forgotten that he caused her a lot of hurt, yet he still has a strange hold over her. The book tells of family secrets, love and betrayal.

Esther’s Inheritance is now also a film.

I was interested to read the Guardians review of this book which concluded with a broader interpretation of the story. Throughout the war, Márai opposed the Nazis and their fascist allies in Hungary’s authoritarian regime (his wife was Jewish). In his heroine’s trance-like capitulation, it is tempting to see a larger drama of mesmerised masses, swindled of their inheritance by charismatic fraudsters with false promises, sleepwalking into disaster. “Wake up, Esther!” Nunu scolds her for refusing to accept that Lajos swapped her mother’s jewelled heirloom for a fake ring. At the close, a dozing Esther, who has neglected to install electric lighting, finds an “end-of-September wind” tearing open the window and snuffing out the candle. The world is engulfed by darkness. But Esther sleeps on.

Márai committed suicide in 1989, so he never witnessed the collapse of communism. He also died before his large collections of books started to be translated and available to a much wider audience. I previously reviewed his book Embers here.

Kati who works with Denis in Hungary sent me this book for Christmas. It was a very enjoyable read – the only book I managed to get read over Christmas.

Set in the autumn of 1899, this is a portrait of provincial life in the Austro-Hungarian empire at the turn of the nineteenth century.
The book describes one week in the uneventful life of an elderly retired Hungarian couple. Their unattractive, (my word, the book uses the word ugly), spinster daughter, nicknamed Skylark has left them for an unprecedented week’s holiday with relatives. At first the couple, whose entire existence revolves around their daughter, are devastated by her absence. Slowly they rediscover a life in their small-town society doing things they normally didn’t do when their daughter was there; eating out in the local restaurant, going to the theatre. The husband, Ákos, meets up with the members of his old club, who despite their advancing years, meet weekly for a lively session of drinking, dinner and card playing. The night before Skylark returns, the elderly couple reach the shocking conclusion that their daughter is a burden to them.

The beauty of this book is in its descriptions of the minutiae of everyday life, in its character descriptions, in its pace. From this vignette of Mr and Mrs Vajkays’ life, we get a great glimpse of life in this provincial town, all those years ago.

The Times described the book The most original, economical and painful novel I have read in a long time

Kosztolányi was born in 1885 in Szabadka, a town which today belongs to Serbia. Sárszeg, the fictional town in which this book is set is based on his hometown. He studied at the University of Budapest and then for a short time in Vienna before quitting to become a journalist, a profession he stayed with for the rest of his life. In 1908, he became a reporter for a Budapest paper. In 1910, his first volume of poems brought him nationwide success and marked the beginning of a prolific period in which he published a book nearly every year. He died from cancer at the age of fifty one.

His last finished novel Anna Édes is also available in English. I’ll add that to others by Hungarian author Sándor Márai to read.

Now all I need is time, lots of time!

Denis, Tommy, Work … do ye want to go on unprecedented week’s holiday?

Thank you Kati for introducing me to two great Hungarian authors.

This post is somewhat related to a previous post I wrote here about an unusual restaurant in San Francisco.

Atilla, one of our Hungarian friends is very interested in music. He introduced me to the song ‘Freedom Cry’ on the album ‘Boheme’ by Deep Forest.

Deep Forest consists of two French musicians, Michel Sanchez and Eric Mouquet. The song ‘Freedom Cry’ was sung by Károly “Huttyán” Rostás who was a Hungarian prisoner and the song was recorded in a Hungarian jail. Deep Forest’s website states: ‘A song from a man singing in a jail, which (sic) would liked to be free again. You can hear him sobbing while singing.’

The album became Deep Forest’s most successful album, selling over 4 million copies and receiving a number of Diamond, Platinum and Gold awards in 15 countries.

However the story doesn’t have a happy ending. According to wikipedia, though Deep Forest made money from this album, Károly never received any money from the song, and neither did his family after he died in 1986.

Here is the song

The words of the song are here on Deep Forest’s website.

This was a very enjoyable and interesting read. Kati, a Hungarian friend gave me this book when I was in Budapest. It’s an English translation of the Hungarian novel, A gyertyak conkig egnek, originally published in 1942.

Márai was born in Hungary in 1900 and by the age of thirty was one of Hungary’s leading novelists. He was driven into exile in 1948 when the Communists came to power and banned his books. He lived first in Italy and then in America. Sadly he committed suicide at the age of eighty-nine.

In the novel, two old men, once the best of friends, meet for the first time in forty-one years. They dine together, sitting in the exact same places as at their last meeting, all those years ago. Later they sit in front of a dying fire, one of them nearly silent, the other, the host, slowly speaking. At their last meeting, in the company of a beautiful woman, an unspoken act of betrayal left all three lives shattered – and each of them alone. Tonight they talk of old passions and that last, fateful meeting.

I felt this book was beautifully written and found it difficult to put down. It gives a great glimpse of life in the days of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

The book was described by the Times as ‘Magnificent. A spellbinding story driven by intense passion.’ and the Observer, ‘Extraordinary. Elegaic, sombre, musical and gripping. An immensely wise book.’

