N 
 1 
 
 «j
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES 
 
 GIFT OF 
 
 FRED 
 
 HARD 
 
 / 
 
 t v,
 
 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE
 
 Hungarian Literature 
 
 AN HISTORICAL &~- CRITICAL SURVEY 
 
 BY 
 
 EMIL^REICH 
 
 DOCTOR JURIS 
 
 Author of "History of Civilization," "Historical Atlas 
 of Modern History," " Gr.eco-Roman 
 Institutions," etc. 
 
 SANS PEUR ET 
 SANS REPROCHE 
 
 L«Jr&.N 
 
 WITH AN AUTHENTIC MAP OF HUXGARV 
 
 JARROLD & SONS, 10 & n, WARWICK LANE. E.C. 
 
 [All rights reserved] 
 1898
 
 r
 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 The present book is the first attempt in the English 
 language at a connected story of Hungarian literature. 
 The remarkable success achieved by a few Magyar 
 novelists in English-speaking countries, together with 
 the growing recognition of the international importance 
 of Hungary as a state and a nation, seem to justify 
 the assumption, that the Anglo-Saxon peoples too, are 
 not unwilling to learn more about the intellectual life 
 of the Magyars than can be found in the ordinary 
 books of reference. 
 
 The main object of the author, himself a Hungarian, 
 has been to impress the reader with a vivid picture of 
 the chief currents and the leading personalities of 
 Hungarian literature. Magyar literature is too vast a 
 topic to be fully treated within the very limited space 
 of a small essay like the present. By introducing the 
 comparative method of historical investigation and 
 analysis, by means of which Hungarian works are 
 measured, contrasted to, or compared with works of 
 English, French, German, Italian or the ancient classical 
 writers, the reader may obtain, it is hoped, a more 
 life-like idea of a literature hitherto unknown to him. 
 
 No nation outside Hungary has facilities of studying 
 Magyar literature as great as those offered to the English
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 public in the incomparable library of the British 
 Museum. Nearly every Magyar work of any importance 
 may be found there, and the catalogues of those works 
 are, in the strict sense of the word, correct. This latter 
 circumstance is chiefly owing to the labours of an 
 English scholar, whose name no Hungarian can pro- 
 nounce without a feeling of reverential gratitude^ Mr. 
 E. D. Butler, of the British Museum, the author of the 
 only authentic and comprehensive, if small, English 
 work on Hungary (his article "Hungary" in the last 
 edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica) is, to our know- 
 ledge, the only English student of Magyar language and 
 literature who has thoroughly grasped the philology and 
 spirit of that language and the distinctive qualities of 
 Magyar writers. He will, we trust, pardon our patriotism 
 for shocking his excessive modesty by this public acknow- 
 ledgment of his merit. 
 
 May this book contribute somewhat to increase the 
 interest of the great British nation in a nation much less 
 numerous but in many ways akin. 
 
 The map of Hungary accompanying this book is, 
 we venture to say, the first map published outside 
 Hungary based on the most careful comparison of 
 the original sources. The greatest pains have been 
 taken to ensure absolute accuracy of names of places 
 and of county boundaries, according to the most 
 recent data. 
 
 EMIL REICH. 
 
 1 7, Tavistock Road, W. 
 June 15///, 1898.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 .■AGE 
 
 Introduction — Advantage of the Hungarians over 
 the Americans, Belgians, Swiss, etc., in having 
 a language of their own - - - 9 — 1 6 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 Outlines of Hungarian History and Constitution 17 — 27 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 Characterization of the Hungarians — Their Par- 
 
 lature - - - 28 — 32 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 The Hungarian Language - - ^ — 37 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 Oldest Hungarian Literature - ;8 -42 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 The Sixteenth Century— Valentin Balassi 43 — 50 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 The Seventeenth Century — Magnate-poetn - 
 
 Theology — Zrinyi - - 51 — 59
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 The Seventeenth Century — Folk-poetry — Rakdczy- 
 
 inarch - - - - 60-61 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 The Seventeenth Century — Erudition - 62 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 171 1 — 1772 — Decadence— Causes - 63 — 66 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 171 1 — 1772 — Mikes — Apor - 67 — 69 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 1772 — 1825 — Revival of Literature — Causes - 70 — 78 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 " French " School — Classicists — National School 79 — 84 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 Verseghi — Karman — Csokonai — Comparison with 
 
 Pope - ... 85 — 91 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 Kazinczy — Language-Controversy - - 92 —99 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 Romanticism — A. Kisfaludy - - - 100 — 102 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 Classicists — Berzsenyi - 103 — 105 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 Kolcsey's Oratory — Town v. Country in Litera- 
 ture - - - 106— no 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 1825 — 1850 — Hungary's Lycurgus— Szechenyi — 
 
 General Revival - - in — 115
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 The Comedies of Charles Kisfaludy - - 116— ng 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 The National Epic — Vorosmarty - - 120 — 128 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 Other Epical Poets — Czuczor - - 129 — 131 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 Rise of Literary Criticism — Bajza - 132 — 135 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 Novels — Foreign Competition — Evil of the 
 
 "Standard " Author— Josika - 136 — 145 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 Eotvos — His Social and Political fendenz -now els 
 
 False View of Hungarian Selfgovernment 146 — 156 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 Baron Kemeny, the Hungarian Balzac - 157 — 168 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 Petofi, the Incarnation of Hungary's Poetic 
 
 Genius - - - 169 — 193 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 Arany, Hungary's Greatest Epic Poet - 194 — 206 
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 Dramatic Literature — Szigligeti — Madach — Csiky 
 — Great, but hitherto ignored importance 
 of the Hungarian Drama - 207 — 225 
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 Jokai, the Novelist — The Greatest Improvisatore 
 
 — Comparison with Liszt - - 226 — 239
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXI. PAGE 
 
 Other Great Novelists— Mikszath - 240 — 242 
 
 CHAPTER XXXII. 
 
 Contemporary Lyrical Poets - - 243 — 246 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII. 
 
 Hungarian Folk-poetry - - 247 — 249 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV. 
 Hungarian Writers on Politics, Constitutional 
 
 Law, History, Philology - 250 — 256
 
 WIiWAl&T PROPER
 
 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Of the nations in the south-east of Europe, the 
 Hungarians, or Magyars, are probably the most 
 renowned, and at the same time, the least known. 
 Although their extensive country has now been 
 in their possession and under their rule for over 
 one thousand years, and albeit the historic role 
 of the Hungarians, rather than that of Hungary, 
 has been and is one of no common magni- 
 tude, in that, without their secular and successful 
 fight against Osman ascendancy, Europe could 
 scarcely have maintained its civilization in the 
 countries east of Munich : yet in spite of all 
 such claims to attention on the part of western 
 nations, Hungary and the Hungarians are still 
 largely unknown in England, France and America. 
 In English-sp2aking countries no serious 
 attempts have as yet been made either to tell 
 the stirring story of Hungary's past, or to analyse
 
 io HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 the rich possibilities of her future. Except single 
 and singular features of Magyar life or natural 
 products, such as the famous " Hungarian " bands 
 of the Tsiganes or gypsies and their "weird" 
 music ; Hungarian flour and Hungarian wine ; 
 and most of all the figure of Hungary's greatest 
 political orator, Louis Kossuth ; except these 
 and a few more curiosities relating to Hungary, 
 the proud nations of the west of Europe do not, 
 as a rule, take notice of all the rest of the life 
 of a nation of eighteen million persons. 
 
 The festivities of the Hungarian millennium 
 celebrated the year before last, came to the 
 western world as a surprise. Few Englishmen 
 were prepared to realize the fact that, at a time 
 when their ancestors were still under small princes 
 of mixed blood, and, moreover, constantly exposed 
 to, and finally nearly absorbed by foreign con- 
 querors, the Hungarians had already reared a 
 solid fabric of government on the site on which 
 for now over a thousand years they have with- 
 stood the armies, the diplomacy and the alien 
 immigration of the Turks, the Germans and the 
 Slavs. Unconquered by force or disaster, and not 
 denationalized by either the Germans or Slavs 
 around them, the Hungarians have maintained 
 almost intact the language and music they brought 
 with them from the Steppes of Asia ; and when 
 in the ripeness of time a Magyar literature was
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. n 
 
 beginning to develop, it proceeded on lines neither 
 German nor Slav, but thoroughly Hungarian. 
 
 This literature is both in extent and quality, 
 one of the most remarkable of the lesser literatures 
 of Europe. The number of writers of Magyar 
 works is no less than 5,000; and their works 
 cover all the provinces of poetry and of philo- 
 sophic, historic or scientific inquiry into nature or 
 man. While accepting the standard of criticism 
 adopted by the recognized arbiters of literary 
 greatness, we have no hesitation in saying that 
 Hungarian Literature has a number, if a limited 
 one, of stars of the first magnitude, and no incon- 
 siderable number of lesser lights. This fact 
 acquires still greater importance from the con- 
 sideration that the bulk of Hungarian Literature 
 properly speaking dates back little over a hundred 
 years ; and that many, far too many Hungarians 
 have, up to recent times, left their native country 
 and, writing their works in German or French, 
 added to the literature of nations other than their 
 own. Comparatively few, exceedingly few, English- 
 men have enlisted among the writers of nations 
 outside the United Kingdom ; very many, ex- 
 ceedingly many Hungarians have, under stress ot 
 various circumstances, written in Latin, German, 
 French or English, and thereby reduced the bulk 
 and often the quality of Hungarian Literature 
 proper. The number of works in Magyar published
 
 i2 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 from 1531 to 171 1 is 1,793. During the same 
 period 2,443 non-Magyar works were published 
 in Hungary. The preceding two totals were 
 given in 1879 and 1885 respectively. Up to April, 
 1897, 404 more works had been discovered, 
 belonging mostly to the class of non-Magyar 
 books printed in Hungary down to 171 1. When, 
 however, we inquire into the number of works 
 written by Hungarians and published outside 
 Hungary, down to 171 1, we learn that no less 
 than about 5,000 works were written and published 
 by Hungarian authors, in 130 non-Hungarian 
 towns, during the period ending 171 1.* At a 
 time when all the western peoples had long ceased 
 to use Latin for all literary purposes, the idiom 
 of Cicero was still the chief vehicle of thought in 
 Hungary. Nearly all through the eighteenth, and 
 during the first quarter of the present century, 
 the number of works written by Hungarians in 
 Latin far outnumbered the works written by 
 them in Magyar. It was even so with German ; 
 and many a famous German author was really a 
 Hungarian ; such as Ladislaus Pyrker, Nicolaus 
 Lenau, Klein (J. L.), the great historian of the 
 drama, Charles Beck, the poet, Fessler, the 
 historian, etc. 
 
 In comparing Hungarian Literature with the 
 
 * The above statistics are taken from the Rigi Magyar 
 Konyvtdr.
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. i 
 
 o 
 
 literature of the Germans, French or English, we 
 cannot but recognize, for the reasons just men- 
 tioned, that the splendour and comprehensiveness 
 of the Literature of those nations cannot be found 
 in that of the Magyars. At the same time we 
 make bold to point out an advantage which 
 Hungarian Literature has over the literature of 
 many another nation, if not in the past, certainly 
 in the future. This advantage is in the Hungarian 
 language. The Magyars have a language of their 
 own. It is not a borrowed language ; not one 
 taken from another nation, in whose use it had 
 been for centuries. 
 
 The Americans, both in North and South 
 America, although they are in nearly everything 
 else the counterparts of their European parent- 
 nations, have yet preserved the idioms of the 
 latter. In politics, social constitution, individual 
 temper, and attitude of mind, the North and South 
 Americans are — a long stay in that continent has 
 convinced us of that — utterly different from either 
 the English or the Spanish. The Americans 
 proper have indeed built up, or developed into a 
 nation of their own. For good or for bad, they 
 have a distinct and novel national personality. 
 One thing excepted ; that one thing, however, 
 is a vital element in the intellectual activity of 
 a nation. We mean, of course, Language. The 
 Americans have moulded and coloured all the
 
 i4 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 old elements of their nationality into organs with 
 a tone and hue of their own. Language alone 
 they have, with slight differences, taken over and 
 preserved in the very form and woof in which 
 the English and Spanish had left it in the old 
 colonies. Hence there is between the Americans, 
 as a new nation, and their language, as an old 
 and foreign idiom, a discordance and discrepancy 
 that no genius can entirely remove. The words 
 of a language are mostly gentry of olden 
 descent. Between them there are associations 
 and tacit understandings ill-fitted for an environ- 
 ment essentially different from their original cast. 
 This discrepancy has, there can be little doubt, 
 exercised a baneful influence on the literature 
 of the American nations. It has baulked them 
 of the higher achievements, and neither in the 
 literature of North America nor in that of South 
 America can we meet with literary masterworks 
 of the first rank. Between the poets and writers 
 of those nations and the languages they are using 
 there is much of that antagonism which has 
 always been found to exist between the cleverest 
 of Neo-Latin poets and the language of Rome. 
 Latin is a dead language ; and all the intellectual 
 atmosphere and soil that nurtured and developed 
 it have long since ceased to stimulate. Accord- 
 ingly, the Politiani and Sadoleti, the Sannazari and 
 Buchanani, and all others who in modern times
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 15 
 
 have tried to revive Latin literature have entirely- 
 failed. As with individuals so it is with nations. 
 The Belgians, or the Swiss in Europe are, like the 
 Americans, in the false position of having each a 
 distinct nationality of their own with languages 
 not their own. This fundamental shortcoming 
 has rendered and will probably, in all times, render 
 them incapable of reaching the lofty summits 
 of literature. Language is intimately allied to 
 literature ; language is the mother, and thought 
 the father of literary works. Any lack of harmony 
 in the parents must needs show in the offspring. 
 Now the Hungarians have not only a language 
 of their own, but also one the possibilities of 
 which are far from being exhausted. For the 
 Hungarians therefore there is no danger of a 
 false position, of an initial vice in the growth of 
 their literature ; and moreover there are immense 
 vistas of literary exploits still in store for 
 future generations. The quarries and mines of 
 the Latin and Teutonic languages have, it may 
 be apprehended, been worked so intensely as to 
 leave scant margins for new shafts. French has 
 changed little in the last three generations, and 
 English and German little in the last two ; while 
 Italian and Spanish have long reached the 
 beautiful but stereotyped plasticity of ripeness. 
 Hungarian, on the other hand, is a young lan- 
 guage. The number of people using and
 
 1 6 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 moulding it has been considerably increased in 
 the last generation, and most of its gold-fields 
 and diamond-layers have not yet been touched 
 by the prospector's axe. There is thus an 
 immense future still open for Hungarian Litera- 
 ture, and this prospective, but certain fact ought 
 never to be lost sight of in a fair appreciation 
 of the literary efforts of the Hungarians. 
 
 Literature being a nation in words, as history 
 is a nation in deeds, it would be impossible to 
 grasp the drift, or value the achievements of 
 Hungarian Literature without some knowledge of 
 the Magyar nation in the past and in the present. 
 It may be therefore advisable to premise a few 
 remarks on Hungary and her history before 
 entering on a narrative of Hungarian Literature.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 HUNGARY, in extent larger than the United 
 Kingdom, is, geographically speaking, one large 
 basin, watered by one large river and its affluents, 
 and bounded by one imposing range of mountains. 
 The river is called the Danube, the mountains are 
 the Carpathian offshoots of the Alps. This geo- 
 graphical unity makes Hungary almost predestined 
 to be the seat of one nation. The natural unity 
 calls for, it may be presumed, the national. Yet 
 the very richness of the soil, diversified as it is 
 by the vegetable and mineral wealth of huge 
 mountains, and the cereal and animal exuber- 
 ance of vast plains has, in all times, attracted 
 numerous tribes from eastern Europe and western 
 and central Asia to the country of the " blue " 
 Danube, and the " blonde " Theiss. Some of these 
 •l nvaders succeeded for a time in establishing a 
 kind of dominion over parts of Hungary. Thus 
 the Huns in the fifth, the Gepidae in the fifth 
 and sixth, the Avars in the seventh and eighth, 
 numerous Slav tribes in the eighth and ninth
 
 \ 
 
 1 8 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 centuries were successively lords of the plains and 
 some mountainous parts of Hungary. Not one 
 of these peoples, however, could either maintain 
 themselves as rulers, or quite disappear as dwellers. 
 Already in the ninth century we find Hungary 
 inhabited by more than fifteen different nations 
 or portions of nations, offering then the same 
 gorgeous medley of Humanity that is still so 
 characteristic of the country. Where the above 
 nations failed, the Magyars signally succeeded. 
 They and they alone of all the numerous, if 
 not perhaps innumerable nations that had tried 
 to rear a lasting polity on the columns of the 
 Carpathians, and behind the moats of the Danube ; 
 the Hungarians alone, we say, succeeded in estab- 
 lishing themselves as the permanent rulers of the 
 Slav and Turanian peoples of Hungary, and as 
 the members of a state endowed with abiding 
 forces of order within and power without. From 
 996 to 1 301 A.D., they took their dukes and kings 
 from the family of the Arpads, under whom 
 they had entered (some 100,000 men, women, 
 and children) the country. Saint Stephen (the 
 first canonized king) consolidated their consti- 
 tution. Without attempting to overrate the value 
 of constitutions either grown or made, and, while 
 laying due stress on that gcometria situs, or 
 providential strategy in the location of nations 
 which has perhaps wrought the major part of
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 19 
 
 History, it is tolerably certain, that the constitu- 
 tion of Hungary, as developed under the Arpad 
 dynasty, and as still surviving in some of its 
 essential elements, has had a most beneficial 
 influence on the public life of the Magyars. 
 Like that of England, it combines the excellency 
 of the Latin system of centralization, with the 
 advantages of the Germanic custom of local 
 autonomy. 
 
 Already in the early middle ages, Hungary 
 was divided into counties endowed with self- 
 government. At the same time there was a 
 centre of government and legislation in the 
 national assembly or diet, where king and 
 subjects met to discuss the affairs affecting the 
 peace or wars of the entire state. In 1222, or 
 seven years after Magna Charta was signed at 
 Runnymede, the Hungarians forced their King 
 John, whose name was Andrew II., to sign the 
 Golden Bull, which, like the English Charter, was 
 to be the text of the country's constitution, all 
 subsequent laws being in the nature of com- 
 mentaries on that text. The elements of the 
 Hungarian and English constitution being nearly 
 alike, the domestic histories of the two nations 
 bear, up to the sixteenth century, striking resem- 
 blance to one another. We learn of wars of the 
 '! barons " against the king, such as those under 
 Henry III. and Henry IV. in England; we read 
 
 u
 
 2o HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 of the constant struggles of the "commons" (in 
 Hungary consisting of the lower nobility, that 
 is, of knights as distinguished from burgesses), 
 for broader recognition of their parliamentary 
 rights ; of rebellions, like that of Wat the Tyler, 
 of the peasants against their oppressors, the 
 landed gentry ; and of fierce dynastic struggles, 
 like the Wars of the Roses. But while these 
 historic parallels may be found in many another 
 country of mediaeval Europe with its remarkable 
 homogeneity of structure, the distinctive parallelism 
 between England and Hungary is in the tenacity 
 with which the ruling people of both countries 
 have carried over their autonomous institutions 
 from the times before the Reformation to the 
 sixteenth and the following centuries, or to the 
 period of Absolutism sweeping over Europe ever 
 since Luther had raised his voice for religious 
 liberty. 
 
 All nations of Europe had constitutions more 
 or less similar to that of England during the 
 Middle Ages ; for there was after all a very con- 
 siderable amount of Liberty extant in mediaeval 
 institutions. But at the threshold of the sixteenth 
 century, when new worlds were discovered by the 
 genius and daring of the Portuguese and the 
 Italians, the better part of the old world, that 
 is, its Liberty, was completely lost, and sovereigns 
 became absolute and peoples slaves. Three nations
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 21 
 
 alone amongst the larger states remained unaffec- 
 ted by the plague of absolutism then spreading 
 over Europe ; they alone preserving intact the 
 great principles of local autonomy, central 
 parliaments, and limited power of the Crown. 
 These were the English, the Poles and the 
 Hungarians. In these three countries alone there 
 was practically no dead past as against a 
 presumptuous present. The nation's past was 
 still living in the shape of actual realities, and 
 the growth of the constitution was, in spite of 
 all sudden ruptures and breaks, continuous and 
 organic. What the Stuarts were to England, the 
 Habsburgs were to Hungary during the seven- 
 teenth century. Hence in both countries we 
 notice continual rebellions and wars, both parlia- 
 mentary and other. The Stuarts, however, were 
 little aided by foreign powers in their attempts 
 at crushing the autonomous rights of the English 
 nation. On the contrary, one of the greatest 
 statesmen of modern times, William of Orange, 
 came, and with him several great powers of 
 Europe, to the rescue of the people of England ; 
 and thus the end of the seventeenth century was 
 also the termination of Absolutism in England. 
 In Hungary it was the grave of Liberty. The 
 Hungarian Stuarts, or the then Habsburgs, far 
 from being deserted by the other Great Powers 
 of Europe, were most efficiently abetted by
 
 22 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 them. This happened of course in a way 
 apparently quite alien to any desire to destroy 
 the liberties of Hungary. Vienna, the capital 
 of the Habsburgs, was, in 1683, besieged by 
 the hitherto fairly invincible Turks, and Austria 
 was menaced with utter ruin. The war being, 
 on the face of it, a crusade, the Christian 
 powers, and, chiefly, fat and gallant John Sobieski, 
 Kine of Poland, came to the succour of 
 Leopold of Austria. The Turk was beaten, and 
 not only out of Austria, but also out of Hun- 
 gary, where he had been holding two-thirds of 
 the counties for over one hundred and fifty years. 
 Hungary was almost entirely liberated from her 
 Mahometan oppressor, and, such is the illogicality 
 of History, for the very same reason nearly lost 
 her autonomous existence. For the evil of foreign 
 saviours now told on the Magyars. Had they 
 driven back the Turk by their own efforts, the 
 result would have been an unprecedented electri- 
 zation and stimulation of all the forces of the 
 nation. The Greeks after Salamis ; the Romans 
 after Zama ; the English after Trafalgar had 
 won not only a victory over an enemy, but an 
 immeasurably increased vitality fraught with novel 
 energies. The Hungarians after the capture of 
 Buda and the Battle of Zenta, both achieved by 
 Austria's foreign allies and foreign generals, had 
 defeated the Turks indeed ; but their own ends
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 23 
 
 too. Never was Hungary in a lower state of 
 national stagnation than shortly after the peace 
 of Carlo vitz (1699), which put a formal end to 
 Turkish rule in most of the Hungarian counties. 
 Prince Francis Rak6czy II., who started the last 
 of the Great Rebellions of the Magyars previous 
 to 1848, and after the above peace, found no 
 Holland rich in capital, no Brandenburg ready 
 to hand with well-trained regiments, no Austria 
 willing to avert side-blows from enemies, to help 
 him in the manner in which the asthmatic 
 Prince of Orange was helped against James II. 
 and his powerful abettor. And when Rak6czy 
 too had expended his forces in vain, Hungary 
 fell into a decrepitude but too natural in a nation 
 whose foreign foe had been conquered by its 
 domestic oppressor. 
 
 The political bankruptcy of the Hungarians by 
 the beginning of the eighteenth century is of such 
 importance for the study of the history of their 
 literature, that we cannot but attempt to search 
 for some of the reasons and causes of this 
 national disaster. The principal cause was, it 
 would seem, the lack of that very class of citizens 
 which had in England so potently contributed to 
 the ultimate victory of popular freedom — the 
 middle class. Hungary never recognized, nor 
 tolerated the complicated maze of semi-public 
 and semi-private institutions collectively called
 
 24 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 Feudalism. Whatever the merits or demerits 
 of that mediaeval fabric may or may not 
 have been, it is certain that the rise of the 
 bourgeois class is owing directly, and still 
 more indirectly to the action and re-action of 
 Feudalism. The parallelism between England 
 Poland, and Hungary pointed out above, must 
 now be supplemented by the statement, that 
 England alone of these three commonwealths 
 had, through the invasion and conquests of the 
 French Normans, received a large infusion of 
 feudal institutions, and that therefore England 
 alone was to create that powerful class of burgesses 
 and yeomen, which was entirely lacking in both 
 Poland and Hungary. Without such a class of 
 " mean " citizens no modern nation has been able 
 to consolidate its polity ; and Hungary in the 
 seventeenth century, being totally devoid of such 
 a class, was in the long run bound to be wrecked 
 by such a deficiency. We shall see how heavily 
 the absence of a middle class told on the growth 
 of Hungarian Literature. 
 