There is a Sándor Márai blog, written by Erik Ketzan, a first-generation Hungarian-American. There I read that Jeremy Irons had starred in a stage adaptation of the book in 2005 and that a Hungarian film adaptation premiered in Hungary in 2006 at the 37th Hungarian Film Festival.

Márai wrote forty-six books in all. To date, five have been translated into English. They include: Memoir of Hungary, Casanova in Bolzano, The Rebels and Esther’s Inheritance. I am interested in all of them particularly Memoir of Hungary as it apparently provides an interesting glimpse of post World War Two Hungary under Soviet occupation. It was first published in the West, because it could not be published in the Hungary of the post-1956 era. One gets a sense of this period of Hungarian history when talking with Hungarian people.

A point of interest is that the Hungarian form of the author’s name is Márai (surname) Sándor (first name). The Hungarian style is always to write the surname first. I have got used to this with our Hungarian friends. I notice that the English translation of this book uses our convention however.

We have been coming to Budapest since 1996, when Tommy first attended the Peto Institute. In the intervening thirteen years, this city has changed a lot.

My abiding memory of that first visit in February 1996 was of city streets covered in snow, (dirty, it being a city) and loads of very old cars.

Hungarian people now comment on how much less snow falls in Winter. Old cars are noticeable but now because of their rarity in Budapest.

Denis comes to Budapest frequently because of a number business interests. Over the years we have visited with him.

Budapest is a city I love.

The view over the city from the top of St Stephens Cathedral, with the Buda hills in the background.

Inside the cathedral

But walk down any street and one sees the most amazing buildings. They really knew how to build grand buildings. The city is well-laid out so easy to navigate. There are three (soon to be four) underground train lines, in addition to many tram lines.

Even the architecture of one of these underground lines is a sight to behold.

The beautiful tiling and wood.

The House of Terror on Andrássy út, (út meaning street), just beside where we stay, is a museum which contains exhibits related to the fascist and communist dictatorial regimes in 20th century Hungary and is also a memorial to the victims of these regimes, including those detained, interrogated, tortured or killed in the building. This museum has pictures of victims on the exterior wall. At night lights are lit under the pictures. It’s a stark reminder of Budapest’s troubled past.

The markets. (No I’m not allowed to mention food!)

The Great Market Hall, Hungarian ‘Nagycsarnok’ is the largest indoor market in Budapest. It was designed and built by Pecz. Another beautiful building.

I visited this and one other market.

I counted about 15 types of dried beans!

Loads of saffron, one of the ingredients I had difficulty finding for my experiment.

Selling honey

Pickled cabbage

And lots of other pickled vegetables too, though personally I’m not a lover of pickles.

Crowd control needed here, me thinks!

The cost of living in Budapest is way lower than Ireland. One thing I love about getting to know Budapest, (and other cities), is that you learn where the real people go, not the touristy spots. We had some super meals in restaurants frequented by Hungarians and a lot cheaper than Ireland.

Gerbeaud, is a coffee house, which I like, though this is on the tourist trail. I included it because the building is stunning.

Other great sites of Budapest include the beautiful bridges over the Danube, lit at night.

Margit Island is an island, 2.5 km long and 500 meters wide, in the middle of the Danube in Budapest. This is a lovely public park in the middle of the city, great for walking (me) and running (Denis and Hungarian friend, Atilla).

A very enjoyable mid-term visit.

The Hungarian State Opera House is celebrating its 125th anniversary this year. It first opened to the public on the 27th September 1884.

It seems 1884 was a good year for creating cultural institutions. A little later in 1884 – on the 1st November, the GAA, (Ireland’s biggest sports organisation) was founded.

The Hungarian State Opera House is a beautiful neo-Renaissance building located in central Pest, on Andrássy út, (út is the hungarian for street). Designed by Ybl, a major figure of 19th century Hungarian architecture, it is a richly-decorated building and is considered one of the architect’s masterpieces.

In size and capacity, the Budapest Opera House is not among the world’s greatest opera houses. But in terms of beauty and the quality of acoustics, it is considered to be amongst the best in the world.

In front of the building are statues of Erkel, (composer of the Hungarian national anthem, first music director of the Opera House and founder of the Budapest Philharmonic Orchestra, in other words a busy man!), and of Liszt, (the best known Hungarian composer).

The three of us really enjoyed our night at the Opera House, last night.

We went to see Nabucco by Verdi.

Nabucco follows the plight of the Jews as they are assaulted and subsequently exiled from their homeland by the Babylonian King Nabucco. The best-known number from this opera is the ‘Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves’.

We had great seats in a box near the centre. (These were our neighbours). Just to give you an idea, three tickets for excellently positioned box seats cost €38 in total!

I’d hazard a guess that as the Irish boys plotted and planned in that upstairs room in Hayes’s Hotel, 125 years ago, they didn’t realise that they were following hot on the heels of the Hungarians. And vice versa.

1884 was the year that two very different cultural institutions were formed, two cultural institutions which have stood the test of time in their respective countries.

Here’s to another great 125 years for both.