 During the eighteenth century and up to 1815. 
 the great and scarcely interrupted wars of the 
 Habsburgs enlisted all the powers of Hungary. 
 In 1741 the Magyars, and they alone, saved 
 Austria from what seemed to be inevitable 
 dismemberment. From that date onward to the 
 campaign of 1788 the History of Hungary is but
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 25 
 
 a chapter in that of Austria. Towards that latter 
 date the wave of Nationalism started in France 
 had reached Hungary. Like the Belgians and 
 the Czechs (Bohemians), the Hungarians too began 
 to revolt from the anti-nationalist and egalitarian 
 autocracy of Emperor Joseph II., one of the 
 characteristic geniuses of the last century, who 
 was exceedingly enlightened on everything else 
 but his own business. The old Magyar institu- 
 tions, and weightiest amongst them, the Magyar 
 language was, by the Hungarian diet, alas ! not by 
 the Hungarian people, decreed to be the public 
 language of the country. Resistance to Joseph's 
 "reforms" became so serious, as to prevail upon 
 the dying monarch to revoke them, 1790; and 
 under his successor, Leopold II., 1790-1792, who 
 was of a less aggressive temper, Hungarian 
 nationality seemed to approach its revival. This 
 was, however, not to be. 
 
 The French Revolution, although essentially a 
 nationalist movement, forwarded in Europe outside 
 France, for nearly two generations after its rise, 
 none but the cause of the monarchs. The Hun- 
 garians, who gave Austria many of her best 
 generals, and fought in nearly all the battles of 
 the Revolutionary Wars from 1792 to 1815, were 
 in the end shorn of all their hopes and expecta- 
 tions by the successful fop who directed Austria's 
 policy from 1809 to 1848. Prince Metternich had
 
 26 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 not the faintest conception of the rights or wants 
 of the Hungarians ; and having brought to fall, 
 as he thought he did, the French Revolution and 
 its personification, Napoleon Buonaparte, he could 
 not but think that a small nation, as the Hun- 
 garians, would speedily and lastingly yield to high- 
 handed police regulations, to gagging the public 
 conscience, and to unmanning the press. The year 
 1848 witnessed the final victory of the French 
 Revolution all over Europe. Hungary, foremost 
 amongst the countries where oppressed nations 
 were demolishing the bulwarks of tyranny, freed 
 herself from the yoke of Austrian ministers. 
 The Austrian armies were driven out of Hun- 
 gary ; the Habsburgs were declared to have for- 
 feited the crown of St. Stephen ; and but for the 
 help of Russia, the Austrian monarchs would 
 have been deprived of more than one half of 
 their empire. When a now nameless Hungarian 
 general surrendered to the Russians at Vilagos 
 (1849), Hungary was bodily incorporated with the 
 Austrian Empire, and Czech and Austrian officials 
 were sent down to germanize and denationalize 
 Hungary. In i860 the reaction set in. The 
 nation, offering a passive resistance of a most 
 formidable character, brought the Vienna Cabinet 
 to its senses ; and when, at Kdnigsgratz (July, 
 1866), the Prussians had routed the armies of 
 Austria, Hungary's greatest political sage, Francis
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 27 
 
 Deak, aided by the Austrian minister, Count 
 Beust, restored the ancient Magyar autonomy 
 and independence. Ever since (1867) Hungary's 
 relation to Austria has been that of confederation 
 for purposes of foreign policy, and absolute 
 independence for the work of domestic rule. 
 The Emperor of Austria is at the same time 
 the King of Hungary ; and thus the two halves 
 of the Empire are united by a personal link. 
 Law and its administration ; Parliament and 
 municipal government ; commerce and trade ; in 
 short, all that goes to form the life of a 
 separate nation is, in Hungary, of as inde- 
 pendent a character as it is in Austria. A 
 Hungarian must, like any other foreigner, be 
 formally naturalized in order that he may be con- 
 sidered an Austrian citizen, and vice versd.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE preceding short survey of the history of 
 Hungary may now be followed by a brief sketch 
 of the' character and temper of the Hungarians. 
 The Magyar proper, and all the numerous 
 individuals in Hungary who have become com- 
 pletely assimilated to and by the Magyar element, 
 bear in character much similarity to the Poles 
 on the one hand, and to the Spanish on the 
 other. They are rhapsodic and enthusiastic ; 
 excellent orators and improvisators ; and most 
 sensitive as to their personal dignity and social 
 respect. As their music so their character is 
 written in passionate rhythms, moving from broad 
 and majestic largo to quick and highly accen- 
 tuated presto. Yet Hungarians, unlike Poles and 
 Spaniards, do not let their rhapsodic impetus run 
 away with them, and they have shown on all great 
 occasions of their history, much coolness and 
 firmness of judgment. Nor do they exaggerate 
 their sense of dignity into bloated grandezza. 
 They are rather humorous than witty ; yet in
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 29 
 
 a country replete with so many idioms and 
 peoples, there may be found curious borderlands 
 of pun, wit, and humour. Passionately fond of 
 music and dancing, to both of which the Hun- 
 garians have given a peculiar artistic development 
 of their own, the Magyars have seldom mani- 
 fested remarkable talent for architecture. Painting 
 and sculpture have found many an able devotee 
 in Hungary. 
 
 But it is in music that most artists of Hungary 
 have excelled. Hungary is saturated with music. 
 No student of Magyar literature can afford to 
 neglect the study of Magyar music. The paral- 
 lelism between the growth of Hungarian music 
 and Hungarian Literature is not so complete, as 
 that between German music and German literature. 
 Yet nothing will furnish us an ampler commen- 
 tary on Magyar lyrics or epic poetry, than that 
 magnificent music which has inspired heroes on 
 the battle-field, lovers in their closets, Bach and 
 Beethoven in their studies alike. It is intense 
 music of torrential and meteoric beauties, and a 
 bewildering bass. Strange to say, Bach's preludes 
 d la fantasia come nearest in character to the 
 original Hungarian music, as played in the 
 wayside inns of the immense puszta, or Plain of 
 Hungary. In Hungary, all musical performances 
 at social gatherings are entrusted to the gypsies, 
 who undoubtedly added much outward ornament
 
 3 o HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 and characteristic ftoriture to the melodies and 
 harmonies of the Hungarian people ; yet the body 
 and soul of that music are thoroughly Hungarian. 
 Music in Hungary is the vocal and instrumental 
 folk-lore of the people ; and no lyrical poet of 
 the Magyars could help writing without having 
 in view the musical adaptation of his poem. On 
 the other hand, it cannot be denied that the 
 continual indulgence in music has had its serious 
 drawbacks. In a measure, music is the opium 
 of Hungary. It fosters but too much that 
 bent for dreamy idleness, which is the chief 
 failing in the Hungarian character. Much has 
 been done in recent times to inspirit the slumber- 
 ing energies of the nation not only in the high 
 walks of public life, but also in the lowly avenues 
 of industrial, commercial, and other less picturesque 
 activity. Still more remains to be done. 
 
 The lack of a middle class, or bourgeois proper, 
 has retarded the growth of literature no less than 
 that of political independence. Within recent 
 times there were only two classes of Hungarians in 
 Hungary, nobles and peasants. The floating and 
 unassimilated portion of the population between 
 these two classes remained either quite alien to 
 Hungarian aspirations, or it attempted to imitate 
 the nobles, of course chiefly in their less commend- 
 able qualities. The undeniable indolence of the 
 small nobleman, or country-squire ; his aversion
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 31 
 
 to town-life ; his abhorrence of trades and crafts ; 
 all these and similar shortcomings inherent in 
 a caste of nobles had a baneful influence on 
 their numerous imitators. Literature is, as a rule, 
 an urban growth. The urban element in Hungary, 
 however — was till the end of the last century 
 of very subordinate importance. The frequent 
 social gatherings of the Hungarian country gentle- 
 men and their numerous imitators were indeed 
 full of spirited talk and engaging conversation. 
 In what might be called the Parlature of a 
 nation, or the aggregate of their private discus- 
 sions, dialogues, speeches, etc., the Hungarians 
 are and always have been very rich. Many a 
 brilliant essay or novelette has been talked in 
 Hungarian drawing-rooms and dining-halls, which 
 in other countries would have made the fortune 
 of a writer. In fact, there is little exaggeration 
 in advancing the statement that the literature of 
 a nation is the complement of its parlature ; and 
 where the latter is inordinately developed, the 
 former is necessarily of a less exuberant growth. 
 This " law," if so it may be called, operated with 
 much force in a country where it is far easier 
 to find listeners than readers. It also accounts 
 for much that is characteristic of Hungarian 
 prose. Like French literature, Hungarian poetry 
 or prose applies more to the ear than to the 
 eye, and accordingly suffers very much from
 
 32 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 translation. That rich parlature in Hungary has, 
 however, another and still more serious drawback. 
 Up to 1870, in round numbers, there was in 
 many parts of Hungary, more especially in the 
 north-west and north, a custom of using, in 
 common conversation, two or three idioms, almost 
 at a time. Sentences were commenced in Latin, 
 continued in Hungarian, and wound up in 
 German, or Slovak. The constant use of 
 several idioms, as it has rendered Hungarians 
 peculiarly apt for the acquisition of foreign 
 languages, so it has made them more than 
 apt to read and assimilate foreign literatures. 
 This again made many a less enterprising mind 
 hesitate, and likewise many a feeble mind but 
 too prone to imitate, especially the German 
 writers, both in style and subject. The originality 
 of Hungarian authors was thus at times much 
 impaired. In the course of the present work 
 we shall meet with several cases. At present we 
 must hasten to speak of the most potent of the 
 factors of Hungarian Literature ; of the Hungarian 
 
 language.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 The Hungarian language is totally different in 
 vocabulary and grammar from the Teutonic, 
 Latin, Slav, or Celtic languages. Between Russian 
 and German, or between Russian and English 
 there is much affinity, both groups of languages 
 belonging to the Aryan, or Indo-German class 
 of idioms. Between Hungarian and German, or 
 Hungarian and Slav, there is no affinity whatever. 
 The Hungarians have indeed inserted some Slav 
 and German mortar into crevices left open by 
 an occasional decay of the Hungarian material ; 
 but the structure and functions of the Magyar 
 language are totally alien to either Slav or 
 German idioms. It is an agglutinative language, 
 the root of words being almost invariably formed 
 by their first syllables, unto which all affixes 
 and pronouns are soldered according to a fairly 
 regular process of word and case-formation. In 
 Aryan languages the root is, as it were, subter- 
 ranean, and frequently hard to lay bare. In 
 Hungarian the root is always transparent The
 
 34 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 vowels have a distinct musical value, and do not 
 resemble the musically indeterminable vowels or 
 diphthongs of English or German. Consonants 
 are never unduly accumulated, as in Bohemian ; 
 and strong accents on one syllable of a word 
 are unknown. Generally, the first syllable of 
 the word has a heavier stress on it. Hungarian 
 is rich both in its actual vocabulary, especially 
 for outward things and phenomena, more 
 especially still for acoustic phenomena ; and in 
 its prospective word-treasury. In few languages 
 can new words, expressing shades and phases of 
 meanings, be coined with greater ease. This 
 facility applies to abstract terms as well as to 
 material ones. It is probably not too much 
 to say, that for purposes of Metaphysics or 
 Psychology few languages offer so ample a 
 repository and laboratory for terms as does the 
 Magyar language. Although far from being as 
 adapted for rhyme as English or German, yet 
 Hungarian has many and sonorous rhymes. On 
 the other hand, it crystallizes with readiness into 
 all the metres of Greek or Latin poetry. A 
 peculiarity of Hungarian (and Finnish) are the 
 diminutives of endearment and affection. 
 
 The origin of the Hungarian language has 
 been, and still is, a matter of great discussion 
 between the students of philology. It is certain 
 that Hungarian is not an Aryan, but an Ugor
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 35 
 
 (Ugrian) language, belonging to a vast group of 
 languages spoken in parts of China, in Siberia, 
 Central Asia, Russia, and Turkey. We here 
 adjoin the genealogy of the Hungarian language 
 as given by Professor Simonyi, of Budapest, who 
 is considered one of the greatest living authorities 
 on the history and grammar of the Magyar lan- 
 guage. He says that Hungarian, together with 
 Vogul, Ostiak, Siryenian, Votiak, Lapp, Finnish, 
 Mprdvin, and Cseremiss (spoken in the north and 
 north-east of Russia) form the Ugrian language- 
 group. This group is closely akin to four other 
 groups, viz., the Samojed ; the Turkish or Tartar ; 
 the Mongolian ; and the Tungusian, or Mandchu 
 groups. These five large groups are called the 
 Altaic languages, and are all derived from an 
 original Altaic idiom. Their mutual relations are 
 shown in the following diagram taken from 
 Professor Simonyi's work : 
 
 Archaic Altaic 
 I 
 
 Northern Branch Southern Branch 
 
 I I 
 
 Archaic Samojedic Archaic Ugrian Turkish and Mongolian Tungusian 
 
 Southern Ugrian Lapp Northern Ugrian 
 
 Finnish Mordvinian Cseremissian Siryenian Hungarian Vogul Ostiak 
 Esthonian Votiak 
 
 It will be seen that Hungarian is in near 
 
 C
 
 36 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 relation to Finnish and also to Lapp, as had 
 been recognized already by the Jesuit John 
 Sajnovics (1770), and proved by the great 
 traveller, Anton Reguly. It is, however, also 
 related to Turkish ; and this explains why the 
 leading neo-philologists of Hungary (Budenz, 
 Paul Hunfalvy, and Arminius Vambery) are, 
 the two former in favour of a Finnish, the 
 latter in favour of a Turkish origin and kin- 
 ship of both the Hungarians and their language. 
 Amongst the numerous students of that vexed 
 question, no one has done more to excite the 
 admiration of his compatriots and foreigners, 
 and the applause of scholars, than Alexander 
 Csoma de Koros, who sacrificed his life in the 
 monasteries of Thibet in the noble attempt 
 at discovering, by the laborious acquisition 
 of Central-Asiatic languages, the origin of the 
 Magyars. We confess that we entertain but 
 scant sympathy for the belief in races and racial 
 persistency. Wherever the Hungarians may have 
 come from, and whether or no every one living 
 Hungarian can trace his descent to one of the 
 clans invading Hungary at the close of the 
 ninth century is, in our opinion, immaterial. As 
 a matter of fact, very few Magyar noblemen can 
 trace their family beyond the year of the battle 
 of Mohacs (1526). It is quite different with the 
 language of the Hungarians. Its origin and
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 37 
 
 character are, on the whole, pretty clear, and from 
 the knowledge of its relations to kindred idioms, 
 many a valuable conclusion may be drawn regard- 
 ing the rise and nature of Hungarian Literature 
 in the past and in the present. The greatest 
 patriot of Hungary, Count Stephen Szechenyi, 
 has tersely expressed the immense influence of 
 language on the nation in the words : " Language 
 carries the nation away with it." Our whole 
 view of Hungarian Literature would be different 
 if for instance the opinion of erudite Matthew 
 Bel (Belius) as to the Hebrew origin of the 
 ungarian language had proved to be true. It 
 would likewise essentially alter our conception of 
 Magyar literary works if the opinion of Pod- 
 horszky as to the close relation between Hun- 
 garian and Chinese would not have been found 
 untenable. But the physical origin of the Hun- 
 garians themselves is, at best, only an idle 
 inquiry into insufficient records of the past
 
 896- 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 The history of Hungarian Literature is divided 
 into four distinct periods. The first comprises the 
 time from the advent of the Magyars in Hungary 
 to the Reformation (896=1520); the second, from 
 the Reformation to the peace of Szathmar, or 
 the termination and failure of Hungary's revolt 
 from Austria ( 1 520-171 1); the third, from 1711 
 to 1772, or the period of stagnation ; and finally 
 from 1772 to our own days, or the period of the 
 full development. 
 
 896-1520. The first period is exceedingly poor 
 in written remains of literature. In fact, the first 
 and thus the oldest literary relic of the Hun- 
 garian language is a short " Funeral Sermon " 
 (Halotti Besze'd), dating from the first third of 
 the thirteenth century ; and for 200 years after 
 that date, we meet, with the exception of a 
 Hungarian glossary of the year 1400, recently 
 discovered at Schlaegl, in Upper Austria, with 
 no example of a Hungarian literary work of 
 even slight extent. From the middle of the
 
 1 520. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 39 
 
 fifteenth century we possess a fragment, called 
 after the town where it was discovered, by Dn 
 Julius Zacher in 1862, the " Konigsberg (in. 
 Prussia) Fragment" Thus, the number of extant, 
 or hitherto discovered Hungarian works of even 
 slight literary merit is, down to 1450 A.D., an 
 almost negligible quantity. Mr. Szilady in his 
 "Collection of Ancient Hungarian Poets" (R/gi 
 Magyar Koltok Tdra) has indeed communicated 
 six and fifty mediaeval Hungarian church-poems 
 and other fragments ; but of that number scarcely 
 a dozen are original poems, the rest being mere 
 translations of the then current church-poetry. 
 The philologist may no- doubt find much to 
 glean from even this scant harvest of Hungarian 
 Literature in the first period. For literature 
 proper, it is of no account whatever. Yet it 
 would be unfair to leave this period without 
 even a passing mention of its oral literature, or 
 epic and legendary stories, of which there must 
 have been no small quantity in those agitated 
 times. 
 
 The Hungarian na'i've epic is lost. A glance at 
 the habits of the Finns will, however, suffice to 
 satisfy the inquirer that the Hungarians, like 
 their cousins in Russia, must have cultivated 
 the art of recitation and oral handing down of 
 the glorious deeds of their ancestors, to no 
 small extent. We now know that the immense
 
 4 o HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 896- 
 
 epic of the Finns, the Kalevala, has been trans- 
 mitted from generation to generation by bards 
 who had treasured up in their memories the 
 endless runot recording the deeds of Lem- 
 minkainen, Vainamoinen, and Jlmarinen. The 
 Hungarians, too, had their bards, called igrigeczek, 
 or hegedosdk (violinists) ; and at the manors of 
 the nobles or the courts of the kings, old heroic 
 songs were recited about Attila, King of the 
 Huns; his brother, Bleda ; the fearful battle on 
 the Catalaunian fields (Chalons-sur-Marne, 451 
 A.D.) ; the building of the castle of Buda ; the 
 siege of Aquileia ; and the last fatal wedding of 
 the terrible Hun. These Hun epics were widely 
 known and recited in mediaeval Hungary, as 
 witnessed by the chronicles of those times. The 
 people firmly believed themselves to be the 
 successors of Attila's hordes, and this belief, 
 although absolutely discountenanced by modern 
 historians, is still lingering in the spinning-halls 
 of Hungarian villages, and in lecture halls in 
 England and America. 
 
 The circle of those oral epics comprised also 
 the Magyar heroes proper. There were stories 
 about Almos, father of Arpad, the conqueror of 
 Hungary ; others about the " Seven Magyars " 
 {Hdt Magyar) ; the conquest of Transylvania by 
 doughty Tuhutum, one of Arpad's generals ; the 
 flight of King Zalan, defeated by Arpad ; the
 
 i 52 o. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 41 
 
 exploits of valiant Botond, Lehel (the Hun- 
 garian Roland), Bolscii, and other paladins of 
 Arpad's times, etc. In the fragments from Priscus, 
 the Byzantine rhetorician and historian ; in the 
 chronicles of Ekkehard, the monk of St. Gallen ; 
 and in the " Anonymus,'' or one of the chief, but 
 hitherto, fatherless chronicles of Hungary, the 
 above and some more heroic stories and epical 
 records may be found. 
 
 In addition to the heroic epic, the Hungarians, 
 like all the rest of the Christian nations of the 
 west, had a considerable tradition of legends and 
 lives of saints. Fortunately for Hungary, it had 
 become, by the end of the tenth century of our 
 era, both the hierarchical and political interest 
 of one of the most learned and most states- 
 manlike of the popes, Sylvester II., to detach 
 Hungary completely from the Eastern, or Greek 
 Church; and to adopt it, by sending a royal 
 crown to Stephen, duke of the Hungarians, into 
 the world of Roman Catholicism. Had Hungary 
 joined the Eastern Church, it could never have 
 withstood the ambition and supremacy of the 
 German Emperors, aided by the Popes of Rome. 
 Having, however, adopted the Roman, or 
 progressive form of Christianity, Hungary was 
 endowed with occidental or richer seedlings of 
 civilization. St. Mary was made the patroness 
 of Hungary ; and all through the Middle Ages,
 
 42 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 896-1520. 
 
 she was adored and glorified in legends and 
 songs. Some of these Hungarian legends about 
 the Virgin Mary we still possess ; likewise, the life 
 of St. Margit, the daughter of King Bela IV. ; 
 the famous story of Josaphat and Barlaam, one 
 of the most popular of mediaeval Christian 
 legends, taken originally from Indian (Buddhistic) 
 sources ; the life of St. Catherine of Alexandria, 
 etc. The most characteristically Hungarian of 
 these legends is, as to its subject, the life of St. 
 Margit. As to its literary merits, it is, alas ! a 
 dry chronicle without any charm of form or 
 diction at all. Nor did the Hungarians, as far 
 as we know, succeed irr throwing one or another 
 of their crusading heroes into strong epic relief. 
 The crusaders, in spite of their marvellous deeds, 
 lent themselves far more to good chronicling 
 than to epics. Their inherent poetic vice of 
 being, or trying to be, saints rather than heroes 
 rendered them unfit for real epics.
 
 1520-1711. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 1520-1711. The Reformation made rapid 
 headway in' Hungary. From the very beginning, 
 Protestantism in Hungary had a political ele- 
 ment, in that its rise was coeval with the 
 accession of the Catholic Austrian dynasty so 
 unwelcome to many Hungarians. Theological 
 and political opposition thus gave a more than 
 ordinary impetus to the study of all the 
 questions and problems agitated during the 
 Reformation. The most prominent result of 
 that movement was a revival of the national 
 feeling ; and coupled with that, a regeneration 
 of Hungarian Literature. The vast intellectual 
 revolution of the fifteenth century, commonly 
 called the Renascence, had, of course, left its 
 traces in Hungary too. One of the most popular 
 of Magyar Kings, Matthew Corvinus (145 8- 1490), 
 invited a number of Italian scholars and artists 
 to Hungary, such as Anton Bonfini, of Ascoli 
 (1427-1503), Marzio Galeotto, of Narni, in. Umbria 
 (i427(?)-i497), Peter Ranzanus-, of Palermo;
 
 44 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1520- 
 
 Thaddeus Ugoletus, of Parma ; Bartholinus 
 Fontius ; Felix of Ragusa ; etc. 
 
 These scholars and artists, ably assisted by the 
 Hungarian John Cesinge, or Janus Pannonius 
 (1432- 1472), and chiefly by the generous and 
 refined king himself, brought some new leaven 
 into the stagnant intellectual life of Hungary. In 
 addition to the university founded by King 
 Lewis the Great, at Pecs (1367), a new university 
 was founded at Pozsony, where the Danube 
 enters Hungary ; the king's famous library (the 
 Corvina) became the delight of scholars ; and a 
 printing press was established at Buda (1473). 
 The king's victorious campaigns against the 
 Hussites (see Josika's novel, " The Bohemians 
 in Hungary "), the Turks and the Austrians, 
 gave rise to numerous poems and songs 
 composed by unknown poets ; and his age, 
 called the Age of the Hunyadis, the king 
 being a Hunyadi, bade fair to be one of great 
 intellectual brilliancy too. However Matthew's 
 premature death and the ensuing political troubles 
 put an end to such prospects. It was left for 
 the passions roused by the Reformation to kindle 
 the fire which the torch of the Renascence had 
 been unable to light. In all the countries where 
 the deep influence of the Renascence preceded 
 that of the Reformation, the intellectual capital 
 of the country was not impaired, even when its
 
 i 7 ii. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 45 
 
 political was. In Hungary, the Renascence left 
 too slender traces to guard the nation from 
 falling into lawless writing about the topics of 
 the day, regardless of the rules and classical 
 measure so deeply impressed by the Renascence 
 on the more fortunate nations of Italy, Spain, 
 France and England. Hence the immense mental 
 and emotional stir imparted by the Reformation 
 was not sufficient to raise up great writers in Hun- 
 gary. In fact, Hungary was, on a smaller scale, 
 in a mental condition exactly similar to that of 
 Germany. There too the Renascence had scarcely 
 begun to do its beneficial work, when the Refor- 
 mation swept everything before it. The conse- 
 quence was the same. Luther himself, although 
 one of the geniuses of language ; Fischart, a very 
 demon of language ; and Hutten, the great 
 champion of thought and liberty, together with 
 numerous minor lights, were, in spite of efforts 
 without number, debarred from creating a great 
 German national literature. It was only much 
 later, when the Renascence had done its work in 
 Germany too, that the Germans, following in the 
 wake of the Greeks, Romans, French, English, 
 Spanish and Italians, were able to create a great 
 national literature of their own. The same remark 
 holds good for Hungary too. 
 
 Protestantism in Hungary assumed all the as- 
 pects it had taken in Germany and Switzerland.
 
 46 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1520- 
 
 There were Lutherans proper, and Calvinists ; 
 Anabaptists and Unitarians. The Geneva of 
 Hungary was the town of the "a'ves," Debreczen, 
 east of the middle Theiss 4 in a large plain. 
 Melius, or Peter Juhasz (1 536-1572) was the 
 " pope " of the Magyar Calvinists ; as Matthew 
 Biro de Deva, 1500(F)- 1545, was that of the 
 Lutherans. Both preached in Hungarian and 
 published a number of doctrinal and contro- 
 versial writings in Hungarian ; and both were 
 followed by many a writer whose enthusiasm 
 was the better part of his ability. The Bible, 
 portions of which had been translated into Hun- 
 garian before the Reformation, was now published 
 in Magyar in its entirety. This most excellent 
 translation, executed chiefly by Caspar Karolyi, 
 was printed at Vizsoly, in the county of 
 Abauj. 
 
 The number of Hungarian poets writing in Hun- 
 garian during the sixteenth century is more than 
 one hundred ; most of them being Protestants. In 
 the first years of the Reformation, their works 
 were mostly of a religious character,, such as 
 psalms and prayers. Amongst these we may 
 mention, the religious poems of Andreas Batizi, 
 Matthew Biro, and Gal Huszar. The constant 
 wars with the Turks or infidels added a peculiar 
 intensity to the religious passions of the time ; 
 and accordingly the first Hungarian drama, " The
 
 i 7 „. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 4 7 
 
 Marriage of Priests" (A papok kdzassdga), pub- 
 lished in Cracow (then belonging to Poland) in 
 1550, and written by Michael Sztarai, was in reality 
 an exposition of Protestantism in the form of a 
 drama. " Moralities," and mordant satires against 
 priests and the Catholic Church generally, were 
 frequent. Didactic poetry, so closely allied with 
 the moralizing spirit of early Protestantism, was 
 ably represented by Gabriel Pesti, whose trans- 
 lation of yEsop's "Fables" appeared in 1536 (in 
 Vienna) ; and by Caspar Heltai, who likewise 
 translated fables from ancient authors, 1566. 
 
 From the second half of the sixteenth century 
 
 we possess a great number of rhymed stories, 
 
 taken from the Bible, from foreign novels or 
 
 from Hungarian history. One of the most famous 
 
 of the authors of such stories was Sebastian 
 
 Tinody, whose " Chronicle" or poetical narrative of 
 
 contemporary events appeared in Kolozsvar, in 
 
 Transylvania, in 1554. As a poetical work it is 
 
 scarcely of any value, with the exception of the 
 
 music accompanying it. As a faithful picture 
 
 of the Hungary of that time it will continue 
 
 to be valuable to the patriot and historian. 
 
 The language is heavy ; the form is unshapely. 
 
 In some respects superior to Tinody were 
 
 Stephen Temesvary and Matthew Nagy de 
 
 Banka ; the latter being the bard of the great 
 
 John Hunyadi. One, Albert Gergei, of whose
 
 4 8 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. im- 
 
 personal circumstances nothing is known, composed, 
 chiefly from Italian sources, the story of a young 
 prince fighting innumerable foes and surmounting 
 difficulties of all sorts in search of the fairy whom 
 he, in the end, does not fail to win. This story 
 (" Argirius Kirdlyfi") has ever since the sixteenth 
 century been the most popular chap-book amongst 
 the lower classes in Hungary. Its naivete and 
 good epic tone render it agreeable even to a more 
 cultured taste. Another poet of the second half 
 of the sixteenth century, Peter Ilosvai, composed, 
 probably from the floating folk-poetry of his age, 
 a poetical narrative of the life of Nicolas Toldy, 
 one of the most popular heroes of the Magyars, 
 who lived in the fourteenth century, under King 
 Lewis the Great, and was of Herculean strength. 
 His feats are sung in Ilosvai's poem (published 
 at Debreczen in 1574) in an effective, if rough, 
 manner. A number of Magyar novels may also 
 be found ; but nearly all were translations from 
 German or Latin novels of the time. The 
 sixteenth century produced even a few Magyar 
 works of historic and philologic character. John 
 Erdosi, or Sylvester, wrote the first grammar of 
 the Magyar language (1539) ; Gabriel Pesti gave, 
 in 1538, a short dictionary of the Magyar language; 
 John Decsi de Baranya published in 1588 a col- 
 lection of about 5,000 Magyar proverbs ; Stephen 
 Szekely de Benced and Caspar Heltai published
 
 i 7 ii. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 49 
 
 " World-Chronicles," in 1559 and 1575 respectively. 
 Very many memoirs and journals of that time are 
 still unpublished. 
 
 We must now mention the greatest of all the 
 Hungarian poets of the sixteenth century, whose 
 name we have so far left unnoticed because, by 
 one of the strange freaks of life, the manuscripts 
 of his lyrical poems, on which rests his great 
 fame among Magyar poets, were first discovered 
 only twenty-four years ago (in 1874), and some 
 of them even after that date, and were therefore 
 never largely known to the contemporaries of 
 their author. This poet is Baron Valentin Balassi 
 (1551-1594). He came from a magnate family, 
 and so great were the gifts with which nature 
 had endowed him, that men praised him as a 
 model of heroism, and women worshipped him 
 as the embodiment of chivalrous charm. In the 
 troubles of his time, both political and social, he 
 took more than one part ; and he may be con- 
 sidered as at once the Knight Errant and the 
 Parsifal of Hungary in the latter half of the 
 sixteenth century. Highly cultivated and sensi- 
 tive as he was, he could not but respond to the 
 religious impulses of his time, and so became the 
 author of many a religious poem. On his wan- 
 derings, which took him not only over the whole 
 of his own country, but even as far as North 
 Germany and probably also to England, he saw
 
 5o HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1520- 
 
 all forms and aspects of life. His lyric sentiments 
 he embodied in the so-called " Flower Songs " 
 (" Virdg-e ! nekek"), which are full of that verve 
 and sweetness so characteristic of the best lyric 
 poets of Hungary. He also introduced a new 
 form of lyric stanza — the Balassi Stanza — which 
 consists of nine short lines, the end-rhymes of 
 which are the same in the third, sixth, and ninth 
 lines, while the remaining three couples, have 
 each their own rhymes.
 
 17". 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 During the seventeenth century Hungary was 
 oppressed by two evils of apparently antagonistic 
 character ; either of which, however, was to have 
 the same fatal effect on Hungarian Literature. 
 On the one hand, nearly two-thirds of Hungary 
 proper, as apart from Transylvania, was under 
 Turkish rule ; on the other, the Habsburgs, then 
 at their apogee, waged a relentless war against 
 the liberties and independence of the Hungarians 
 both in non-Turkish Hungary and in Transyl- 
 vania. In the latter country, the Bocskays, 
 Bethlens, and Rakoczys had in succession con- 
 trived to establish a Hungarian principate which, 
 although acknowledging Turkish ascendancy, yet 
 retained many of the rights of sovereignty. 
 These two sets of circumstances were in them- 
 selves hurtful to the development of anything 
 relating to Hungarian nationality, and most of 
 all to Hungarian Literature. The counties under 
 Turkish rule could not, by the very nature of 
 the oppression under which they smarted, produce 
 
 D
 
 52 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1520- 
 
 any literary movement at all. The counties under 
 Austrian rule were held in bondage both political 
 and intellectual, which stifled all attempts at a 
 national literature. The sages have as yet not 
 been able to prove, that a republican government 
 must of necessity be beneficial to the material and 
 political welfare of a nation. As to the intellectual 
 progress of a nation, on the other hand, Liberty is 
 generally taken to be an indispensable condition. 
 Literature is possible only where there is at least 
 a republic of minds. The Austrian government 
 took good precautions to render the rise of such 
 a republic in Hungary an impossibility. All the 
 higher and middle schools in Austrian Hungary 
 were, during the seventeenth century, in the hands 
 of the Jesuits. The order of Jesus has not, as is 
 well known, prevented a very great number of 
 its members and pupils from rising to eminence 
 in Theology and in Science. It could not, owing 
 to its cosmopolitan and anti-national constitution, 
 further movements of national literature. Quite 
 apart from the debatable nature of its moral 
 and political teachings, it retarded or stopped 
 all such movements by employing in its schools 
 the Latin language as the vehicle of instruction. 
 At Nagyszombat (in 1635); at Kassa (in 1657); 
 at Buda (in 1687), the Jesuits founded, or taught 
 in, universities, where lectures on all branches of 
 knowledge were delivered in the mongrel language
 
 i 7 u. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 53 
 
 of the mediaeval Scholastics, which has always had 
 a baneful influence both on knowledge and its 
 students. In the Protestant schools, the number 
 of which exceeded seven hundred and fifty, the 
 same radically false system was observed. The 
 consequence was, that the vast majority of 
 Hungarians had never received a living knowledge 
 of either the history of Man or of Nature, and 
 could accordingly turn their dead intellectual 
 capital to no account. The only Hungarians 
 whose mental acquirements had sufficient vitality 
 to serve as stimulants to literary production of 
 a higher type were such as could read Italian or 
 French, that is, works, written in one, and thus 
 fertilizing another living language. Such excep- 
 tional individuals could then be found only 
 amongst the wealthy classes, or in other words, 
 amongst the magnates. Thus it happened that 
 all great literary work in Hungarian produced 
 during the seventeenth century was done by the 
 great noblemen, and by them alone. Hungary 
 may therefore afford a fair test for the curious 
 problem, whether from an aristocracy of birth can 
 be recruited that aristocracy of genius the work 
 of which forms a nation's great literature. In 
 Hungary, the aristocracy of birth proved, on the 
 whole, unequal to such a task. The Hungarian 
 magnates of the seventeenth century did much 
 creditable work in belles-lettres, and some also
 
 54 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1520- 
 
 in graver departments of literature. Yet, they 
 
 were unable to originate more than a temporary 
 
 and inferior reform ; and, moreover, they did, as 
 
 we shall see, serious harm to the literary life of 
 
 the nation at large, in that they were not able to 
 
 engage its interests in the growth of its literature. 
 
 Of these magnates, the eloquent Cardinal 
 
 Primate of Hungary, Peter Pazmany (1 570-1637), 
 
 Archbishop of Esztergom, claims our attention 
 
 first. In his thirteenth year he became a convert 
 
 to Catholicism, and later a Jesuit ; and so intense 
 
 was his zeal for the Church of Rome, that most 
 
 of his active life was spent in a propaganda, 
 
 by writings even more than by words, for his 
 
 church, and with a constant literary warfare with 
 
 the non-Catholics of Hungary. He is said to 
 
 have converted no less than thirty of the noblest 
 
 families of his country to the Catholic persuasion. 
 
 At his time, perhaps the greatest number of 
 
 Protestants were in Transylvania, whose princes 
 
 were warm-hearted protectors of the Reformation ; 
 
 and since they cultivated the Hungarian language 
 
 in preference to any other, Pazmany thought it 
 
 wise to use the same idiom in his controversial 
 
 writings. Pazmany's theological armoury is taken 
 
 chiefly from the controversial works of his French 
 
 colleague and contemporary, the famous Jesuit 
 
 Bellarmin. In his style, however, he shows 
 
 considerable originality. He prefers the strong,
 
 i 7 n. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 55 
 
 racy expressions, proverbs and similes of the 
 common people. His is a direct and vigorous, 
 rather than an artistic style. The strange con- 
 trast between his popular vocabulary and the 
 scholastic fence of his thoughts lends a peculiar 
 flavour to his Hodegus or " Kalauz" (161 3), and 
 his sermons {Predikdcziok" 1636). Among his 
 numerous Protestant opponents were : Peter 
 Alvinczi, of Kassa ; and George Komaromi 
 Csipkes, of Debreczen ; the latter translated the 
 whole Bible into Hungarian. As a sad contrast 
 to the splendid career of the convert Pazmany, 
 we may mention here the life-long sufferings 
 and wanderings of the loyal Protestant Albert 
 Molnar de Szencz (1574-1634), who was persecuted 
 wherever he came, in Germany, Austria, Hun- 
 gary or Transylvania ; and who, one of the 
 true epigones of the Conrad Gesners and 
 Sylburgs, published, in the midst of poverty 
 and misery, Hungarian dictionaries ; a valuable 
 Hungarian translation of the Psalms (1607, after 
 French models), which is in use to the present 
 day; a Hungarian Grammar (1610); and a 
 Hungarian translation of Calvin's Institutio. 
 Finally, the gorgeous picture of the Cardinal 
 cannot be set off to more advantage, than by 
 a slight mention of the fanatic and obscure 
 Sabbatarians (" Szombatosok "), in the background, 
 whose religious poetry is no uninteresting evidence
 
 56 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1520- 
 
 of the Hungarian theological literature of that 
 time. 
 
 Amongst the numerous protege's and pupils of 
 the victorious archbishop we find also Count 
 Michael Zrinyi (1618-1664), a descendant of the 
 famous Zrinyi, who, in 1566, defied single-handed 
 the invasion of Sultan Soliman the Splendid, by 
 offering him, with a handful of men, unconquer- 
 able resistance in the Castle of Szigeth, some 
 twenty miles west of Pecs. Count Michael was 
 one of the best educated men of his time, and 
 equally great as a patriot, poet and general. 
 The sad state of Hungary could not but affect 
 deeply a man, whose historic role seemed to be 
 clearly indicated by the glorious heroism of his 
 ancestor. Having travelled abroad, especially in 
 Italy, where Tasso's religious epic Gerusalemme 
 liberata was read then more than ever after, 
 he conceived the idea of stirring up a vast 
 crusade against the Turks, by singing the deeds 
 of his great-grandfather in an epic at once 
 political and religious. This epic is commonly 
 called the " Zrinyiad " (" Zrinyidsz "), and consists 
 of fifteen cantos, written in rugged and rough 
 style. It reveals much power of description and 
 religious enthusiasm ; but it is lacking in form 
 and moderation ; nor can the portraits of its 
 heroes be called plastic by any means. It is, 
 from the artistic standpoint, spoiled by the
 
 r 7 n. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 57 
 
 deficiency above mentioned ; the central hero is 
 too perfect to be lastingly interesting. Old 
 Zrinyi is capital matter for ballads ; for an epic 
 he is too faultless. On the other hand, the 
 "Zrinyiad" is one of the most effective of 
 patriotic epics. Like the epic works of Klop- 
 stock in Germany, or " Ossian " in England, it 
 had at the time of its appearance a great 
 national value, apart from its literary merits. 
 In telling the Hungarian nation in tones of 
 sacred anger, that the Turkish oppression was 
 due to the depravity of the Magyars, in exhort- 
 ing them in vigorous modes to rally and shake 
 off the yoke of the infidels, Zrinyi added an 
 internal lustre to his work which even now, 
 after more than two centuries, has not lost 
 much of its splendour. Like the daring and 
 glorious deed of his ancestor, his poem is more 
 of a patriotic than an historic event. It were 
 only gross exaggeration to count the " Zrinyiad " 
 amongst the world's great epics. The poet might 
 well belie history in letting his ancestor personally 
 kill the great Sultan. It would be dishonest to 
 add to the glory of the poet by ignoring the truth 
 of the literary canon. 
 
 As to the other magnates who wrote poetical 
 works in Hungarian during the seventeenth 
 century, it will be sufficient to say, that their 
 poems were meant chiefly for the gratification
 
 58 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1520- 
 
 of their authors ; and although some of them 
 were printed in book form, yet the bulk was 
 left in the well-deserved obscurity of family 
 archives. The most noteworthy of these poets 
 were: John Rimay de Rima (1564-1631), an 
 imitator of Balassi ; Peter Beniczky de Benicze 
 (i6o6(?)-i664) ; Count Stephen Kohari (1649- 
 1731); Baroness Catherine Sidonia Petroczi ; 
 Count Peter Zichy ; Count Valentin Balassi, the 
 second poet of that name ( 1 626 (?)- 1684) ; and 
 Baron Ladislas Listhy (1 630-1 660 (?)), whose epic, 
 "The Disaster of Mohacs" (" Mohdcs veszedelme"), 
 betokens a remarkable talent for versification. 
 
 So exclusive was the influence of the magnates 
 on the literature of that time, that the one 
 remarkable poet of the seventeenth century who 
 was no magnate himself, although a nobleman, 
 selected as the subject of his epic poem a 
 romantic event from the life of one of the 
 leading magnates. Count Francis Wesselenyi 
 besieged, in 1644, the Castle of Murany, defended 
 by the beautiful widow, Mary Szecsi. In the 
 end he won both the heart of the heroic beauty 
 and the castle. This famous event forms the 
 burden of one of the most popular of Hungarian 
 poetical narratives, briefly called, " The Venus of 
 Murany" (" Murany >i Venus, 1664), written by 
 Stephen Gyongyossi. Its language is musical, 
 and the narrative tone very felicitous. The poet
 
 i 7 n. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 59 
 
 has evidently made a close study of Ovid, 
 and frequently reaches the light touch and charm 
 of the Roman ; he even adds an element of 
 romance, which has endeared his work to more 
 than six generations of Hungarian readers. The 
 metre is Alexandrine.
 
 1520- 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 AMIDST the din and excitement of the endless 
 wars in Hungary, both civil and foreign, during 
 the seventeenth century, the agitated mind of the 
 common people vented itself in numerous ditties, 
 skits and lampoons, which, after the name of one 
 of the national parties, have been called Kurucz- 
 poetiy. It consists almost exclusively of largely 
 unprinted little poems, mostly political, and depicts 
 the agonies and torments of the patriots. Some of 
 them are good and true in tone, and even powerful 
 in the expression of hatred and satire. The one 
 ever-memorable folk-poem of that time, however, 
 was not written in words. The profound passions 
 aroused by the last great revolution under the 
 romantic Francis Rakoczy II., towards the end 
 of the seventeenth and the beginning of the 
 eighteenth century, were incarnated in inimit- 
 able fashion in the "Rakoczy march" the most 
 fanaticising of all war-marches. Whoever actually 
 composed it (tradition ascribes it to a Hungarian 
 gipsy-woman by the name of Panna Czinka),
 
 i7 ii. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 61 
 
 that march spells a whole period of Hungarian 
 history, just as Milton's Paradise Lost spells a 
 whole period of English life. The Magyar 
 nation was at the end of the seventeenth cen- 
 tury far too unpractised in literary architecture 
 to rear its pangs and longings into a dome of 
 words. It was, however, then as now sufficiently 
 imbued with the power of musical creation, to 
 embody its woes in the fiery rhythms of the most 
 heroic of martial songs.
 
 1520-1711- 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 DURING the period in question very little was 
 done for historic and scientific studies. John 
 Cseri de Apaca (1625- 1660), an enthusiastic 
 student and patriot, published a small Hungarian 
 "Encyclopedia" (1655), in which the elements of 
 knowledge, both philologic, natural and mathe- 
 matical are given in a simple and clear manner. 
 Francis Pariz-Papai published a much used 
 dictionary of the Hungarian and Latin languages 
 (1708). The nine books of the chronicle of John 
 Szalardi, who died 1666 (" Sir -almas Kronika"), 
 form the first attempt at historiography in the 
 Hungarian language. Some of the leading men 
 of that age left memoirs ; and grammarians were 
 also not wanting. The great philosophic wave, 
 sweeping over Europe in the seventeenth century 
 (Bacon, Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz, Pierre Bayle), 
 left scarcely any traces in Hungarian ' Literature, 
 except in Cseri's Encyclopedia, where Cartesianism 
 is not quite absent.
 
 I7H-I77 2 - 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 1711-1772. The period bounded by the years 
 1711-1772 is one of decline. During these years, 
 which comprise the reigns of Emperor Charles 
 VI., and most of that of Austria's greatest ruler, 
 Maria Theresa (1740- 1780), there was practically 
 very little Magyar literature ; and the little was 
 bad. Hungarians of that period wrote, as a rule, 
 in Latin ; and the subjects they selected were 
 those of laborious erudition ; philology ; descrip- 
 tive natural science ; annalistic history ; historic 
 theology. This decline in national literature was 
 only another phase of the decline of the Magyar 
 idiom. For, both in Transylvania, which was 
 now again, as formerly, united with Hungary, 
 and in Hungary proper, the Hungarian language 
 ceased to be used in the schools, at the county- 
 sessions, in the law-courts, and in polite society. 
 In all these centres of intellectual intercourse, 
 Latin, German or French were used instead of 
 the sonorous language of Arpad. In Catholic 
 and Protestant schools alike instruction was
 
 64 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. , 7 „. 
 
 given in bad Latin. At the county-sessions ; in 
 the national parliament ; and in the law-courts, 
 Latin alone was used ; while the higher classes 
 of society were talking either in German or in 
 French. For the latter fact, there is a simple 
 explanation at hand. When, in 171 1, Hungary 
 was at last " pacified," it had become evident to 
 the most patriotic of the leading families, that 
 further armed resistance to the Habsburgs being 
 impossible, the only chances of promotion for their 
 children were at the court of Vienna. This 
 involved the adoption of Viennese manners, and 
 Viennese mediums of conversation ; that is, of 
 French and German. No sooner was that done 
 by the aristocratic families of Hungary, than the 
 abnormal state of the then national literature 
 revealed all its latent barrenness. As has been 
 seen in the preceding chapters, all the great 
 Hungarian writers from 1600 to 171 1 were re- 
 cruited from the class of the magnates. When, 
 now, after 171 1, the magnates flocked to Vienna, 
 there to undergo a thorough process of Germani- 
 zation, or rather Austrianization, there was no 
 class of writers left in Hungary to take their 
 place. Hence the sudden dearth of great writers, 
 and the astounding decline of Hungarian Litera- 
 ture. To this must be added the fact, that 
 German literature which was naturally destined 
 to have a considerable influence on Hungarian
 
 I772 . HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 65 
 
 writers, both from geographical contiguity, and 
 on account of the general knowledge of German 
 in the then Hungary ; that German literature, we 
 say, was not beginning to reach its classical period 
 before the sixties of that century, and could 
 therefore stimulate Hungarian Literature but very 
 little. It is much more difficult to account for 
 the exclusive use of Latin in the schools and in 
 parliamentary debates. Had the use of Latin in 
 the schools been accompanied by the study of 
 Greek and Greek literature it would probably 
 have wrought very much less mischief. 
 
 Unfortunately for Hungarian Literature, the 
 study of Greek was almost entirely neglected 
 in the last century. Graeca uon leguntur. The 
 immense power of aesthetic education inherent in 
 Greek classical works could thus not benefit the 
 Hungarians. Nay, it may be said in strict truth, 
 that for Hungarians, naturally inclined as 
 are to grandiloquence and redundancy, both of 
 words and thought, the study of Latin literature, 
 untempered by that of Greek, was in many ways 
 harmful. Many Latin poets and prose-writers 
 lack that simplicity and moderation, which mark 
 off Hellenic authors from all but the very best 
 writers of all ages. The exclusive study of Latin 
 was therefore doubly harmful to the Hungarians : 
 first, in that it made them neglect their own 
 language ; and secondly, in that it supplanted
 
 66 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. i 7 „. 
 
 the study of Greek literature. The exclusive 
 use of Latin in all the schools and colleges of 
 Hungary during the last century was, however, 
 part of that general obscurantism weighing on 
 all the educational institutions of the Habsburg 
 empire. Both Charles VI. and Maria Theresa 
 left the instruction of youths in the hands of 
 monks and priests. Previous to the abolition of 
 the order of the Jesuits (1773) that order had no 
 less than thirty "gymnasia" or higher colleges 
 in Hungary. After its abolition, these colleges 
 were placed in the hands of other orders, such 
 as the Praemonstratencians, the Benedictines, Paul- 
 ists and Franciscans. As in Austria, so in 
 Hungary, the regular clergy, more still than the 
 secular, attempted to shut off their pupils from 
 the new light rising in France, England and 
 Germany, and for that purpose the habitual use 
 of scholastic Latin was one of the most efficient 
 means. At the Protestant schools, of which the 
 most famous were at Debreczen, at Sarospatak, 
 and at Pozsony, in Hungary proper; and at 
 Nagy Enyed, Kolosvar, Marosvasarhely, and at 
 Udvarhely, in Transylvania, instruction was 
 likewise given in Latin. Nor can it be seriously 
 maintained that the Protestant teachers were 
 more prone to let in the new light than were 
 the Catholic.
 
 177- 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 » 
 
 In poetry proper, it is for the present period 
 customary, but scarcely necessary, to mention the 
 Jesuit Francis Faludi (1704-1779), who has put 
 some wise saws and moral platitudes into light 
 verse; and Baron Ladislas Amade' (1703- 1764), 
 whose not un melodious lyrics were sufficient to 
 give the successful courtier a mild reputation as 
 an interesting poet. In dramatic poetry there is 
 nothing worth mentioning. The Jesuits occasion- 
 ally had their pupils play a patriotic or religious 
 drama made ad hoc, and good pro tunc. Of prose- 
 writers there is one, and one only, whose " Letters " 
 written from Turkey, where he was in exile, have 
 abiding literary value. This was Clement Mikes 
 (1690- 1 761), who was brought up by Prince 
 Rakoczy, to whom he proved constant under all 
 circumstances, and for this reason Mikes still 
 belongs to the generation of Hungarian nobles 
 who cultivated their language with the pride of 
 true patriots. The " Letters " are not only full of 
 historic interest, especially with regard to the 
 
 E
 
 68 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. i 7 n- 
 
 interior condition of the then still mighty Turkish 
 empire, but also as specimens of pure, idiomatic 
 and well-balanced Hungarian prose. 
 
 The remarkable works in History, Theology or 
 Science of that period were, as noticed, written in 
 Latin. Of learned works written in Hungarian 
 the two best were by men who had spent their 
 youth in the preceding century, and were thus less 
 afflicted with the gangrene of the decadence of 
 the period from 171 1 to 1772; Michael Cserei 
 (1668-1756), and Peter Apor (1676-1752), both of 
 very great nobility. Cserei wrote a " Transylvanian 
 History " (" Erdttyi Historia "), in which the events 
 from 1661 to 171 1 are told in a lively, naive and 
 pleasing style. Apor is the author of a remarkable 
 work on the history of the manners, customs, and 
 institutions of ancient Transylvania. It is entitled 
 " Mcttuuorphosis Transylvaniae" and its object is 
 to show, by contrast, how low the country had 
 sunk from its former glory. His satire is not 
 infrequently both scathing and well-expressed. 
 
 The bent for erudite laboriousness gave rise to 
 several works on the history of Hungarian Litera- 
 ture. The still-life of the small town of Bartfa in 
 the county of Saros must have hung heavily on the 
 hands of David Czwittinger, one of the lawyers of 
 that town, who published, in 171 r, a dry list of 
 Hungarian writers, in alphabetical order. He was 
 distanced by the indefatigable and patriotic Peter
 
 1772. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 69 
 
 Bod (17 1 2- 1769), who had, like so many Protes- 
 tants, spent several years at Dutch universities, 
 where he amassed much polyhistoric knowledge 
 and a good library. There, no doubt, he also 
 acquired the taste for literary history, and in his 
 " Hungarian Athenaeum " (" Magyar At h<?nds, 1766) 
 he collected much material bearing on the lives 
 and works of no less than six hundred Hungarian 
 authors. In Law or Philosophy there appeared, 
 during this period, no work in Hungarian claiming 
 our attention.
 
 1772- 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 1772-1825. After a period of decadence, lasting 
 for over sixty years, Hungarian Literature was again 
 brought to a state of revival and progress, which 
 has gone on almost uninterruptedly to the present 
 day. This revival is part of an immense revo- 
 lution which swept over most countries of conti- 
 nental Europe in the second half of the last 
 century. The most conspicuous and best known 
 event of this Modern Renascence is the series of 
 terrific upheavals and wars commonly called the 
 French Revolution. It is, however, quite evident 
 that the French Revolution was only the politic 
 aspect of a vast movement, which in many 
 countries outside France assumed the garb of 
 intellectual revolutions. Thus the mental achieve- 
 ments that, in their totality, are called the 
 "classical period" of German literature (1750- 
 1805) are in the domain of Thought and Senti- 
 ment, a revolution no less colossal and far- 
 reaching than were the ever-memorable proceedings 
 of the French assemblies, or the bloody epics of
 
 1825. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 71 
 
 the Revolutionary campaigns. Both were gigantic 
 onslaughts against the Ancien Regime in institu- 
 tions, manners, thought and sentiment. Accord- 
 ingly, the course of both revolutions was — making 
 due allowance for externals — essentially the same. 
 As the French Revolution landed in, or rather 
 was brought to its final consummation in the 
 titanic and all-embracing personality of Napoleon, 
 so German literature met its final trysting-place 
 and culmination in the orchestral mind of Goethe. 
 The minor nations of Europe were seized by the 
 same Revolution, if in a manner considerably less 
 intense. The very aggressiveness of the French 
 Revolution, its encroachments on the territories 
 of Italy, Switzerland, Germany and Austria, pre- 
 vented those minor nations from enacting their 
 Revolution at once in its intellectual and political 
 aspects. While fighting the French, they were all 
 engaged in following them on the lines of the 
 Revolution, first (1790- 1830) for intellectual free- 
 dom ; and then, after the defeat of the French 
 armies (1830-1848), for the very political ideals 
 that the French had been the first to proclaim. 
 For, this was the immense advantage of the 
 French over the other nations on the continent : 
 they had brought their intellectual revolution 
 through men like Turgot, d'Alembert, Diderot, 
 Voltaire, Rousseau, etc., to maturity, before they 
 started for their crusade of politic liberty ; whereas
 
 72 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1772- 
 
 the other nations were a generation or two behind- 
 hand, and still in the throes of their intellectual 
 renascence. 
 
 This is not the place for a laborious inquiry into 
 the causes of that immense Revolution which has, 
 towards the end of the last, and in the first five 
 decades of the present century, completely altered 
 the face of European civilization. It is nevertheless 
 necessary to give some account of such causes 
 as were instrumental in ripening the intellectual 
 aspect of that Revolution in Hungary. Among 
 the leading causes was a structural change in the 
 population of Hungary on the one hand, and the 
 reaction against the provocative and anti-national 
 measures of the Habsburgs on the other. 
 
 Up to the sixties of the last century, the 
 population of Hungary consisted practically of 
 (1) a rural population, comprising both magnates, 
 noblemen and peasants ; and (2) a small urban 
 population, comprising largely foreign or German- 
 ized craftsmen and tradespeople. Under such 
 circumstances, literature, which is pre-eminently 
 an urban growth, could not develop. For, not 
 only was the urban population too small and too 
 much immersed in material pursuits, but the only 
 intellectual class, viz., the aristocracy, was living in 
 the country, that is, in an atmosphere unfavourable 
 to continuous literary efforts. By the end of the 
 sixties, however, the structural change, above
 
 1S25. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 73 
 
 indicated, took place. Owing to a series of 
 measures issued by Maria Theresa and Joseph II., 
 the rural population of Hungary was liberated 
 from its most odious fetters. Bondage, and a sort 
 of serfdom {jobbdgysdg), with all its concomitant 
 evils were almost abolished. Numerous rural 
 families left their obscure abodes, repaired to the 
 towns, and urban life, for the first time in Hun- 
 garian history, was raised above the low level on 
 which it had been vegetating for centuries. With 
 the increase of urban population came an increase 
 of wealth and comfort ; a greater activity in com- 
 merce, both mercantile and social. Many a gifted 
 Hungarian, who would have previously spent his 
 days in the obscurity of his county, now willingly 
 lived in one of the rising towns. With an acceler- 
 ated speed of work came a more rapid appre- 
 ciation of talent, and a greater number of authors. 
 The influx of the rural population to the town 
 facilitated that mutual action and reaction between 
 Nature and Man, which, in one form or other, is 
 the main spring of literature. In England, too, 
 the great period of Shakespeare was preceded by a 
 similar structural change in the population. The 
 dissolution of the monasteries and the numerous 
 enclosures of commons, depriving as they did, 
 hundreds of thousands of rural people of their 
 means of livelihood, drove them into the towns, 
 which rapidly ozonified that atmosphere of great
 
 74 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1772- 
 
 intellectual stir, without which no great writers 
 are possible. In Germany, too, the period of 
 Lessing, Schiller, and Goethe was preceded by a 
 new influx of the rural population into the towns 
 devastated by the thirty years' war. Nor can it 
 be doubted that Italy, in possession of highly- 
 organized and rich towns long before any other 
 mediaeval nation, took, for this very reason, the 
 lead in all literary matters. 
 
 This broad fact of Hungarian history (totally 
 neglected by the historians of Hungary, probably 
 because of its very broadness), must therefore be 
 considered as the prime mover in the revival of 
 Hungarian Literature. It created that mysterious 
 propelling power which in times of progress every- 
 body feels and nobody can account for. It was 
 the latent and constant stimulus to renewed mental 
 labour, and to keener delight in it. Like great 
 rivers it was swelled by smaller affluents of causes. 
 Thus that great structural change in nearly all 
 parts of Hungary was accompanied by two 
 structural changes in limited layers of Hungarian 
 society. Maria Theresa, probably with a view of 
 carrying Austrianization into the very hearts of the 
 Hungarian nobles had, in 1760, established the 
 famous Hungarian Guard in Vienna. Each county 
 in Hungary was to send up a few young noblemen 
 to Vienna, where they were clad in sumptuous 
 style, and treated with all the seductive arts of a
 
 1825. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 75 
 
 refined court. Thus a considerable number of 
 Hungarian noblemen were given an opportunity 
 for that higher education and refinement, which in 
 former times had been the privilege of the select 
 few. Vienna was in many ways a centre of 
 Franco-German civilization, and the young Magyar 
 noblemen derived, from a lengthy stay in the 
 Austrian capital, a benefit similar to that for which 
 English gentlemen flocked to Paris in the thirteenth 
 and seventeenth century. This then, constituted 
 one of the minor changes in the intellectual develop- 
 ment of one class of Hungarians. There was also 
 another change. Joseph II., in dissolving over 
 a third of the existing monasteries, and a great 
 number of monastic orders too, set free a number 
 of educated men, who would have otherwise led a 
 sterile life in the lonely cells of their monasteries. 
 They now began to devote their unexpected 
 leisure to pursuits of a different kind ; and some 
 amongst them became workers in the field of 
 literature. Thus a new source of literary pro- 
 duction was opened up. 
 
 To these structural changes in the population of 
 Hungary, that is, to the home and internal cause 
 of a potential revival, now came the external 
 agency of those anti-national measures against 
 Hungarian institutions, which Maria Theresa, with 
 fine womanly tact, had used in a tentative manner, 
 but which were applied by Joseph II. in the most
 
 76 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1772- 
 
 reckless and irritating fashion. Joseph had one 
 ideal : the homogeneous Austrian state. Like all 
 ideals it was unrealisable. It was worse than that : 
 it was suicidal. The Austrian empire has its very 
 raison d'etre in the heterogeneity of its constituent 
 parts. To level down the Austrian " lands " to one 
 and the same pattern, is to deprive them of all 
 vitality. They live by contrast to one another. 
 Unable to be quite independent each by itself, 
 they would, if unconnected by some common tie, 
 only serve to aggrandize either Prussia, Russia or 
 Italy, and so upset the balance of Europe in a 
 fatal manner. United by the dynastic tie, they 
 form an imposing, if incongruous whole, the com- 
 ponent parts still retaining very much of a strong 
 individuality. Any attempt at forcing them into 
 blank uniformity must needs be answered by a still 
 stronger attempt on their part to rend the dynastic 
 tie asunder. The various provinces have, since 
 1648, and with respect to Hungary, since 171 1, 
 made no civil war on one another. Not one of 
 them had, as had Prussia in Germany since 
 Frederick II.'s time, or England since Cromwell's 
 time, the supremacy over the rest. Their sole 
 union and bond was in their common dynasty. 
 To try to reduce them to one and the same level, 
 as Joseph II. did, was both the worst dynastic 
 and national policy imaginable. The Austrian 
 provinces, then or now, if reduced to complete
 
 i82 5 . HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 77 
 
 uniformity, will first of all abolish the dynasty — 
 as superfluous. In the egalitarian ordinances of 
 Joseph II. there was so much that was subversive 
 of the very pillars and coping-stones of the whole 
 Austrian edifice, that the Hungarians, as well as 
 all the other nationalities under his rule (Belgians, 
 Czechs, Poles, etc.), forthwith rose in a body in 
 defence of their privileges, charters, rights ; in fact, 
 of their existence severally and collectively. The 
 Emperor wanted to abolish the Hungarian lan- 
 guage, Hungarian institutions, Hungarian society. 
 At once the Hungarians, who had then almost 
 entirely neglected their language, learned to regard 
 it as the chief palladium of their nationality. 
 Hungarian periodicals were started ; such as 
 the "Magyar Mussa" (since 1787); "Magyar 
 Muzeum" (since 1788, in Kassa) ; " Mindcnes 
 Gyiijtemeny" (since 1789) ; " Orpheus" (since 1790, 
 edited by Kazinczy) ; " Urania" (since 1794, edited 
 by Karman), etc. Hungarian actors were encour- 
 aged ; Hungarian literary societies were started, 
 the oldest being that founded by John Kis, at 
 Sopron, in 1790 These efforts were immeasurably 
 increased in efficiency by the publication of very 
 numerous Magyar works in nearly all genres of 
 literature, and in styles and "schools" of great 
 divergency. The members of the Guard natur- 
 ally proceeded on French lines, taking the great 
 French writers, and chiefly Voltaire, as their model.
 
 78 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. i 772 - 
 
 The foremost members of the new urban element, 
 which also included many an unfrocked monk, 
 coming as they did from the country where the 
 Magyar language and folk-poetry had never died 
 out, and where the national pulse beat strongest, 
 proceeded on national lines. The older country- 
 gentry, and numerous released monks, conversant 
 above all with Latin literature, proclaimed the 
 classical metres and forms as the only safeguard 
 and aim of literature ; while another section of the 
 new urban element followed in the wake of the 
 Germans, whose classical writers were just then at 
 the height of their fame. This great divergence of 
 schools was in itself proof of the definite revival of 
 Hungarian Literature. In the spiritual republic, no 
 less than in the political, parties are of the very 
 essence of vigorous life. By the end of the last 
 century there could have no longer been any doubt 
 about the strong vitality of Hungarian Literature.
 
 1825. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 THE first of these "schools" to publish serious 
 works with the intention of reforming the literature 
 of Hungary, were the members of the Hungarian 
 Guard at Vienna, and chiefly George Bessenyei 
 (1747-181 r).* In 1772 he published a tragedy, 
 entitled " Agis " (" Agis tragMidja") in which he 
 attempted to give, within the strict rules of the 
 Franco-Aristotelean tri-unity of time, place and 
 action, a model for his contemporaries. In point 
 of language, Agis is not without some merits ; 
 as a dramatic work it has long been regarded as a 
 failure. Bessenyei was more successful in his 
 comedies (" Philosophus," etc.), in which he even 
 contrived to create a type, Pontyi, representing the 
 narrow-minded, ultra-conservative country-squire 
 of his time. His style is held to be much better 
 still in his prose works containing philosophical 
 
 * We may mention, that Bessenyei was, to a certain 
 extent, preceded by two amiable and cultivated writers; 
 Baron Lawrence Orczy (1718-1789), and Count Gedeon 
 Raday (1713-1792).
 
 8o HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1772- 
 
 essays after the rationalistic fashion of his epoch. 
 Amongst the numerous colleagues and literary 
 followers of Bessenyei were : Abraham Barcsai 
 (1742- 1 806), Alexander Baroczi (1735-1809), who 
 excelled chiefly in translations from the French ; 
 Ladislas Baranyi, Joseph Nalaczi, Bessenyei's own 
 brother, Alexander, who tried his hand at Milton's 
 "Paradise Lost" etc. To the Bessenyei circle 
 {? Bessenyei Gy'drgy tdrsasdga") belonged also 
 Paul Anyos (1756- 1784), in whose mournful and 
 sentimental poems there are many traces of 
 genuine poetry. Nor must Joseph P6czeli be 
 forgotten (1750- 1792), who through his numerous 
 translations from French and English works 
 (Edward Young's " Night Thoughts ") and his 
 " Fables" (" Mese'k") deserved highly of Hungarian 
 Literature. 
 
 The next in time and merit was the school of 
 the Classicists, or more properly speaking, Latinists. 
 The first four remarkable members of that school 
 were all unfrocked priests. Baroti David Szabo 
 (1739-1819), and Joseph Rajnis (Reinisch) were 
 ex-Jesuits; Nicolas Revai (1750-1807) was a 
 Piarist, and Benedictus Vinig (i752(?)-i83o) an 
 ex-Paulist. The circumstances of their mental 
 development above indicated led them naturally 
 to an imitation of the Latin poets ; and Virag in 
 Hungary, like Ramler in Germany, or Cowley 
 in England, was held to be one of the numerous
 
 1S25. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. Si 
 
 " Horaces," in whom the nascent literatures of 
 Europe were happily so rich. In ripe mellowness 
 of formal beauty and musical ring Virag cannot, 
 we are afraid, be said to have seriously challenged 
 the laurels of the friend of Augustus. His Works 
 {Postal Munkdk, 1799) are, on the other hand, 
 inspired by a noble glow of patriotism, which 
 might have added some lustre to the poems 
 even of Flaccus. Virag translated Horace into 
 Hungarian, as Baroti had done with the Aeneid. 
 The poetical works of the other two ex-priests 
 were of an inferior kind. 
 
 To the above two schools now was added the 
 third ; the national or genuinely Magyar school. 
 The two former laid special stress on purity and 
 perfection of form, both external and internal. In 
 fact, the classicists came near sacrificing everything 
 else to correctness of form. In this they were 
 partly justified, partly supported by the peculiar 
 adaptability of the Hungarian language to the 
 most complicated of classic metres. Hexameters 
 or alcaics are just as natural to Hungarian, as 
 they are to Greek and Latin ; and infinitely more 
 so than to any other Indo-German language of 
 Europe. The classicists, and especially the 
 greatest of them, Berzsenyi — see below — were able 
 to handle the most national and intimate subjects 
 in the most foreign of verse-forms, and with perfect 
 ease too. This seemed to go far in convincing
 
 82 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1772- 
 
 many writers, that classical forms were the only 
 ones to adopt, and classical models the only ones 
 to follow. The prosodic wealth of the Hungarian 
 language is, however, not exhausted by its classic 
 metres by far. From time immemorial Hungarian 
 poetry was wedded to Hungarian music, and the 
 latter, with its pointed rhythms and sudden irrup- 
 tions of cadences, was quite unfitted for the stately 
 calm of antique metres. In German classical 
 music, classical metres, such as the hexameter or 
 the alcaic may be, and have been employed. In 
 Hungarian music they are out of place altogether. 
 Here, then, was the inner justification of the 
 "Magyar" school. Its members strongly and 
 rightly felt, that in the cult of antique prosody 
 the classicists had overstepped the bounds ; that 
 Hungarian poetry needed forms and moulds other 
 than those of Virgil or Horace ; and that the 
 short cross-rhymed stanza was to Hungarian 
 Literature, what the violin and the " czimbalom " 
 (dulcimer) were to Hungarian music. It is impos- 
 sible to play Hungarian music on the organ. 
 
 Of the Magyar school was Adam Horvath 
 (1760- 1 820), who in addition to an epic called 
 " Hunnias" (1787), in which he tried to sing 
 the exploits of John Hunyadi after the battle 
 of Varna (1444), published a number of simple 
 poems in the style of the folk-poetry of the 
 Hungarian peasants. By refining the prosody of
 
 ,825. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 83 
 
 that genre he introduced it into the literary world. 
 The most successful of the Magyarists was Count 
 Joseph Gvadanyi (1725-1801), whose " A Village 
 Notary's Travel to Buda" (" Egy falusi nStdrius 
 budai utazdsa" 1790), was a felicitous attempt to 
 expose, in the form of a novel in verse, the utter 
 decadence and denationalization of the town-people 
 and the gentry of the middle of the last century. 
 The " notary " has survived as a type. Gvadanyi's 
 other novels are on the same lines, all of them 
 being animated by a resolute patriotism. He was 
 followed by Andreas Dugonics (1740-18 18), an 
 ex-Piarist, whose " Etelka" a novel (1788) became 
 very popular, chiefly owing to its strongly accentu- 
 ated patriotism and anti-Austrian feeling, and also 
 to the racy, popular language he used. He also 
 compiled a valuable collection of Hungarian 
 proverbs and apophthegms (" Magyar peldabeszedek 
 t ( s jeles monddsok"). The number of writers 
 belonging to the Magyar school in the two last 
 decades of the eighteenth century is considerable. 
 They all excel in patriotic verve, and much of the 
 anonymous work done at that time for the restora- 
 tion of Hungarian Literature is due to them. We 
 cannot here give more than a list of a few names. 
 John Konyi, Stephan Gati, Francis Nagy, the first 
 Hungarian translator of the Iliad, and Joachim 
 Szeker, who did much for the bettering of female 
 education in Hungary. Separate mention must 
 
 F
 
 84 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1772- 
 
 be made of a number of Magyarist poet-naturalists 
 whose centre was the city of Debreczen, and 
 amongst whom were John Foldi (1755-1801), who 
 wrote some remarkable works on Hungarian 
 prosody in its relation to music ; and Michael 
 Fazekas, whose " Ludas Matyi" a chap-book 
 written in the interests of the peasants, has long 
 been one of the most popular comic stories. Nor 
 were the usual excrescences of the juvenile epoch 
 of a new language wanting. A limited class of 
 now obscure writers (Gregory Edes, John Varjas, 
 etc.), abused the great flexibility of the Hungarian 
 language in verse-forms and metres of the most 
 absurd kind. They were the caricaturists of the 
 rapidly growing Magyar idiom.
 
 1825. 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 The formation of different schools of literature 
 was of great benefit to the growth and advance 
 of Hungarian poetry and prose. Many a minor 
 talent could and did, by clinging to and being 
 supported by a " school," steady his work. After 
 the lapse of some time, however, the exclusiveness 
 of " schools " would have done great harm to the 
 higher development of Hungarian Literature. By 
 1795 more than schools and literary guilds was 
 needed. The nation wanted powerful individuali- 
 ties who were, so to speak, schools themselves. 
 Fortunately for the cause of the Hungarian 
 intellect, such men did arise in time. The first 
 of them was Francis Verseghy (1757-1822). 
 An ex-Piarist, and involved in the conspiracy 
 of Martinovics : he had gone through the 
 experiences of a priest, a politician and a 
 state-prisoner. His poetical works, which are 
 very numerous, manifest a tender, yet strong 
 mind, much ease of form, and a power of
 
 86 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. i 772 - 
 
 satire. He translated the Marseillaise into Hun- 
 garian. He is at his best in short poems. 
 What raises him above most of his predecessors 
 is his considerable independence as a poet. He 
 clings slavishly to no school, and succeeds in 
 combining some of the excellencies of all. In 
 genius he was far excelled by tempestuous John 
 Bacsanyi (i 763-1 845), who espoused the cause 
 of the French Revolution, did some work for 
 Napoleon, and was in 18 14 taken back to 
 Austria, where he died an exile. He brought 
 Ossian's poems to Hungary ; and in his fierce 
 poems all the fire of the revolutionary fever 
 may be felt. Yet with all that he could reduce 
 to fine proportions and to efficiency neither his 
 life nor his work. In the melancholy and sweet 
 poems of the ex-priest, Gabriel Dayka (1768- 1796), 
 the Hungarian Holty, which have to the present 
 day lost nothing of their Wordsworth like delicacy, 
 we have the first instalment of those mournful 
 largos, in which Hungarian Literature is as rich 
 as is Hungarian music. 
 
 These three writers were as the forerunners 
 of literary individualities of a much higher 
 type. The first of them was Joseph Karman 
 (1769- 1 795). He too spent some time in Vienna, 
 where then centred the political and social life 
 of a large portion of Europe. Like so many 
 more Hungarians, he burst into enthusiasm for his
 
 1825. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 87 
 
 country by staying and living amongst a foreign 
 people who, in the nobler traits of character, 
 were decidedly inferior to the Magyars, and 
 who yet were considered to be their rulers. The 
 people of Austria, and especially the Viennese, 
 are utterly different from the Hungarians. Their 
 love of the burlesque, of the grotesquely funny, 
 of the clownish, stood out then, as it still largely 
 does, in sharp contrast to the dignified gravity 
 of the Magyars. To be considered as subject 
 to people so very much less adapted for the 
 functions of government than themselves, was 
 at all times galling to the Hungarians ; and 
 perhaps never more so, than in the nineties of 
 the last century, when a mighty wave of 
 opposition to the Habsburgs was sweeping over 
 Hungary. Karman's was a most sensitive soul. 
 He fully realized that to render Hungarian 
 Literature more perfect and independent was 
 first of all a great political deed. He keenly 
 felt, that Hungary, unless emancipated intellec- 
 tually, must fall a victim to the then immense 
 ascendancy of Austria. Every good poem, every 
 good novel, written by a Hungarian in the 
 language of his country, was then of more 
 service to Hungary than all the proceedings at 
 the national assemblies. Karman, despite his 
 extreme youth, at once set to work. He 
 proclaimed that Pesth ought to be the literary
 
 88 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. i 772 . 
 
 centre of Hungary. He started a quarterly 
 (" Urania "), and hastened to write his " Memoirs 
 of Fanny" (" Fanni hagyomdnyai"). The latter 
 is a novel in the form of letters and leaves 
 from a diary. Fanny, the heroine, loves with 
 all the inconsiderate passion of a young girl, 
 a young man, whom she is not allowed to 
 marry. She dies of a broken heart in the 
 arms of her lover. The plot of the novel is 
 of the simplest. The excessive sentimentality 
 of the heroine, who is, as it were, drowned in 
 the floods of her own feelings, is to our present 
 taste somewhat overdone. With all these short- 
 comings, however, Karman has poured over his 
 little story so much of the golden light of fine, 
 unaffected style, and has enriched it with so 
 many touches of the most effective descriptions 
 of scenery, that " Fanny " will always rank 
 among the foremost of the literary products of 
 the kind, of which Goethe's " Werther" is the 
 most famous. 
 
 The second great poet was Michael Vitez 
 Csokonai (1773-1805). Born at Debreczen, a town 
 whose famous fairs brought together annually 
 an immense concourse of the agricultural and 
 trading people of Hungary, Csokonai was at an 
 early age imbued with the riches of the gallery 
 of types for which his country has always been 
 so remarkable. Although at all periods of his
 
 1825, HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 89 
 
 irregular and vagrant life Csokonai kept in close 
 touch with books, Burger amongst the Germans, 
 Pope amongst the English, and Metastasio 
 amongst the Italians, being his favourites ; yet 
 the real source of his surprising fertility of 
 invention, and surety of draughtsmanship was 
 laid in his constant contact with the people 
 itself. His proud and independent character, 
 the rueeedness of which was not rendered less 
 objectionable by an independent fortune, drove 
 him from post to post. As a roving poet he 
 visited most of the counties, making friends 
 everywhere, protectors and helpers nowhere ; and 
 when he finally returned to his old mother's 
 house, his health was irretrievably shattered by 
 poverty, privations and occasional excesses. He 
 is a great poet. His language is full of savour 
 and truly Magyar. He has abundant and merci- 
 ful humour, without lacking wit. Frequently 
 he soars to philosophical heights of thought, 
 where, like the eagle, he broods alone. In his 
 lyrical poetry there is much of the rhapsodic 
 frenzy, which was to make Hungary's greatest 
 poet, Petofi, as unique in poetry, as Liszt is in 
 music. Csokonai's most famous poem is a comic 
 epic, somewhat in the style of the Rape of the 
 Lock, called " Dorottya" or the Triumph of the 
 Ladies at the Carnival (A ddmdk diadalma a 
 farsangou"), in four parts. It narrates the
 
 9 o HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1772- 
 
 vvarfare of the ladies of a small town, under the 
 leadership of an old maid (Dorottya), with the 
 men of the same place. The women complain 
 of the shortness of the carnival, of the rarity of 
 weddings, etc., and attempt to steal the registers 
 of births compromising to many of them. In the 
 end, the women fall out amongst themselves, 
 Venus steps in, rejuvenating Dorottya, and 
 making peace by marrying the contending 
 parties to each other. The tone of that comic 
 epic is throughout one of genuine mirth, and 
 the language forms a fit drapery of the fleeting 
 scenes of this charming carnival. The types 
 stand out with great plasticity, and in this 
 respect at least, Csokonai's Dorottya need fear 
 no comparison with Pope's masterpiece. The 
 critics of his time did not recognize Csokonai's 
 greatness ; and his townsmen, nearly all of them 
 rieid Calvinists, did not think much of a poet 
 in whose stanzas wine flowed abundantly, and 
 love was rampant in forms at times unrestrained. 
 When, therefore, some years after the poet's 
 death, admirers of his wanted to have his statue 
 erected at Debreczen, and the words, " I too 
 lived in Arcadia" engraved upon it, the good 
 burghers of Debreczen violently opposed the 
 suggestion. For, as if trying to give the 
 departed poet exquisite material for another 
 comic epic, they alleged, that by "Arcadia," was
 
 1825. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 91 
 
 meant, as they had learned, a country with 
 good pasture, especially for donkeys ; and since 
 they solemnly protested against being considered 
 donkeys, etc., etc. From this incident followed 
 the so-called Arcadian lawsuit (" arkddiai por").
 
 1772- 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 In the literature of all civilized nations we meet 
 with certain writers, whose great effect on their 
 contemporaries was owing less to the absolute 
 excellency of single works of theirs, than to the 
 general tone and power of suggestion inherent in 
 all their individuality. Such are, in England, Dr. 
 Johnson and Thomas Carlyle ; in France, Diderot 
 and Renan ; in Germany, Haraann and Herder. 
 Without being creative geniuses, they influence 
 their time as if they were such. One does so by 
 the brilliancy of his talk, like Johnson ; the other 
 by pamphlets or essays de omni re scibili, like 
 Herder ; a third by boldly attempting to rear a 
 new intellectual world in the place of the fabric of 
 old literature and knowledge, like Diderot. The 
 merit of such men is immense, yet relative. They 
 deserve more highly of literary men, than of litera- 
 ture. They spread interest in or taste for good 
 literature. They are critical, not constructive ; and 
 so decidedly preparatory and temporary is their 
 work, that in the whole range of the world's
 
 1825. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 53 
 
 literature there has so far been one man, and one 
 alone, whose genius shone equally in this prepar- 
 atory or critical work, and in the still more precious 
 work of positive creativeness too. That man was 
 Lessing. In him the critical faculty did not 
 seriously impair the creative ; and he rendered 
 immense services to German literature both by 
 what he destroyed, by what he suggested and by 
 what he created. 
 
 Hungarian Literature was fortunate enough to 
 find one of those initiators and suggestive stimu- 
 lators during the period of its great revival, in the 
 person of Francis Kazinczy (i759-i 8 30- His 
 work has frequently been compared to that of 
 Lessing. No greater injustice could be done to 
 Kazinczy. To compare him to the author of 
 "Laokoon" "Emilia Galotti" and " Anti-Goetze" 
 is to render him much smaller than he really was. 
 Without being a Lessing by far, he had a very 
 considerable and beneficial influence on Hungarian 
 writers, many of them greater than he. He was 
 the son of a well-to-do gentleman of the county of 
 Bihar, which has a population of both Magyars 
 and Roumanians, and does not therefore belong to 
 the counties where the purely Magyar spirit is 
 permeating all the phases of life. To this circum- 
 stance, no less than to his education, must be 
 ascribed Kazinczy's little sympathy with the 
 strongly Magyar and nationalist aspirations of the
 
 94 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1772- 
 
 Debreczen school. His youth he spent chiefly in 
 North Hungary, where the study of German 
 literature was then rife in the better circles of 
 society. Having acquired a competent knowledge 
 of German, French and English, he poured forth, 
 since 1791, numerous, most carefully composed 
 translations from Shakespeare (Hamlcf), Goethe, 
 Moliere, Klopstock, Herder, Lessing, etc. From 
 1794 to 1 80 1 he was kept in various state prisons, 
 for having been, as was alleged, implicated in the 
 conspiracy of Martinovics. This terrible experi- 
 ence left no particular traces either on his mind 
 or on his character. Subsequently, as previously, 
 nay during his imprisonment, he was busy with 
 the elaboration of essays, critical, historical, or 
 novelistic, all of which had two distinct aims : first — 
 to reform the Hungarian literary language, by the 
 introduction of new words and especially new 
 idioms ; secondly, to reform Hungarian Literature 
 by modelling it after the standard of Greek master- 
 pieces. Both lines of reform were in the right 
 direction. The Hungarian language was in 
 Kazinczy's youth still far from developed. Its 
 vocabulary was limited mostly to the desig- 
 nation of things material, and quite fallow for the 
 production of terms expressing things abstract or 
 aesthetic. It resembled a country in which there 
 is abundant currency in the shape of small coin ; 
 it lacked gold coins and bank-notes of great value.
 
 1825. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 95 
 
 Yet like Hungary itself, its language was replete 
 with gold-mines. In the rich and racy vocabulary 
 of the common people there was both overt 
 material and abundant hints for material hidden 
 under the surface. Kazinczy, instead of taking 
 these hints — instead of coining his new terms and 
 idioms from the language of the common people, 
 as he ought to have done, preferred to coin them 
 according to standards taken from the western 
 languages of Europe. In this he was grievously 
 mistaken. There are unfortunately very few, if 
 any, true dialects of the Hungarian language. 
 This, the greatest drawback to Magyar writers, 
 as the reverse of this deficiency is the greatest 
 advantage to the writers of Germany, France, 
 Italy or England, was rendered very much more 
 harmful by Kazinczy, in that he totally neglected 
 the few dialectic features together with the 
 common household language of the people. In 
 his efforts to enrich the language he thus could 
 not but obtain results of an inferior type. His 
 syntactic moves have not been followed on the 
 whole ; and of his new words few have gained 
 general recognition. 
 
 He was much more successful in the second of 
 his life-long efforts ; in the introduction of the 
 aesthetic ideals of the Greeks into Hungary. We 
 have seen above, that the neglect of the study of 
 Greek literature in Hungary had, in the preceding
 
 96 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1772- 
 
 periods stunted the growth of Hungarian Literature. 
 Literature, like sculpture, is born of Greek parents ; 
 and none but nations trained in the Hellenic 
 world of ideas, can make a literature proper. In 
 Germany, Lessing, Wieland, Herder and Goethe 
 were so profoundly imbued with Hellenic modes 
 of thought and moulds of expression, that many 
 of their best works have, as has been felicitously 
 remarked, enriched ancient Greek literature. So 
 deep were in Germany, through the works of 
 these men, the furrows of Greek thought, that even 
 writers like Schiller, who did not know Greek, 
 were full of the Greek spirit of beauty and moder- 
 ation, and amongst its most ardent propagators. 
 It was from these German Hellenes that Kazinczy 
 learned the great and invaluable lesson of Greek 
 idealism, that spiritual atmosphere in which the 
 human intellect feels as different from its ordinary 
 sensations, as does the human body in a river. 
 Kazinczy was the first of the Hungarian writers 
 whose soul had undergone the process of Platoni- 
 zation, to use this clumsy but expressive word 
 for a process, the chief stages of which are 
 an increased familiarity with mental tempers, the 
 greatest exponent of which was Plato. In 
 Kazinczy's wide correspondence with nearly all 
 the literary men of his age ; in his greater and 
 smaller works ; in his personal interviews with the 
 leading men of his time ; he invariably, and with
 
 1825. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 
 
 97 
 
 noble persistency, endeavoured to instil Hellenic 
 ideals of form, of beauty, of serenity. He had 
 clearly seen how much German literature had 
 been benefited by the adoption of those ideals ; he 
 sincerely and fervently wanted to confer the same 
 boon on the literature of his own country. This 
 endeavour constitutes his greatness, as its success 
 does his historic importance. His own poems 
 are mediocre; yet he has the merit of being the 
 author of the first sonnets in Hungarian ; his forte 
 lies in his prose works, and there chiefly in his 
 translations from the classical writers of Rome, 
 Germany, France and England. It was also his 
 indefatigable activity which gave rise to a whole- 
 some literary controversy about the nature and 
 limits of a radical reform of the Hungarian 
 language as a vehicle of literature. This con- 
 troversy merits special mention. 
 
 Omitting the names of some learned precursors, 
 whose works have not much advanced the philo- 
 logical study of the Hungarian language, it may 
 be stated, that the first to subject that idiom 
 to a careful and systematic study based on 
 researches into its historical development, was 
 Nicolas Revai. In his Elaboratior Grammatica 
 Hungarica (1806, 2 vols.), he summed up his 
 previous essays, and placed Hungarian philology 
 on a tolerably sure basis, after the manner sub- 
 sequently adopted by Jacob Grimm for Germanic
 
 98 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. i 772 . 
 
 philology. Although he still hankered after the 
 purely imaginary affinity between Magyar and the 
 Semitic languages, he yet succeeded in clearing 
 up many a vital point in Hungarian historic 
 grammar. With regard to the then wanted reform 
 of the language, he taught that that reform ought 
 to proceed on the lines of the laws of language as 
 discovered by a close study of the ancient remains 
 of Hungarian Literature. He was vehemently 
 opposed by Verseghy (see page 85), who taught 
 that the reform ought to be guided, not by the 
 bygone forms of Hungarian, but by those actually 
 in force. It is now pretty clear, that while the 
 science of language is sure to be enriched by 
 methods of study such as that of Revai, the art 
 of language is more likely to gain by the advice 
 of Verseghy. Kazinczy, who possessed neither 
 Revai's philologic erudition, nor Verseghy's powers 
 of philologic analysis, but who adopted principles 
 of reform from both, Kazinczy became the centre 
 of the passionate warfare that now arose for the 
 golden fleece of " Pure Magyar." The Conserva- 
 tive party, whose headquarters were at Debreczen, 
 Somogy, Szeged, and Veszprem, were called 
 orthologues ; the adherents of Kazinczy, neologues. 
 Satyric writings were published by both ; by the 
 orthologues: " Busongo Amor" 1806, and the still 
 more famous " Mondolat" 18 13 ; by the neologues : 
 " Felelet" 18 16, written by Kolcsey and Szemere;
 
 1825. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 99 
 
 and chiefly, the prize-essay of Count Joseph 
 
 Teleki, in 18 17. In the end most of the work 
 
 of the neologues has been accepted by the 
 nation.
 
 177- 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 The great campaigns fought by Austria against 
 the French Revolution and Napoleon were in 
 reality the prelude of the subsequent warfare of 
 the Conservative and reactionary classes against 
 the rising Liberalism of modern times. In litera- 
 ture, that mighty duel of night and light was 
 reiterated by the struggle between the romantic 
 and the national schools of poetry. The romantic 
 writers, whether Byron in England, Chateaubriand 
 in France, or Eichendorff in Germany, were all 
 perfect in form, and morbid in subject. They were 
 to poetry what Prince Metternich was to politics, 
 a genius of twilight. So natural was this con- 
 nection between the French Revolution on the 
 one hand, and national, or sound literature on 
 the other, that they who personally fought in the 
 wars against the Convention and the Directory 
 (1792- 1 799), as later on against Napoleon (1799- 
 181 5), invariably inclined to the romantic or the 
 reactionary school. This will explain the rise of 
 romantic works in Hungary at a time when their
 
 1825. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. ior 
 
 classical and national school had scarcely begun to 
 appear. The first great romantic Hungarian poet is 
 Alexander Kisfaludy (1772- 1844). He had fought 
 in the Austrian army in Italy and Germany 
 against the revolutionary armies of France, and 
 so naturally considered the gentry of his country 
 as the true representatives of his nation. In 1801 
 he published the first part of a series of lyrical 
 poems called " Himfy Szerelmei" through which 
 runs the uniting link of luckless love for one and 
 the same maiden. Kisfaludy lived for some time 
 in the country of Petrarch, and the influence of the 
 great singer of hopeless love is clearly visible in 
 the Magyar poet's work. It is written in stanzas 
 of twelve lines, and is full of that shapeless but 
 sweet sentimentality which so characterizes the 
 romantic writers. It is like a landscape in which 
 the most attractive part is the fleeting clouds : 
 mountains, rivers, houses, and persons being all 
 blurred and vague. It is atmospheric poetry, full 
 of sweet words and sounds, as if coming from 
 distant music. In 1807 Kisfaludy published 
 another part of his Himfy, this time singing 
 the joys of requited love, as the first did its 
 sorrows. The work was received with great 
 enthusiasm, more especially, of course, by the un- 
 married population of the country ; and Kisfaludy 
 was encouraged to write novels, dramas and 
 ballads in great number. All these works are
 
 io2 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1772- 
 
 meant to form an apotheosis of mediaeval times 
 in Hungary ; just as the German and French 
 romantic writers revelled in the charms of 
 chateaux and knights and crusades. Some of 
 his ballads are really good, such as Csobdncz. 
 Mis dramas are worthless.
 
 1825. 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 The romanticism started by Kisfaludy did not, 
 however, retard the other literary movements in 
 Hungary. The Hungarian language is in many 
 ways too closely akin to the classic languages, 
 if not in body, at least in prosody, to have easily 
 forsaken the classic forms which had long been 
 used by writers of this period, for the sake of 
 romanticism. The Hungarian language is in that 
 respect like Hungarian music. Although appar- 
 ently nothing can be more remote from the 
 strict moderation and stately respectability of 
 classical music than Hungarian music, yet the 
 strictest of the forms of classical music, viz., the 
 fugue, has a curious internal resemblance to 
 Magyar airs, in that the latter easily yield 
 magnificent fugue themes, and preludes to fugues. 
 Likewise the Hungarian language lends itself 
 with surprising felicitousness to the expression of 
 the highest form of classic metrical poetry : the 
 ode. 
 
 Daniel Berzsenyi (1776- 1826) was the poet who
 
 io 4 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1772- 
 
 fully realized the riches of the classical veins in 
 the mines of the Hungarian language, and who 
 gave his country a number of perfect odes written 
 in the metre and in the spirit of the best of 
 antique odes. His patriotic odes, most famous 
 of which is the one beginning " Perishing is now 
 the once strong Magyar " {Romldsnak irtdult hajdan 
 eras Magyar" in alcaic metre); his religious 
 odes, most perfect of which is " God-seeking " 
 (" Fohdszkodds " in alcaic metre) ; show the 
 chief quality of classical poetry : perfect form 
 wedded to hale and true subjects. He moves 
 on the Alpine roads and in the ravines of the 
 antique arduous metres with natural ease ; for the 
 real subjects of his poetry are akin and similar 
 to Alpine sunsets and sunrises, majestic glaciers, 
 and despondent abysses. He is sublime and 
 natural ; and amongst modern writers of odes in 
 antique metres only the German Platen, when 
 at his best, can compare with him. His poems 
 were listened to with rapturous attention by the 
 old warriors and politicians of the National 
 Assembly, and read with equal enthusiasm and 
 admiration by the youth of Hungary. From the 
 height whereon he places himself with his lyre, 
 there is no difference of size or age in his 
 listeners. Nor has time abated one tittle of the 
 glory of his best poems. Some of the best 
 critics of his epoch (amongst them Kolcsey)
 
 1825. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 105 
 
 did not appreciate him adequately. At present 
 we cannot sufficiently wonder at their blindness. 
 We must console ourselves with the thought that 
 poets, like the sun, are, as a rule, not noticed 
 for some time after their appearance on the 
 horizon. In the time of Berzsenyi there died at 
 Vienna (in 1820) a young Hungarian, probably 
 by his own hand, in utter distress ; his name 
 was Ladislas Toth de Ungvarnemet. His mind, 
 living in the regions of the Greek ideals (he 
 even wrote Greek poetry), could not endure the 
 sordid materialism of his surroundings. He left, 
 in Hungarian, a tragedy after the Hellenic model, 
 " Narcisz." Hungary has, by the premature death 
 of Toth, probably lost her chance of having her 
 Shelley.
 
 1772- 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 The enlightened foreigner from France, England 
 or Germany, reading about the allegedly great 
 literary works written by Hungarians, Poles, 
 Czechs or other nationalities who have so far 
 not succeeded in playing first fiddle in the 
 European concert, will probably indulge in a 
 polite doubt as to the exceeding excellence of 
 those works, not one of which has ever been 
 spoken of in the columns of the leading papers 
 or periodicals of London, Paris, Berlin, Rome 
 or Vienna. In the preceding pages we have 
 ventured to mention Pope and Shelley, and a 
 few great German poets in the same breath 
 with great Magyar writers. This may appear 
 preposterous to Englishmen or Germans. Far 
 from reviling them for that, we would rather 
 hasten to add, that in a certain sense they are 
 quite right. Pope's genius is in one most 
 essential point decidedly superior to that of 
 Csokonai (see page 88). Pope's best poems are 
 not exclusively English in taste, subject-matter
 
 1825. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 107 
 
 or form. They belong to that class of European 
 literature, the best products of which may be 
 relished with equal delight by Spaniards and 
 Danes alike. They are European in character ; 
 and so much is this the case with the fore- 
 most of those writers, that Shakespeare, for 
 instance, is far better known, by the youth at 
 least of Germany, Austria and Hungary, than 
 by that of England. In the great German 
 writers there is little of that specifically German 
 tone, which people other than Germans cannot 
 very well enjoy. In Lessing there is no trace 
 of the sentimentality and liquoriciousness of his 
 native province ; in Schiller there is not a trace 
 of Suabian cunning or lumbersomeness ; and 
 Goethe might just as well have been born at 
 Syracuse under Gelon, or at Athens under 
 Pericles. Is there any trace of Puritanism, this 
 the most specifically English feature of his 
 time, in Shakespeare? The major part of the 
 better writers of Hungary or Poland, on the 
 other hand, have suffered their intense patriotism 
 to make such inroads on the literary character 
 of their works, that the latter frequently lose 
 all their point to readers outside Hungary and 
 Poland. 
 
 These reflections are suggested by a considera- 
 tion of the works of Francis Kolcsey (1790- 1838), 
 a really great orator and a good poet. Born in
 
 108 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1772- 
 
 the county of Bihar, where he spent the best 
 part of his short life, he employed his magnificent 
 powers of oratory chiefly in inculcating in the 
 Hungarians of his time the lesson of patriotism. 
 There can be no doubt that his speeches, his 
 lofty " Paraenesis," and some of his critical work 
 are written in that gorgeously laborious style 
 which has made the fame of Bossuet in France 
 and Gibbon in England. His poems breathe a 
 mild melancholy that gives them a sombre tint 
 of peculiar beauty. Yet, on the whole, he never 
 oversteps the narrow limits of Magyar life as 
 then existent ; and what appeals to men of all 
 countries and all nations found but a feeble 
 rhetorical echo in his writings. No young Hun- 
 garian can read his works without deep emotion. 
 In maturer years, however, he finds that Kolcsey's 
 works belong to those that one gladly remembers 
 to have read once, without desiring to read them 
 again. 
 
 The growth of Hungarian Literature from 1772 
 to 1825 was, compared to that of England from 
 1570 to 1620; of Germany from 1760 to 1805; 
 or of France from 1630 to 1675, a slow one. 
 Many of the Hungarian writers of that period 
 were endowed with gifts of no common calibre ; 
 and some of them, such as Kazinczy, Kisfaludy, 
 Csokonai, Berzsenyi, Kolcsey, can certainly not 
 be denied the distinction of genius. Yet with
 
 1825. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 109 
 
 all their efforts, individual or collective, they 
 did not quicken the step of literary progress 
 very considerably. This was owing to the fact, 
 that Hungary had as yet no literary centres, 
 such as England possessed in London ; France 
 in Paris ; and Germany in Berlin, Leipsic 
 or Weimar. Nearly all the poets and other 
 writers so far mentioned lived in small towns 
 scattered over the country, and, from the lack 
 of good communications, were practically isolated 
 from one another. Kazinczy lived in the county 
 of Zemplen ; Kolcsey in the county of Bihar ; 
 . Kisfaludy, Berzsenyi, Adam Horvath in the 
 cis-Danubian counties. There were, it is true, 
 some literary centres in Pesth ; such as the house 
 of the able folk-poet Vitkovics. But they were 
 few, and Pesth was, as yet, not a great capital. 
 Literature needs local concentration of hig-h- 
 strung people. Country life gives the aptitude 
 for poetic work ; intense urban life alone ripens 
 that aptitude into creative talent. Virgil at 
 Mantua, or Cicero at Arpinum would have 
 remained sterile provincials. The great mental 
 agitation set in motion by the writers in 
 Magyar above mentioned was given additional 
 fuel by a very large number of Hungarians 
 writing in Latin and French. The ideas of the 
 French and German Rationalism (" Aufklaerung") 
 of that time were eagerly seized upon, elaborated
 
 no HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1772-1825. 
 
 and discussed in over five hundred works and 
 pamphlets treating of Religion, Politics, Law 
 and Philosophy. Hungary was thus during that 
 period (1772-1825), instinct with great intellec- 
 tual powers ; and all that was wanting was to 
 focus them. As long as the political or the life 
 of Hungary was crippled by the autocracy of 
 Metternich, that is, down to 1825- 1830, that 
 national focus could not be forthcoming. With 
 the revival of the political life in and through 
 the national Diet assembled at Pesth in 1825, 
 the only remaining condition of a quicker and 
 more energetic pulsation of Hungary's literary 
 life was fulfilled. Henceforth Hungary employed 
 the right strategy for the able men of her literary 
 army, and the result was a short but brilliant 
 period of literary productions, many of which 
 attain to the higher and some to the highest 
 degrees of artistic perfection. And inasmuch as 
 the creation of the national focus was the most 
 potent cause of the unprecedented revival of 
 Hungary's literature, we must first treat of that 
 glorious man who was chiefly instrumental in its 
 realization : Count Stephen Szechenyi.
 
 1S25-IS50. 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 1825-1850. Count Stephen Szechenyi, "the 
 greatest Magyar" as Kossuth called him, was one 
 of those rare patriots whose enthusiasm is tempered 
 by the most careful respect for facts and practical 
 probabilities, while their love of detail and material 
 work is broadened and elevated by the noble 
 passion of disinterested patriotism. The maxim 
 of his life was, " Hungary has not yet been ; she 
 will be" (" Magyar vr s sag nem volt lianem /ess"). 
 A scion of a magnate family he had, like Mirabeau, 
 derived much light from the study of foreign 
 countries. As most of his contemporaries, he was 
 convinced that Hungary, unless aroused from her 
 political and industrial torpor, could not in her 
 then state claim a place amongst the civilized 
 nations of Europe. He was by no means of a 
 revolutionary disposition against the Habsburgs. 
 On the contrary, he wanted to realize all the vast 
 reforms he contemplated in peace with Austria ; 
 for being a sort of enthusiastic Walpole ( — the 
 manes of Sir Robert will pardon us that epithet ! — )
 
 ii2 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1825- 
 
 his activity was directed mainly, at times at least, 
 to the bettering of the material condition of 
 Hungary. 
 
 Szechenyi did not, however, neglect the intel- 
 lectual needs of his country either. When still a 
 young cavalry officer he offered one year's revenue 
 of his estates (^10,000 in value ; nominally, £5,000) 
 for the establishment of a national Hungarian 
 Academy of Science, the members of which were 
 to consider the cultivation and development of 
 the Hungarian language as their prime duty. 
 Szechenyi's magnanimous offer was at once 
 responded to by similar offers on the part of three 
 rich magnates (Count George Andrassy, Count 
 George Karolyi, and Baron Abraham Vay), and 
 thus a serious commencement was made with the 
 founding of an intellectual centre in Hungary. 
 The Academy (" Magyar Tudomdnyos Akademia ") 
 was formally established in 1830, its first president 
 being Count Joseph Teleki. Among the great 
 number of linguistic, historic, and scientific works, 
 both original and translations, published by the 
 Academy, we may mention the " Monumenta" or 
 historic sources of Hungary ; several smaller dic- 
 tionaries for current use, and the great Dictionary 
 of the Hungarian Language, edited by Gregory 
 Czuczor and John Fogarasi (1844- 1874) ; the 
 translation of the best works of foreign authors on 
 History, Philosophy, Law, and Science, including,
 
 i8 5 o. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 113 
 
 amongst others, almost all the standard works 
 of English literature ; and a series of original 
 researches into all branches of Science, descriptive, 
 mathematical, physical and chemical. Together 
 with numerous writers of that period, Szechenyi 
 also attempted, and very felicitously too, an 
 internal reform of the Magyar language, to the 
 vocabulary of which he added some needed and 
 now generally accepted terms. 
 
 Szechenyi's restless propaganda succeeded in 
 moving even the ultra-conservative and indolent 
 country-gentry ; and in the thirties many a noble- 
 man had a residence of his own built in Pesth. 
 The Country began to move into the Town. In 
 1837, the national Hungarian theatre was opened at 
 Pesth. Numerous newspapers and periodicals were 
 published ; the number of press-organs in Magyar, 
 which was five in 1820, rising to ten in 1830, and 
 to twenty-six in 1840. In 1891 there were 645 
 Magyar newspapers and periodicals in Hungary. 
 The work meted out to the " Academy " being 
 rather of a technical nature, the " Kisfaludy- 
 Society" (" Kisfaludy-Tdrsasdg") was formed in 
 1836, with the view of promoting the interests of 
 belles-lettres proper in Hungary. Thanks to the 
 patriotic and well-directed activity of that Society, 
 many an unknown but gifted author was enabled 
 to bring his work under the notice of the country. 
 Its prizes were, and are eagerly competed for,
 
 ii 4 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 1825- 
 
 and it has done very much for the great progress 
 of good literature in Hungary. Historical and 
 archaeological societies were formed in many parts 
 of the country ; and the nation became conscious 
 of the greatness of Hungarian music, which in the 
 wizard hands of Francis Liszt (1811-1887), the 
 greatest of all executive, and one of the most 
 striking of creative musicians, was fast becoming 
 the admiration of Europe. Nor were the schools 
 neglected. Since 1844 the language of instruction 
 in schools was mostly Hungarian. The political 
 reverses of the Hungarians in 1849 caused the 
 introduction of the German language into the 
 schools of Hungary ; in 1861, however, the national 
 language was again reinstated in its rights, and 
 now the language of instruction in all the schools 
 and colleges of Hungary is Magyar. 
 
 These are some of the most important intel- 
 lectual reforms which, from 1825 to 1848 com- 
 pletely changed the face of the Hungary of olden 
 times. While previous to 1825, all attempts at 
 reform were restricted to small circles and strag- 
 gling individuals, and could, therefore, bear no 
 fruit for the nation at large, now the efforts for 
 the renascence of the material and intellectual 
 life of the country were concentrated by the 
 creation of a true capital of social, literary and 
 scientific centres ; by the co-operation of great 
 numbers of patriotic and able men ; and by the
 
 i8 5 o. HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 115 
 
 powerful, nay, in Hungary, all-powerful stimulus 
 imparted to all the energies of the nation through 
 the revival of its ancient parliamentary life. In 
 Hungary, as well as in England, Parliament is 
 the soul of the body-politic. The stagnation of 
 parliamentary life in Hungary from 1 81 3 to 1825 
 was almost tantamount to the stagnation of all 
 the other intellectual energies of the nation. 
 From 1825 onward, the National Assembly met 
 frequently ; the Magyar language was again used 
 in the debates, and many reforms that had proved 
 unrealizable in the hands of private reformers, 
 were carried out by the power of the nation 
 assembled in Parliament. The constant opposition 
 offered to all reforms in Hungary, at the hands 
 of the Vienna government, only acted as a further 
 stimulus to the Hungarians ; and within the five- 
 and-twenty years of the present period, Hungary 
 advanced by leaps and bounds, both in its politic 
 and literary development. 
 
 II
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 The role of Kazinczy as mentor and model for 
 the younger generation of his time was now 
 allotted to a very gifted poet, Charles Kisfaludy, 
 brother of Alexander (see page 101). He was born 
 in 1788, and like his brother, became a soldier in 
 the Austrian army. His proud father, on learning 
 that he had, in 181 1, thrown up his military career, 
 disowned him ; and Charles had to rough it in 
 wild wanderings over Europe amidst great priva- 
 tions. Yet his mind, singularly widened by the 
 view and study of European civilization, was 
 thereby so strengthened and developed, that on 
 his return to his country (1817), he contrived to 
 rise from abject poverty to comparative comfort 
 by his own literary exertions. His dramas, some 
 of which he wrote in the course of a few days, 
 were at once so intensely relished by the public, 
 that Kisfaludy, who produced with equal ease 
 poetic works of lyric or epic character, quickly 
 became the centre of the literary life of Hungary. 
 The "Aurora" a literary periodical founded by
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 117 
 
 him in 1822, was enriched by the contributions of 
 the foremost writers, mostly his followers ; and he 
 himself was the rallying personality for the new 
 literary movement. Alas ! his body, less elastic 
 than his mind, could never overcome the effects of 
 his wanderings, and he died of consumption in 
 1830. 
 
 In Kisfaludy the influence of the literary ideals 
 of the French and Germans is easily traceable. 
 Like his models he was steeped in romanticism 
 and worship of the distant past. Yet he was 
 saved from the sickliness and namby-pambiness of 
 many a German or French romantic poet by his 
 strong sense of humour. In his dramas (" Stibor 
 Va/da," " Ir^n," etc.) he frequently manifests strong 
 dramatic vitality. It is in his comedies and gay 
 stories, that he excels. His humour is broad, 
 subtle, sympathetic and well worded. In his 
 tragedies he did not succeed in creating a type, 
 this, one of the safest criteria of a poet's genius. 
 In his comedies (" Csaloddsok" ["Disappoint- 
 ments "] ; " K&ok " ["The Wooers "] ; " Lednyorzo " 
 [Girl's Guard "], etc.) on the other hand, he has 
 given types of undying vitality ; such as "Mokdny," 
 the rough, humorous and honest young country 
 squire. If we consider the fact here so frequently 
 alluded to, that social life in Hungary was up 
 to the thirties of this century exclusively life 
 among the county-families in the country, or in
 
 n8 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 small towns ; if, moreover, we remember that 
 such life on a small scale, where each person 
 stands out in bold relief and unencumbered by the 
 numerous social mediocrities of large towns, is 
 the proper foster-earth of rich personalities : it 
 will be easy to see, that social life in Hungary 
 in Kisfaludy's youth was bristling with delightfully 
 original types of men and women. They only 
 waited for the hand of the poet to spring into 
 their frames, and form valuable pictures. Country- 
 life and small towns in Hungary, to the present 
 day, are full of the most delightful types, both 
 men and women ; and the reputation of a Dickens 
 might have been acquired by him who would have 
 told the " adventures " and freaks of, for instance, 
 the quaint, many-tongued sires of the county of 
 Saros. Kisfaludy, with the true poet's eye saw 
 those types, and put them bodily on his canvas. 
 They talk on his pages that very language, full of 
 savoury adjectives and verbal somersaults, that 
 they used when meeting at the halls of their 
 friends, at the " Casino " of the place or at the 
 table in front of the Swiss Coufiserie, in the sleepy 
 streets of their county capital. In his novels, 
 " Tollagi Jdnos " [a proper name] ; " Sulyosdi 
 Simon " [a proper name], etc., Kisfaludy has 
 recorded many a precious feature of the life of 
 these sturdy, amiable, enthusiastic, shrewd and 
 simple country-gentry, in the midst of whom
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 119 
 
 moved the pathetic and lofty young girl ; the 
 coquettish and charming young wife (or " little 
 heaven," " mennyecske" as the Hungarian word has 
 it) ; the quaint old maid, and the still quainter old 
 bachelor. Here Kisfaludy is at his best ; and in 
 showing his fellow-writers some of the wealth to 
 be found in their own country, he did Hungarian 
 Literature and Hungarian nationality an immense 
 service. In some of his lyrical poems, and especi- 
 ally in his truly majestic ode to the memory of the 
 disaster of Mohacs (1526), written in dystichs, 
 Kisfaludy is frequently more than clever ; in that 
 ode he soars to the sublime. His " Epreszledny" 
 (" Girl Gleaning Strawberries ") is a charming 
 idyll.
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 The work of Kisfaludy was great. He charmed 
 his readers, and thus awakened an interest in 
 Hungarian Literature in circles that had hitherto 
 been callous to the intellectual revival of their 
 country. His vocation, however, was limited. 
 The Hungarians, by nature grave and given to 
 ponderous sentiments, needed, for a full awaken- 
 ing of their literary life, more than the perfume 
 of flowers. The rhythmic thunder of the war- 
 clarion ; the majesty of the organ was needed. 
 And the right man came. The man, in whose 
 sublime poems was heard the turmoil of the 
 old glorious wars, the symphony of love and 
 patriotism, in tones of unprecedented beauty. 
 That man was Michael Vorosmarty (i 800- 185 5). 
 His life was devoted entirely to the pursuit of 
 literature, and in his soul there was only one 
 grand thought : to become Hungary's troubadour, 
 to kindle the holy light of patriotism on the altar, 
 and with the aid of the muses. In this he was 
 successful beyond all his predecessors. His were
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 121 
 
 some of the rarest qualities, the union of which 
 goes to make the great poet. In beauty and truly 
 Magyar rhythm of language he was and largely 
 still is unsurpassed. His diction is, like his 
 country, full of the majesty of vast mountains, 
 and the loveliness of flower-clad meadows sloping 
 down to melodious rivers. Without being a reck- 
 less innovator of words, his works read at the first 
 appearance as if written in a new language. As 
 when the student of Hellenic antiquity, after 
 years spent with engravings of old Greek art, 
 comes for the first time to see one of the still 
 extant remains of that art itself: so felt the 
 contemporaries of Vorosmarty when the glorious 
 hexameters of his epic, " Zaldn futdsa" first 
 struck their ears. There was at last, not only 
 this or that instrument of the orchestra of Hun- 
 garian language ; there was heard, not only the 
 wails of the 'cello of Kolcsey ; the musical 
 cascades of the clarinet of Charles Kisfaludy ; 
 the wafting chords of the harp of Berzsenyi ; 
 or the gossamer oboe of Csokonai : there was 
 heard the unison and harmonious struggle of 
 all the instruments of the great idiom. Like 
 the composers of the immortal symphonies, 
 Vorosmarty wielded the resources of the Magyar 
 language, intensifying the effect of each instru- 
 ment by the parallel or counter-quires of the 
 other instruments. In his love-songs you hear
 
 i22 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 not only the notes of the melody, but also, as 
 in the songs of his Austrian contemporary, 
 Schubert, the undercurrents of the melody in 
 the accompaniment. The wealth of poetic figures 
 in Vorosmarty is surprising ; yet a chaste modera- 
 tion tempers all undue exuberance. He is power- 
 ful, not violent ; imposing, not fierce. He writes 
 mostly Largos ; but there are very few longeurs 
 in them. The quick pulsation of the drama does 
 not suit him ; the epic and ode are his favourite 
 forms. For, in him is much of the priest, of the 
 seer of a nation. In the depth of his reticent 
 heart he feels the whole life of his nation, and 
 smarts unspeakably from its then degradation. 
 Too proud to indulge in constant moanings, he 
 is yet in an agony of rage and indignation at the 
 oppression of his people. But this holy anger 
 goes forth from him sculptured in songs, swelling 
 with abiding life of beauty and power. 
 
 Vbrosmarty's poetic vocation was, if not aroused, 
 yet, undoubtedly, guided into the right direction 
 by an epic of one Alexander Szekely, a Unitarian 
 preacher, entitled "The Szekler in Transylvania" 
 (" A Szdkelyck ErdUyorszdgban "), in which a not 
 infelicitous attempt was made to work into one 
 national song the ancient Magyar legends and 
 mythology. An epic is the song of a nation 
 whose critical dangers are not yet over. It may 
 be said, without exaggeration, that heroic Wolfe
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 12 
 
 3 
 
 in driving- the French out of Canada (1759), 
 drove out the last chance of the Americans for 
 anything like a great national epic. In gaining 
 their independence a few years after Wolfe's 
 success, the Americans also obtained perfect 
 security. There was no serious enemy left to 
 jeopardize their existence. The Indians could 
 and did annoy them much ; they could not 
 seriously call their very existence in question. 
 Hence the Indian tales of Fenimore Cooper 
 are the only epics of the Americans. In 
 Hungary matters stood quite differently. There 
 the very existence of the nation was doubtful. 
 A catastrophe might occur at any time. And 
 in the terrible anguish of that "gigantic death" 
 (" nagyszerii haldl"), of which Vorosmarty sings 
 in his " Szozat" (national hymn), the people of 
 Hungary needed more than a drama or an ode 
 can give. It needed a national poem of large 
 dimensions in which the glories of the past were 
 held up to the people as an incitement to the 
 conquest of the trophies of the future ; in which 
 the powers of the Divine were shown to have 
 a personal interest in the destinies of the nation ; 
 and in which the sacred language of thirty 
 generations of patriots glows in all the vic- 
 torious beauty of perfection. When in 1748 
 Klopstock published his great epic, the " Messias," 
 he too desired to do his country a patriotic
 
 i2 4 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 service. His aim was, however, at once larger 
 and smaller than that of Vorosmarty. He meant 
 chiefly to weld for the Germans the weapon of 
 a better language. Beyond this he meant his 
 epic for any nation whatever, its subject-matter 
 being of universal acceptance amongst Christian 
 nations. Not so Vorosmarty. He meant to 
 write a Messianic epic, in which the Messiah 
 was the Hungarian nation itself. He wanted to 
 raise up a particular nation, his nation, to the 
 consciousness of its force, of its vocation. And 
 thus, while the intellectual scope of his poem 
 was much more limited than that of either 
 Milton or Klopstock, the intensity of its purport 
 far exceeded both. 
 
 The name of the epic was, "The Flight of 
 Zalan" (" Zaldn futdsa"). It appeared in 1825, 
 or in the year when the national Parliament 
 reassembled after twelve long years' adjourn- 
 ment, and when the nation, at any rate, many 
 of the best men of the nation, were in feverish 
 expectancy of the rise of New Hungary. Its 
 subject is taken from the history of Arpad the 
 Conqueror, and centres in the Battle of Alpar, 
 in which Arpad defeats his most fearful enemy, 
 Zalan, one of the Bulgarian rulers of the terri- 
 tory between the Danube and the Tisza (Theiss) 
 rivers. There are in the poem three parallel 
 streams of epic deeds, which, like the three
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 125 
 
 choruses of string, reed and brass instruments 
 in an orchestra, join in one powerful symphony. 
 Arpad, the great duke and father of his people, 
 fights Zalan, and especially his herculean general 
 Viddin. Ete, the young and romantic Magyar 
 knight fights Csorna, the diabolic Bulgarian 
 hero; and in the heavens " Hadur" ("God of 
 the war," a name introduced by Szekely), the 
 national god of the Magyars, fights and conquers 
 " Armdny" the arch-fiend. The element of love 
 is represented by Ete, who loves Hajna, the 
 beautiful daughter of an old Hungarian hero. 
 She is also courted by a divine charmer, 
 whose temptations, however, she rejects, and 
 from whom she receives an enchanted horse. 
 A large portion of the epic is taken up with 
 the description of single combats between the 
 heroes. In the end, the Hungarians are (as in 
 reality they were) victorious, and Zalan flees 
 from his country. 
 
 There is undoubtedly much Ossianic misty 
 glamour in Vorosmarty's great epic ; and the 
 figures of its leading heroes do not stand out 
 with all the desirable plasticity from among the 
 multitude of minor heroes and mythologic divini- 
 ties. Yet Ete and Hajna are suffused with all 
 the charms of youth, love and heroism ; and in 
 Hadur and Armany two powerful mythological 
 types are placed before us. Arpad himself
 
 i26 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 answers very well the chief purpose of the poem, 
 in that he is rather the incarnation of a nation 
 strong, noble, God-fearing and conquering, than 
 the representative of any special personality. 
 Perhaps the least endowed figure of the poem 
 is Zalan, in whom the poet might have represen- 
 ted, in contrast to Arpad, the various enemies 
 endangering Hungary's existence, and of whom 
 he only made a proud and despairing prince. 
 Yet, after allowing for these shortcomings — very 
 natural in a work written in eleven months — 
 " Zaldn futdsa " is a truly great epic. The 
 splendour of its language, in regard to which 
 it is fully the equal of " Paradise Lost," fell 
 upon its first readers with the spell of the Fata 
 Morgana of the Hungarian pusztas or prairies, 
 on the lonely traveller. There was one general 
 feeling : " such language had not yet risen from 
 any Hungarian lyre!" (" igy meg nem zenge 
 magyar lant ! "). A nation whose past could 
 inspire such epic music, was a nation of imposing 
 resourcefulness. Only great nations, after con- 
 quering great dangers, can produce great epics. 
 A great epic is not alone a literary event ; as 
 such it would redound mostly to the glory of 
 the author. It is a national event, and redounds 
 chiefly to the glory of the nation. It is the 
 symptom and warrant of national greatness ; of 
 that noble enthusiasm — without which, numerous
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 127 
 
 factories and railways can be built indeed, but 
 no fabric of a national commonwealth holding 
 its own amidst roaring seas of danger and 
 adversity. Vorosmarty 's epic poured into the 
 Hungarians that Belief and Confidence, that 
 Eternality of Hope, which alone steels nations 
 against fate. Sztkhenyi had connected Buda, 
 the capital of the past, with Pesth, the capital 
 of modern Hungary, by means of a gigantic 
 suspension bridge. Vorosmarty now connected 
 Hungary's past with her future by the rainbow 
 of his immortal epic. 
 
 In addition to" The Flight of Zalan," Vorosmarty 
 enriched Hungarian Literature with several other 
 smaller epics, such as " Sztyfak," " Cserhalom" and 
 the exquisite " The Two Neighbouring Castles " 
 (" Ktt szomszM vdr"). After 1831 he ceased writ- 
 ing epics. He had a real passion for dramatic 
 poetry, and although in " Csongor tfs Tiinde" alone 
 he contrived to write a drama of superior finish, 
 yet he continually tried his hand at that form 
 of poetry ("V/mrisz") ("The Sanguinary Wed- 
 ding"); "MarotMn" (Banus Marot) ; " Aldozat" 
 (The Sacrifice), etc. His lyrical poetry, on the 
 other hand, contains priceless gems. Adorning, as 
 he did, even the smallest of his lyrical poems 
 with the unrivalled splendour of his diction ; he 
 reaches in some of them, and first of all in the 
 majestic " National Hymn " (" SzSzat, 1837), the
 
 128 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 highest level of poetic //an. In these select 
 poems, while still singing nothing but the hopes 
 and glories of his nation, he becomes so European 
 in tone and chaste beauty of form, that his work 
 will lose little of its perfection by fair translations 
 into other European languages. In them there 
 is felt the breath of that civilization of Greater 
 Hellas, or Europe, which was originally that of 
 Hellas proper. Nor does his lyric muse move 
 in grave and solemn moods alone. In his 
 famous "Song of F6t " (" Foti da/"), he has left 
 the wine-drinking community of the world a 
 model song in praise of the noble child of 
 Bacchus. He likewise succeeded in writing 
 poetic apotheoses of some of the great Hun- 
 garians of his time, such as Liszt, the great 
 musician, and in the composition of small 
 narrative poems, which prove him to have been 
 endowed with a keen sense of humour (" Mdk 
 Bandi ; " " Laboda ; " " Pctike ; " " Gdbor dedk "). 
 His great activity as a creative poet did not 
 prevent him from writing a considerable number 
 of articles for literary periodicals, such as the 
 " Tudomdnyos Gyujtemeny" " Kritikai Lapok " 
 (edited by Bajza), and for the new "Aurora," 
 and the " Athenceum." He was also one of the 
 translators of the " Thousand and One Nights," 
 and of some of Shakespeare's plays.
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 The national and literary current of which 
 Vorosmarty was the chief exponent brought 
 several other great epic works to the surface. 
 Andreas Horvat de Pazmand (1778- 1839) was 
 working for many years at a national epic in 
 twelve long cantos, singing the history of Arpad 
 the conqueror. In 183 1, at last, he published the 
 huge poem which, however, was distanced and 
 soon silenced by the masterwork of Vorosmarty. 
 It certainly helped both to set off " The Flight 
 of Zalan " still more strongly, and also to widen 
 the circle of old Magyar mythology. 
 
 An epic poet of far superior merit was 
 Gregory Czuczor (1 800- 1866). Had he not been 
 a monk, and so lost much of the vivifying 
 contact of civil life, he might have soared 
 very high. It must be, however, added that 
 his conflict both with poverty and with the 
 Austrian Government, did make up largely 
 for the lack of experiences of romantic, con- 
 jugal and family conflicts. His was a vigorous,
 
 i 3 o HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 systematic and finely discerning mind. To the 
 epic he felt attracted not only by the general 
 literary tone of his time, but by his personal 
 bent for popular or rather folk-poetry. The 
 naivete of the latter, which forms its distinctive 
 feature, is also one of the chief elements of the 
 epic. Among Czuczor's epics, " Botond" in four 
 cantos, is the best. It tells part of the life of 
 that famous Hungarian hero of the time of the 
 conquest. Botond had brought home from his 
 Byzantine campaigns a charming Greek girl, 
 Polydora. One of the Magyar heroes, Bodol^ny, 
 who also loves Polydora, takes her secretly back 
 to Constantinople. Now Botond again invades the 
 Greek Empire, and with his huge war-club breaks 
 a hole in the gate of the capital. In the end 
 he gets back Polydora. This simple plot is 
 enlivened with recitals not only of military and 
 heroic exploits, but also of touching love-episodes. 
 The contrast between burly, brave Botond 
 and the refined Greek maid, the episodes in 
 which Szende, the page occurs, and the beauti- 
 fully rolling hexameters lend a peculiar charm 
 to this epic. Perhaps now, after the realization 
 of most of the ardent political hopes of Czuczor's 
 age, his epic will be considered even as much 
 better than at the time of its appearance when 
 it had to compete with the more fiery epic 
 muse of Vorosmarty. Of Czuczor's linguistic
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 131 
 
 works we have already made mention (see page 
 112). 
 
 A contemporary of Czuczor, John Garay (1812- 
 1853), although not a poet of great distinction, 
 must be here mentioned, on account of the 
 popularity of his innumerable ballads and similar 
 epic poetry, covering almost every one of the 
 memorable events of Hungarian history. Rather 
 a rhetor than a poet, he wrote his ballads, of 
 which " Kont" (relating to the martyr-death of 
 thirty Hungarian patriots at the hands of Emperor 
 Sigismund), is the best known, in an easy-flowing 
 popular style. He trusted rather to the attrac- 
 tiveness of the story itself than to his own 
 poetic genius. When well recited, many of his 
 ballads are still very effective.
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 Despite the very great advance made in the 
 development of their literature up to 1830, the 
 Hungarians were still wanting in one of the 
 necessary elements of the growth of truly good 
 works. Honest, just and well-informed criticism 
 was wanting. Kazinczy, it is true, had in his 
 extensive correspondence paid very careful atten- 
 tion to the critical examination of the prosody 
 and language of his friends and pupils. Such 
 external criticism, however, did not suffice. In 
 a country, such as Hungary, where Greek literature 
 was then known only to exceedingly few writers, 
 the canons of criticism were easily neglected. 
 Moreover, literature being still considered more 
 as a patriotic than a literary function, poets did 
 not, as a rule, tolerate even mild criticism. Yet 
 without such criticism, Hungarian Literature was 
 likely to deteriorate. Even men of genius are 
 the better for good criticism. Yet they are the 
 exception ; and to the vast number of writers with 
 talent rather than genius, criticism was, and
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 133 
 
 always has been, the mentor whom they could 
 not afford to miss. It has been one of the great 
 advantages of French literature that its creative 
 writers have nearly always been watched by 
 great critical writers. From Boileau and Diderot, 
 to Sainte-Beuve, the French have always had men 
 of piercing and tasteful criticism, who controlled 
 the works of the purely spontaneous genius. 
 Nor can the literature of Germany congratulate 
 itself on a more auspicious circumstance than 
 the fact of Lessing's incomparable activity as a 
 critic at the very outset of the classical period. 
 It is with regard to this historic value of sound 
 literary criticism, that we must appreciate the 
 work of the Hungarian writer forming the 
 subject of the present chapter. 
 
 Joseph Bajza (1804- 185 8) had many of the 
 qualities of a great critic. He was courageous, 
 especially in that courage which is perhaps the 
 rarest, the courage defying current opinions ; 
 he was learned ; he possessed a very keen sense 
 of linguistic niceties and poetic forms ; and, 
 last not least, he was no mean poet himself. 
 Already in 1830 he gave signal proof not only 
 of his pure patriotism, but also of his penetrating 
 knowledge of the true needs of the then Hun- 
 garian Literature, by fiercely attacking a plan, 
 broached by a Hungarian publisher, to prepare 
 a Hungarian Encyclopaedia (or " Conversations-
 
 i 3 4 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 Lexicon," as, in imitation of the well-known 
 German publication, it was called) on lines, as 
 Bajza proved, unpatriotic, because unsuited to the 
 character and stage of Magyar literature of that 
 time. This was the " Conversations- Lexicon 
 Quarrel." In the same year, Bajza started his 
 critical paper (" Kritikai Lapok"), which was 
 later on (1837) followed by his " Athenczum" and 
 its appendix " Figyelmezo" In these periodi- 
 cals he discoursed with great verve and knowledge 
 on the theories of various poetic forms ; and 
 carefully criticised the works of his contem- 
 poraries. His chief contributors were Vorosmarty 
 and Toldy (then still Schedel), the former a great 
 poet, the latter (see p. 254) a great scholar. The 
 authority of Bajza made itself felt very soon ; 
 and the numerous polemics occasioned by his 
 articles only served to aggrandize his position 
 as a critic. Already in his essays on the epi- 
 gram, the novel, the drama, etc., Bajza had 
 proved himself a constructive as against a purely 
 negative critic. In that capacity probably his 
 chief merit is his elaboration of the "theory" of 
 the folk-poem. In Hungary, with her numerous 
 peasantry, there is an inexhaustible wealth of 
 poems composed by unknown people, exclusively 
 peasants, shepherds, and similar inglorious poets. 
 These poems, invariably meant to be adapted 
 to songs, are wafted over the country like the
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 135 
 
 mild breezes of spring, and like them, no 
 one knows their origin. In previous times, 
 the rococo taste of enlightened pedants had 
 contemptuously ignored these blossoms of the 
 wild puszta (prairie). Since Csokonai they were 
 held in greater esteem ; but it was Bajza who, 
 by framing them in the time-honoured formulae 
 of classical aesthetics, raised them to a literary 
 status. Since Bajza, the " ncpdal" or folk-song 
 was not only a matter of national delight or 
 pride, but also of serious study. 
 
 To Bajza's circle belonged the poets Alexander 
 Vachott (1818-1861); Frederick Kerenyi (1822- 
 1852), who died in America; Julius Sarosy 
 (1816-1861), the author of several stirring revo- 
 lutionary poems ; Andreas Pap ; Emeric Nagy ; 
 Sigismund Beothy, etc.
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 The rapid growth of Hungarian Literature since 
 1825, shows chiefly in works of poetry proper; 
 that is, in verse. Hungarian prose had in the 
 first ten years of this period received no develop- 
 ment similar to that of Hungarian verse. Yet 
 many a writer had tried his hand at the creation 
 of Hungarian literary prose. The reason of this 
 belated advance of Hungarian prose was owing 
 mainly to the late introduction of the Magyar 
 language into the schools. Not before a language 
 has hewn its way through the thickets of philosophy, 
 the subtleties of distinctions in physics and chemis- 
 try, or the awkward bulkiness of historical facts, 
 will it be supple and flexible enough to do efficient 
 service for the innumerable needs of prose. With- 
 out a prose ready for all the turns and twists of 
 serious thought, great historical or philosophical 
 works are almost impossible. The difficulty was 
 overcome in Hungary by applying prose first to 
 novels, and then to History or Philosophy. Novels 
 and romances, taking as they do the place of the
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 137 
 
 epics in olden times, have also a national or more 
 than literary importance. And we find that 
 nations without great epics are also, as a rule, 
 without great novels of their own. The astounding 
 progress made in Hungary in epic literature proper 
 bade fair to inaugurate the forthcoming of a novel- 
 istic literature. Vorosmarty and Czuczor were 
 soon to have their followers in prose — the novelists. 
 The frequency of rich types in Hungarian society 
 could not but favour that branch of literature. In 
 fact, the greatest difficulty for Hungarian novelists 
 then, and to a large extent even now, was not to 
 discover and work out a good subject, but to hunt 
 up a sufficient number of readers. In the thirties 
 and forties of this century, most of the cultivated 
 individuals in Hungary were so familiar with 
 German and even with French, that they could 
 and did easily gratify their novelistic appetites with 
 the innumerable products from the pens of German 
 and French novelists. People will seldom relish or 
 crave for lyric or epic poems of nations other than 
 their own. They will ordinarily prefer home- 
 made verse. With novels it is quite different. 
 There is scarcely any exaggeration in stating 
 that Lord Lytton's novels have been read more 
 extensively in Germany and Austria-Hungary 
 than in England. The same applies respectively 
 to George Sand, the French, and Mme. Flygare 
 — Carlen, the Swedish novelist. Hungarian
 
 138 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 novelists had, therefore, to contend against formid- 
 able competition from abroad. But there was 
 another and equally grave difficulty to conquer. 
 The public in all countries has a fatal tendency to 
 take up one author as the " standard " author in a 
 given department of literature, and to give all other 
 authors in the same field the cold shoulder. The 
 less intense the interest which the public takes in 
 that department, the more it will be inclined to 
 believe in the "standard" man. In Hungary, that 
 evil tendency has wrought great injury to novelists. 
 At once a few of them became the " standard " 
 novelists. Nobody wanted to hear of any other. 
 By this means the rise of other, perhaps greater 
 novelists, was retarded, if not altogether foreclosed ; 
 and the "standard" man, eagerly seizing on the 
 great favour bestowed upon him, poured forth 
 scores of novels, irrespective of the higher demands 
 of Art. The consequence was that he deteriorated. 
 For one good novel he gave ten bad ones. Having 
 a sort of literary monopoly, he did not heed adverse 
 criticism. The public, on the other hand, did not 
 care to learn of a new novelist, and, as actually 
 happened in Hungary, almost entirely neglected a 
 real genius for no other reason than that mental 
 laziness, which in countries with less abundant 
 literature is perhaps one of the most baneful of 
 obstacles to the success of a writer. 
 
 The preceding remarks appear to be necessary
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 139 
 
 for a right appreciation of Hungarian novels. 
 Foreign readers, and perhaps more especially 
 the English, are apt to admire in Hungarian 
 novels such qualities as strike them as new and 
 "weird," because German, French, or English 
 novelists do not excel in them. Thus foreign 
 readers will easily be impressed, and in many cases 
 unduly so, by the great picturesqueness of Hungarian 
 novelists. This quality, commendable though it 
 no doubt is, will induce many a foreign critic to 
 overrate the value of this or that Hungarian novel. 
 In Hungary, picturesque turns of phrases are of the 
 very commonest. They do not strike a Hungarian 
 critic as being particularly meritorious. Hence the 
 reader of the present work must not be astonished 
 at some of the subsequent severe judgments passed 
 on Hungarian novelistic celebrities. Far from 
 trying to deter English or French readers from the 
 reading of such novels as they will find criticised 
 adversely, we would rather advise them to enjoy 
 those novels without further regard to the views 
 of the writer. We have in so criticising of necessity 
 placed ourselves on a basis rather Magyar than 
 European, and we are fully aware of the marked 
 difference in taste to be found in the various 
 nations of Europe. If the novelists and poets of 
 one nation were to be judged by the taste of 
 another, Thackeray could hardly be regarded as 
 a great novelist, and Tennyson scarcely as a great
 
 i 4 o HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 poet. Yet both are in England recognized as two 
 of the best writers in English literature. 
 
 Of the great novelists of Hungary, four stand out 
 as peculiarly excellent. Their names are Nicolas 
 Josika ; Joseph Eotvos ; Sigismund Kemeny ; and 
 Maurus Jokai. The first three belong to the class 
 of Magnates, being Barons ; the last is a commoner 
 by birth. It is rather curious, that the Magnates, 
 who have in the present century given no poet of 
 the first order to Hungary, should in the field 
 of Hungarian novel writing have furnished three 
 writers of the first rank, of whom one, Baron 
 Kemdny, has done work not unworthy of the 
 greatest novel-writer of the century. 
 
 The first of the four to attract general attention in 
 Hungary was Baron Joseph Josika. He was born 
 in 1794 at Torda, in Transylvania. Having spent 
 many years in the military service of Austria, and 
 in travels abroad, he retired in 1818 and withdrew 
 to Transylvania, where he pursued historic and 
 literary studies, relating chiefly to his own province. 
 Transylvania harbours many of the most glorious 
 traditions of Hungarian history. For generations, 
 especially in the seventeenth century, it was 
 practically the only home of Magyardom. There 
 is no lack of romantic, picturesque, or startling 
 facts in the public or social life of that country ; 
 and Josika, whose heart had, through his first 
 luckless marriage, learned the depths of sorrow, as
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 141 
 
 through his second wife he learned the bliss of 
 true love, Josika was in a position to do full 
 justice to the wealth of picturesque characters and 
 scenery in Transylvania's past. His first novel, 
 " Abafi" was published in 1836, and at once 
 received general applause on the part of the critics, 
 and, what was still more important, at the hands of 
 the public. Its subject is taken from the troubled 
 times of Sigismund Batori, when Turks, Austrians 
 and Magyars, were fighting and intriguing for the 
 possession of Transylvania, in the last two decades 
 of the sixteenth century. Baton's mighty and 
 tainted personality, with all his cruelty, heroism, 
 astuteness and audacity, is, together with that of the 
 Turkish conquerors, pashas, and court people, the 
 personal background to the hero of the novel, 
 Oliver Abafi, who rises from conduct dissipated 
 and lawless, to the heights of noble self-sacrifice. 
 The story is told with great power of description 
 and impersonation. The reader cannot fail to feel 
 as if quite at home in that agitated corner of 
 Europe, where some of the historic agencies met 
 in deadly conflict, and where men and women 
 breathed much of that grand air of great events, 
 which colours them in tints unknown to the people 
 of less eventful times. The novel is intensely 
 interesting and will convey a more life-like picture 
 of its period than many a dull historic volume. 
 Equal to, and if possible, even more fascinating,
 
 1 42 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 is Josika's novel, "The Bohemians in Hungary" 
 ("A csehek Magyarorszdgban"). This novel goes 
 back to older times still. It pictures the state of 
 Hungary in the middle of the fifteenth century, 
 when the Bohemian (Czech) Hussites were invad- 
 ing Hungary. Of all the innumerable sects and 
 heresies from the end of the twelfth century to the 
 rise of Protestantism, the Hussites were no doubt 
 the most powerful. From the depths of the forests 
 ranging round the river Main, to the mountains 
 encircling Hungary and Transylvania, these heroic 
 and fanatic warriors spread the terror of their 
 name. But for some grave political mistakes and 
 unforeseen reverses of Vitovt, one of the greatest of 
 the historic Slavs (flourished 1380 to 1430), who 
 wanted to found a Slav empire, reaching from the 
 western confines of Bohemia, to the walls of holy 
 Moscow, the Slavs, on the basis of Hussitism, and 
 under leaders like Ziska, and the Procops, might 
 have for ever reduced the historic role of Germany 
 to that of a small power. Theirs would then have 
 been a great empire, strongly unified in language, 
 creed and traditions. No Austria would have been 
 possible ; and Hungary would have probably been 
 submerged in the Slav flood. It is the story of the 
 lives of some of these wild and terrible Czechs in 
 the north and north-west of Hungary which forms 
 the subject of the powerful novel of Josika. The 
 castles of the Czech leaders were real fortresses of
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 143 
 
 Slavdom, and the population of those parts of 
 Hungary being largely Slav to the present day, the 
 danger for Hungary was very great. Fortunately 
 for the independence of the Magyars, their young 
 king Matthew Corvinus, son of John Hunyadi, was 
 a match for the Bohemians. One by one he 
 destroyed their castles, liberating thousands of 
 prisoners, and ridding the country of the Slav 
 invasion. His illustrious figure shines in Josika's 
 novel like the youthful emblem of that his- 
 toric vitality which has kept Hungary in a 
 ruling position over Slav and Germanic tribes 
 these last thousand years. The picturesqueness of 
 Josika's novel is extraordinary. Male and female 
 characters of intense fascination move in the castles, 
 battlefields, dungeons and mountain-paths described 
 by the novelist. Komoroczy, the knight and 
 robber ; the glorious king and his romantic love ; 
 Elemer, the hero, called " the Eagle" ; the charm- 
 ing widow, who defies with a dimpled smile the 
 most ruthless of amorous men ; Jews, at once 
 grand in suffering and commonplace in their 
 greed; all these and many more scenes and por- 
 traits reconstruct that memorable time when the 
 Renascence was rising over the dying gloom of 
 the Middle Ages. 
 
 It is impossible to tell here, even very briefly, 
 the plots and characters of the very numerous 
 novels written by Josika both in Hungary and at
 
 i 4 4 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 Dresden, whither he retired after escaping the 
 Austrians, who had sentenced him to death as one 
 of the prominent members of the Hungarian 
 " rebels." All these novels are historic in subject, 
 and even quote, sometimes, chapter and verse from 
 the chronicles on which they are based. The most 
 famous are "Esther, " "Francis Rdkoczy II." the 
 hero of which is the most popular of all Hungarian 
 princes who ever revolted from the Habsburgs ; 
 " A Hungarian Family during the Revolution " 
 (" Egy magyar csaldd a forradalom alatt") ; " The 
 Last Bathory" ("Ac utolso Bdthory). Josika is 
 easily compared to and measured by Walter Scott. 
 Yet there is in the very tendencies of their works a 
 marked difference. Scott, in writing his novels, was 
 prompted more by his literary tastes and pro- 
 clivities than by any consideration of politic aims. 
 Both Scotland and England were during his life- 
 time (1771-1832) at the height of their triumphal 
 career. His novels were romantic work pure and 
 simple. England being at the head of the powers 
 combating the French Revolution, her literary 
 geniuses, too, followed lines opposed to modern 
 Liberalism ; in other words, they became romantic. 
 Hungary, on the other hand, was, during the life- 
 time of Josika, an oppressed country, and after a 
 short period of glory during her war of indepen- 
 dence, she vegetated for over ten years in a torpor 
 caused by a fiercely reactionary government. Into
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 145 
 
 Josika's novels, therefore, there necessarily entered 
 a political element, which coloured his work with a 
 tint unknown to the great Scotchman's tales. And 
 this, together with the circumstance of his becoming 
 rapidly a " standard " novelist, explains Josika's 
 literary eminence and also his literary failings. 
 In his attempt to use the story of Hungary's past 
 as a means of reviving her present, he naturally lost 
 sight of some of the purely literary laws of novel- 
 writing. His characters being already given by 
 history, he neglected to elaborate their psychology. 
 Events happen rather unto or by them, than 
 through them. The inner machinery of motives is 
 sometimes clumsy or too flimsy. Being much in 
 demand as a " standard " novelist, he wrote much ; 
 too much. Yet with all these occasional short- 
 comings, Josika is one of the most splendid 
 novelists of the picturesque class. Few Hungarian 
 books recording Hungary's past will give the 
 foreign reader a more pleasing and, at the same 
 time, instructive picture of the romantic days 
 of that great country. The professorial critic, 
 reposing on the tattered laurels of his victims, if 
 not on his own, will find much to rebuke in 
 Josika. The youth of Hungary and the un- 
 prejudiced foreigner will always read him with 
 delight.
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 The second great novelist in that period was 
 Eotvos. Born in 1813, he received a careful 
 education, and after extensive travels in western 
 Europe, embraced the judicial career for a time. 
 When still a young man, at the age of six-and- 
 tvventy, he published his first great novel, " The 
 Carthusian" ("A Karthauzi" 1839-40). This 
 remarkable work had an immense effect. It was 
 read with equal delight in the palaces of the 
 magnates, and in the closets of the middle-class 
 people. It charmed the young and moved the 
 old. It seemed to express the very innermost 
 cravings and mental propensities of the then 
 Hungarian public. More than that. It expressed 
 a state of feeling then almost universal on the 
 continent of Europe. Like Goethe's " Wertker" 
 it lent expression to what lay dormant and un- 
 expressed in the hearts of millions of Europeans. 
 The sultry atmosphere then weighing on con- 
 tinental Europe had engendered a morbid melan- 
 choly in many a high-strung man and woman.
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 147 
 
 Life seemed to be full of unsolved and unsolvable 
 problems ; full of forces disruptive and disinte- 
 grating, causing unease uncertainty and distress. 
 All the nobler efforts of men in building up their 
 private or public fortunes appeared to be blighted 
 and marred by the demoniac perverseness of the 
 political and social powers of the time. A brood- 
 ing meditativeness seized people, and fresh and 
 vigorous deeds being impossible, pale and 
 despondent reflections embroiled men in a dumb 
 struggle against destiny. Such was the mental 
 temper of a very large class of men and women in 
 France, Germany, Austria, Hungary and Italy. 
 Eotvos himself had, from early youth, been given 
 to that morbid meditativeness and self-destructive 
 sensitiveness of the age ; and the sorrowful 
 condition of his country only increased his pathetic 
 melancholy. Hungarian young men and women, 
 then and now, are naturally very much more 
 pathetic and grave than the youth of any other 
 country. They have neither the virile alacrity of 
 the British youth so agreeably manifested in the 
 games and muscular amusements of young 
 England ; nor the precocious polish and gaiety of 
 French youths. Theirs is a heavy mood, similar 
 to that of the Largos of Hungarian music, but 
 followed by no Friss or Vivace. To souls tuned 
 in such minor keys, the " KartJiauzi" came as the 
 very revelation of their deepest secrets. Hitherto 
 
 K
 
 148 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 the epics and novels written in Hungary had 
 been retrospective work. They narrated the woes 
 and joys, the troubles and glories of past ages. 
 In Eotvos' novel there was, practically for the 
 first time, a work of introspective actualite ; a 
 work appealing to the reader himself, and not 
 only to his historic imagination. The queries 
 tormenting the young men and women of that 
 age were here subjected to an analysis full of 
 psychological inquisitiveness, enveloped in the 
 gloaming of poetic descriptions of Nature. The 
 plot of the novel is of the simplest Gustavus, 
 a French nobleman, in whose agitated soul are 
 accumulated all the tempest-laden clouds of his 
 age, seeks in vain to find peace and consolation 
 in Love, Pleasure and Ambition. Julia, his first 
 love, deserts him for an unworthy "other one;" 
 Betti, his second love, he rejects himself. And 
 so, tossed from one rock of discord to the other, 
 he finally enters the order of the Carthusians, 
 and there, amidst steady work and in firm faith, 
 finds the only solution that can await characters 
 like his : Death. Goethe, with the terrible 
 serenity of judgment so peculiar to him, once 
 remarked, that there are, as he called them, 
 " problematic characters, who can do justice to no 
 situation in which they may be placed." Such a 
 character is Gustavus. But such was also the 
 general and typical character of his time ; and
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 149 
 
 hence the immense effect of the novel. Even the 
 chief and serious deficiency of the novel, being as 
 it was, the deficiency of numerous Hungarian 
 minds of that time, only helped to increase its 
 popularity. Eotvos could never quite overcome 
 the inner contrast between his Franco-German 
 education and the Magyar character of his works. 
 Of all the great Hungarian writers, his language 
 is the least Magyar in form and savour. The 
 European and the Magyar were constantly battling 
 in him and frequently to the detriment of the 
 latter. His was not that power of blending 
 European and national culture into a new and 
 harmonious composition. That power is distinc- 
 tively the characteristics of the classical writers 
 of nations. It belongs only to the highest form 
 of genius. But the reading public of the 
 " Karthausi" was largely recruited from amongst 
 people in whom that conflict between western 
 and Magyar culture had likewise not been brought 
 to a harmonious issue. They thus found in the 
 great novel that very failing of their own class, 
 without which, according to Grillparzer's profound 
 remark, success is hardly obtainable In any 
 profession. 
 
 In 1845, Eotvos published another great novel: 
 "The Village Notary" ("A falu jegyzoje"). It 
 was meant to be a scathing satire on the corrup- 
 tion, backwardness and general administrative
 
 iSo HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 misery of public county life in Hungary. Eotvos, 
 whose conceptions of the state and its organs were 
 formed largely after the models of German, 
 Austrian and French organizations, was deeply 
 convinced of the utter insufficiency of that local 
 selfgovernment, which in Hungary had nearly 
 always been one of greater independence than 
 that even of England. In Hungary all the lead- 
 ing and influential officials in the counties were 
 elective, and from among the noble class of the 
 county only. Being more than underpaid, they 
 frequently abused their power, and contrived to 
 secure a relatively large income by means of 
 exactions and terrorizations of all kinds. The 
 typical figure of these squires was the szolgabird, 
 or under-sheriff, as he may be termed, if with 
 inaccuracy, who presided over nearly all the public 
 affairs of one of the districts into which counties 
 are divided. His administration was frequently 
 carried on pasha fashion indeed ; and the poorer 
 classes were much at his mercy. Eotvos, who 
 thought that the strongly centralized and system- 
 atized organization of French or German local 
 governments was undoubtedly much superior 
 to the system obtaining in Hungary, published 
 his novel with the intention of bringing about 
 a change in public opinion, and so finally a 
 change in the county-system itself. To the 
 immense benefits accruing to the Hungarians as a
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 151 
 
 nation through the very system of local self- 
 government which Eotvos so cruelly exposed, he 
 was insensible. That county-life, in spite of all 
 its crying abuses, was the only and indispensable 
 preliminary schooling for the functions of govern- 
 ment in council or parliament ; that these rough 
 and uncultured county-gentry in Hungary, as well 
 as their brethren in England, were far better fitted 
 for some of the most important tasks of govern- 
 ment and politics than the most methodic and 
 punctual official in French or German local offices, 
 to all that Eotvos paid no serious attention. His 
 warm-hearted love of Equality and Right made 
 him boil over at the sight of many an injustice — 
 at the hands of men whose inferiority in point of 
 knowledge and western culture rendered them easy 
 objects of contempt to one who gauged all political 
 greatness by the standard of France or Germany. 
 Eotvos, the politician, entertained of course the 
 same ideas about the value of the old Hungarian 
 county-system, as did Eotvos the novelist. He 
 was a " centralist " ; and the number of his 
 followers has been very great to the present day. 
 They still maintain that even the present remnants 
 of the old county-system in Hungary are very 
 injurious to the Magyar state ; and that nothing 
 short of a total overhauling, or — to talk plainly — 
 abolition of that system, and the introduction of 
 French centralization in its lieu can save the
 
 1 52 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 kingdom of St. Stephen. In more recent times 
 the historic work of Bela Grunwald on the social 
 and political condition of Hungary from 171 1 to 
 1825 ("A rcgi Magyarorszdg"') has elaborated the 
 ideas of Eotvos with the armoury of learned foot- 
 notes and systematic chapters. The novel of 
 Eotvos is still the text of all the loud centralists 
 in Hungary, to whom the county selfgovernment 
 is an absurd anachronism. As a matter of fact, 
 on the continent, Hungary is the only country 
 where local selfgovernment is. still extant. Nor 
 can there be any doubt, that that local self- 
 government alone enabled the Magyars to hold 
 their supremacy over the numerically stronger 
 nations in their country. Taking the British 
 constitution as the model of all representative 
 government, we cannot go astray in claiming for 
 such government three absolutely indispensable 
 elements. First, a parliament proper, consisting 
 of two Chambers or Houses ; secondly, a cabinet 
 proper ; and thirdly, two or three real and 
 energetic political parties, the numerous members 
 of which take an intense interest in every one of 
 the political issues of the day. Applying this 
 standard to the United States, for instance, we 
 find, that the Americans while having a federal, 
 two-chambered parliament and also two or more 
 genuine parties, yet have no Cabinet proper ; and 
 hence many of the features of political corruption
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 153 
 
 that were rampant in England in the times from 
 Charles II. to George III., when the Cabinet was 
 still forming, and not yet formed, may be noticed 
 in the United States at the present day. In the 
 same way France has a Cabinet indeed, and also 
 a two-chambered parliament ; but genuine political 
 parties, with members intensely interested in 
 politics, are wanting. Hence the instability and 
 irregularity of the French representative govern- 
 ment. In Hungary, and there alone, the student 
 of politics will find a perfect replica of the British 
 constitution, in that the fine superstructure of 
 Parliament and Cabinet is based on the broad 
 pedestal of genuine political parties. The mem- 
 bers of these parties take a real, passionate and 
 untiring interest in political questions of any kind, 
 and hence there is a real public opinion, a real 
 nation. This basis of the political life in Hungary, 
 where has it been quarried from but in the local 
 selfgovernment of the counties? Interest in the 
 mostly arid questions of politics can be acquired 
 only by early and constant contact with men who 
 make it almost the chief interest of their lives. It 
 is in the county halls, and in the social reunions 
 of the county-gentry, that the young Magyars 
 learn the great lesson of dispensing authority, com- 
 manding respect and discussing public business 
 with tact and prudence. It is there that men were 
 formed who could at all times find resources to
 
 i 5 4 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 withstand the anti-national policy of the Habs- 
 burgs or the occasional rebellions of the Slav or 
 Roumanian peasantry. Of the country-gentlemen 
 in Hungary indeed may be said, what Macaulay 
 wrote of the English esquire of the seventeenth 
 century : that " his ignorance and uncouthness, his 
 low tastes and gross phrases, would, in our time, 
 be considered as indicating a nature and a 
 breeding thoroughly plebeian. Yet he was essenti- 
 ally a patrician, and had, in large measure, both 
 the virtues and vices which flourish among men 
 set from their birth in high place, and accustomed 
 to authority, to observance and to self-respect." 
 [History of England, Ch. III.) It was amongst 
 these rough squires that the two great parties of 
 England were formed. It was likewise amongst 
 the much derided tdblabirok and szolgabirok 
 (squires and justices) of Hungary, that the men of 
 1825 and 1848 were formed ; and in our time they 
 have given Hungary one of the indispensable 
 elements of representative government: real 
 political parties. 
 
 It appears necessary to dwell at some length 
 on the great historic and political questions under- 
 lying the famous novel of Eotvos. No doubt, 
 every Hungarian cannot but wish to see that 
 novel in the hands of all who take an interest in 
 Hungary. For, "The Village Notary" contains 
 capital portraits of many a quaint, wild or pathetic
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 155 
 
 type of inner Hungary. The down-trodden notary 
 (Tengelyi) ; the tyrannical szolgabird (or squire) 
 Paul Nyuz6 (meaning : flayer) ; Viola, the honest 
 peasant, who being shamefully wronged betakes 
 himself to the forest and pusztas (prairies) to lead 
 the life of a robber ; Mrs. Rety, the wife of the 
 chief magistrate of the county, who is entangled in 
 a fearful domestic tragedy, etc., etc. Moreover, the 
 novel contains excellent pieces of irony and satire ; 
 and being reared on the broad idea of social 
 reform never sinks to mere pamphleteering. Yet, 
 with all that, we cannot but protest against the 
 misstatement of the political importance of county- 
 life in Hungary as advanced in that novel. Fully 
 acknowledging, as we do, its literary value, which 
 is diminished only by the heavy and un-Magyar 
 diction, we deprecate its judgment on an institu- 
 tion without which Hungary would have long been 
 reduced to the level of a mere province of Austria. 
 Eotvos, like most idealists bred in the school of 
 German idealism, could not endure rough Reality. 
 He forgot, that for the making of history, as for 
 that of bread, unclean matter is, at certain 
 stages, an indispensable element. 
 
 We have two more novels by Eotvos : " Hungary 
 in 15 14" (" Magyarorszdg 15 14 ben" 1847), which 
 is a fair picture of the time of the peasant-rebellion 
 in Hungary, under George Dozsa ; and " The 
 Sisters" ("A ndverek" 1857), a feeble story with 
 many ideas on Education.
 
 156 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 On Eotvos, as a writer on politics, and the 
 Philosophy of History, see page 251. It may 
 here be mentioned that Eotvos, who was President 
 of the Academy, was frequently called upon to 
 deliver commemorative discourses on the lives 
 and merits of deceased members of the Academy 
 and the Kisfaludy Society (see page 113). His 
 speeches are, as a rule, of great oratorical power, 
 and illuminated with grand conceptions of Life 
 and Literature. He was eminently an orator, not 
 a rhetor ; and although he seldom reached the 
 magnificence of Kolcsey (see page 107), he is no 
 unworthy follower of him.
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 At the present day most people of culture out- 
 side Hungary know the name of Jokai, the 
 Hungarian novelist ; few, if any, know the name 
 of Sigismund Kemeny. Yet, of the two, Kemeny 
 is probably the greater writer. He is the Balzac 
 of Hungary, less Balzac's fame. For, strange 
 to say, in Hungary itself, the novels of Kemeny 
 are very little known ; and although several 
 Magyar critics of the highest authority have 
 declared Kemeny to be the greatest novelist of 
 the Hungarians, yet the reading public in Hun- 
 gary neither buys nor reads the masterpieces 
 of the Transylvanian baron. This lack of general 
 appreciation seems to be somewhat inherent in the 
 very kind of genius possessed by men like Balzac 
 and Kem6ny. The former, it is true, has a well- 
 known name, and his works have spread over 
 Europe and America. Yet, even in France, the 
 full grandeur of his genius has not yet been 
 recognized. Balzac has, as yet, no statue in 
 Paris, which city he has described more ingeniously
 
 158 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 than any other writer. Even in his native town 
 of Tours his statue was erected only in quite 
 recent times. The Academie has never admitted 
 him within her circle ; and the French are not yet 
 aware that in Balzac they have their Shakespeare 
 in prose. Indeed, nobody short of Shakespeare 
 will stand comparison with the gigantic genius of 
 Balzac. Both have created a long series of grand 
 types of humanity endowed with an undying life 
 and charm of their own. To both the secrets 
 and puzzles of the human soul were transparent ; 
 and both had the powers of philosophic analysis 
 and poetic synthesis in equal shares. Shakespeare, 
 too, had to bide his time ; and twenty-eight years 
 after his death, John Milton does not even mention 
 his dramas as necessary reading for a young gentle- 
 man's education. Considering, then, the fate of 
 Balzac in France, with an eager reading public 
 immeasurably more numerous than that of Hun- 
 gary, we need not wonder that Kemeny suffered 
 with tenfold intensity from the drawbacks peculiar 
 to his Balzacian genius. 
 
 We said, Kemeny is the Balzac of Hungary. 
 We did not say, he was equal to Balzac. In 
 Hungary a full-fledged Balzac can as yet not be 
 expected. No amount of native genius will enable 
 a man to overcome obstacles such as stand in 
 the way of him who should undertake to do for 
 Hungarian society what Balzac did for French.
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 159 
 
 The France of Louis-Philippe was infinitely better 
 adapted to the writing of its " Come'die Jiumaine" 
 than the Hungary of Kemefiy's time. 
 
 Hungary is far from being as homogeneous as 
 is France. In the latter country, despite much 
 variety in language and social institutions, there 
 is one pervading common spirit in all classes 
 and peoples of the state. Whether Norman or 
 Gascon, the citizen of France is chiefly a French- 
 man, with distinctly French ideas and sentiments. 
 France is the country of the French. Hungary 
 is not the country of the Hungarians ; it is a 
 trysting-place of nations rather than the country 
 of one nation. There are not only classes and 
 ranks, but each class or rank differs according to 
 the nation it belongs to. The Magyar bourgeois 
 is not like the Slav bourgeois ; and both differed, 
 especially in Kemeny's time, from the German 
 bourgeois. No one, certainly not Kem£ny, can 
 claim an intimate knowledge of all the nations 
 in Hungary ; and thus no one has, as yet, so 
 profoundly impregnated himself with as immense 
 an array of social facts as had Balzac before he 
 wrote his great novels. Balzac knew the entire 
 anatomy and physiology of the peasant, the 
 soldier, the clergyman, the provincial, the Parisian, 
 the maid, the concierge, the bourgeoise, the grande 
 dame, the actress, the scholar, the lawyer, the 
 speculator, the vivcur, the diplomatist — in short,
 
 160 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 of every shade of character that went to form 
 French society. In Hungary, such a knowledge 
 could not be acquired. Familiarity with ten to 
 twelve languages is required to know the full 
 anatomy and physiology of the peasants in Hun- 
 gary alone. To do, therefore, for Hungarian 
 society what Balzac had done for French ; to 
 write the Hungarian " Comedie Jiumaine" has so 
 far been practically impossible ; nor did Kemeny 
 do it. And yet, within the narrow limits of his 
 arena, Kemeny worked with the spirit and genius 
 of Balzac. That his capacity was essentially 
 akin to that of the great French writer there 
 can be no doubt. It was not of the same compre- 
 hensiveness. Balzac had humour and wit ; 
 Kemeny had none. Balzac had an exquisite 
 sense of proportion, if not always in his style, at 
 least always in the architecture of his plot ; 
 Kemeny had not. Balzac was an encyclopaedist 
 of the human heart, in that he knew women as well 
 as men ; Kemeny knew men far better than women. 
 Balzac's range of observation being greater, his 
 mind was subtler even than that of Kemeny. 
 Yet, with all that, Kem^ny's genius was essentially 
 akin to that of Balzac. He, too, had that vast 
 knowledge of historic events and that interest in 
 scientific researches that suggested to Balzac 
 innumerable shades and innuendoes of thought, 
 and aper^us on every form and phase of life.
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 161 
 
 Kemtmy, like Balzac, had studied much in books 
 and nature and man ; he also had that love of 
 realism — that following up of mental or emotional 
 waves into their minutest recesses in the face or 
 voice or gestures of persons. The outward or 
 material appearance of man : his dress, house, 
 arms, art-work, or contrivances were a matter of 
 profound study to Kem6ny, as they were to Balzac. 
 Although intensely analytical, he is equally great 
 at and fond of descriptions. He paints nature, 
 more especially that of his beloved Transylvania, 
 as one intimate with mountains, rivers and forests. 
 He knows their language and physiognomy ; 
 his landscapes are like the choruses in Greek 
 tragedies. They form part of the scenes ; not 
 only of the scenery. They are like the contra- 
 puntal bass to the melodies of his novels. But 
 in what Kemeny resembles Balzac most is his 
 inexorableness. There is no other word for it. 
 In nearly all his novels, as in .most of those of 
 Balzac, man is crushed down pitilessly, remorse- 
 lessly. Without making any deliberate show of 
 pessimism, Kemeny is intensely pessimistic. As 
 in Balzac the overpowering demon of modern 
 times is money, after which all crave, all run and 
 rush, jostling, panting, jading ; so in Kemeny, the 
 bane of man appears under the form of those small 
 mistakes and errors which dig the grave of all 
 hopes. The great passions, vices and crimes do
 
 i6 2 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 not, in Kemeny's novels, act as the causes of the 
 final downfall of his heroes or heroines. His 
 heroes do not die from strokes of lightning, shoot- 
 ing- forth from the black clouds of their terrible 
 passions or heinous crimes. On the contrary : 
 such lightnings rather illumine their road to 
 success. They end, as it were, through a fire 
 caused by a carelessly dropped match. The ghastly 
 irony of real life, which no unbiassed observer can 
 have failed to notice, is shown in his novels in all 
 its terrible working. The melancholy of Eotvos 
 is sweet and soothing ; the gloom of Kem6ny is 
 discomforting, distressing, just because Kem6ny 
 never seems to be deliberately pessimistic. While 
 reading his novels, the reader is so struck with the 
 beauty of those gems of original and profound 
 ideas and remarks, which Keme^ny strews in pro- 
 digious abundance over the objects and persons 
 of his novels, that the persistent gloom and 
 despair dominating nearly all his works, do not 
 become so painful to the reader. It is when we 
 have finished the book ; when we overlook the 
 whole of the plan ; when we have laid our ear 
 on the throbbing heart of each of the persons 
 with whom we had been through several yolumes ; 
 it is when the novel in its entirety has entered our 
 mind, that we feel deserted by all hopefulness, 
 and embittered by the foul destiny reigning over 
 man's best efforts. There can be but little doubt
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 163 
 
 that the indifference, with which Kemeny has been 
 so far received in Hungary, is- largely owing to his 
 pessimism. The Hungarians, like the English, 
 have little idiosyncrasy for pessimism. This mood 
 of viewing 1 things is the outcome of mental 
 struGrcdes, from which the better minds of both 
 countries have been saved by their intense political 
 life. Pessimism is eminently the nursling of 
 thought. In Hungary there is, as in England, 
 much more acting than thinking. Whatever there 
 may be of pessimism in the Hungarians is used 
 up in some of their superbly-despondent folk- 
 songs. For Kemeny's pessimism the time has 
 not yet come. Perhaps he would have impressed 
 his contemporaries far more deeply had he chosen 
 not to write historic novels. Nearly all of his 
 great novels are historic novels. As history, they 
 are really incomparable. If we possessed a hun- 
 dred historic novels, describing a hundred import- 
 ant periods of general history, in the manner, 
 with the graphic power and true intimacy with 
 the past, so peculiar to Kemeny, we should know 
 history infinitely better. Kemeny has something 
 of the erudition of a Gierke or John Selden, with 
 the plastic descriptiveness of a great painter. 
 Read his Transylvanian novels, and you have a 
 clearer, more vivid and more correct knowledge 
 of Transylvanian history in the sixteenth and 
 seventeenth centuries than you could gather from 
 
 L
 
 1 64 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 the study of the various chroniclers and memoir- 
 writers of that time, such as Reicherstorffer, Sche- 
 saeus, Sigler, Heltai (see page 47), Verantius, Tinody 
 (see page 47), Somogyi (Ambrosius), Stephen 
 Szamoskozy, Nicolas Olah, Zsamboky, Michael 
 Brutus, Francis Forgach, Nicolas Istvanffy, Francis 
 Miko, Gregory Pettho, Kraus, the Bethlens, Haner, 
 etc. Kemeny is thus one of the best historians 
 of Hungary. Nor can we think much less of him 
 as a novelist. He engages our interest in the 
 characters of his tales ; they work on our imagina- 
 tion, they appeal to our hearts. More particularly 
 to Hungarians, the actors of Kemeny's novels 
 appear as individuals full of charm and significance. 
 To use one of Ben Jonson's happy phrases, they 
 are " rammed with life " — life national, patriotic, his- 
 toric. And yet, with all these commanding excel- 
 lencies in his novels, Kemeny has, there can be little 
 doubt, committed a grave blunder in literary 
 strategy, in investing the output of his vast 
 intellectual mines in historic novels. Had he 
 been less of a historian, he might have written 
 his historic novels at a smaller loss of literary 
 efficiency. His very greatness as a historian 
 debarred him from approaching Balzac still more 
 closely. For his faithfulness as a historian pre- 
 vented him from elaborating fully those types of 
 humanity, the creation of which is Balzac's glory. 
 Such types cannot, as a rule, be found in history.
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 165 
 
 History, or that part of reality in which human 
 beings are the actors, is full of blurred types 
 of mongreldom and bastardy. No line in the 
 features of man, as a real phenomenon, is drawn 
 out purely and to its legitimate term ; good and 
 bad, sublime and vile, sentiments and deeds, are 
 lumbering higgledy piggledy across each other. 
 The poet or artist, who is truest to reality, is un- 
 truest to poetry and art. At all times the attempt 
 at realism in art has landed where has the attempt 
 at materialism in philosophy — in impotence. His- 
 toric novels, if very historic, as are these of 
 Kemeny, must thus necessarily benumb the creative 
 power of the poet. And so they have. Had 
 Kemeny, instead of the past, embraced the pres- 
 ent ; had he followed in the wake of Balzac in 
 fetching from the depth of Hungarian humanity 
 some of the arch-types of European humanity, as 
 was done by the author of " Pcre Goriot" with 
 regard to French humanity, Kemeny would stand 
 out as one of the greatest writers of European 
 literature. As it is, he is only one of the great 
 writers of Hungarian Literature. What is perhaps 
 more astonishing still in that choice of the historic 
 novel by Kemeny, is the fact that he was for 
 years engaged in a profession than which very 
 few can attach us more intently to actual, present 
 life. Kemeny was one of the most influential 
 and hardest-worked political journalists of his
 
 166 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 time. In the columns of the " Pesti Naplo" 
 he poured out, in astounding profusion, leading 
 articles about all the great events and persons 
 of his time. In these articles he showed pro- 
 found knowledge of the very pulse and heart of 
 his age ; and such was his power of exposition, 
 analysis and appreciation of the fleeting occur- 
 rences of the day, that his political articles have 
 been a matter of admiration both to his con- 
 temporaries and subsequent historians. As a rule, 
 great politicians do not write historic novels. 
 They are too much imbued with the spirit of their 
 own age, in the direction of which they have had 
 no small share, to be inclined, or even able, 
 to familiarise themselves with the spirit of ages 
 bygone. Kemeny is an exception, and while this 
 certainly testifies to the comprehensiveness of his 
 mind, it renders the strategic mistake above 
 mentioned more marked still. 
 
 We must abstain from giving a detailed 
 account of his novels. Their plots are, by them- 
 selves, simple, if not purely on the lines of the 
 historic events which they relate. Their author, 
 like Balzac, excels chiefly in psychology and 
 analysis ; and although the dialogue is not 
 neglected, it is not made the centre of the tale. 
 In " Gyulai Pdl" (1846) is shown the struggle 
 between a noble and high-minded statesman and 
 his ambition. In the attempt at saving his prince,
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 167 
 
 Sigismund Bathori, from the latter's rival, Balthesar 
 Bathori, Gyulai plunges into a series of crimes, 
 and mortally wounds the heart of his idol, 
 Eleonore, who finally brings about his execution. 
 In "The Widow and Her Daughter" {As ozvegy 
 es lednya" 1857) is told, and with greater regard 
 to form and architecture than in Kemeny's other 
 novels, the tragedy of the family of Mikes. A 
 subject admirably suited to the gloom of Kemeny's 
 mental atmosphere is treated in his " The Fana- 
 tics" ("A rajongok" 1859), a story of the curious 
 sect of the Sabbatarians in Transylvania in the 
 fourth decade of the seventeenth century (cf. page 
 55). The Macchiavellian prime minister, Kassai, on 
 the one hand, and the rich and mystic Simon Pecsi, 
 the head of the Sabbatarians, with his beautiful 
 daughter Deborah, on the other, are amongst the 
 leading persons of this terrible novel. No less 
 appalling in its way is " Rough Times " (Zord 
 idol" 1862), in which the capture of the Hungarian 
 capital, Buda, by the Turks, is told with magnifi- 
 cent power. In the short novels of Kemeny, taking 
 up subjects of modern time (" Love and Vanity " 
 [" Szerelem es hiusdg"~\\ "Husband and Wife" 
 [" Ferj es no "] ; " The Abysses of the Heart " 
 ["A sziv drvenyei"J) ; as well as in his smaller 
 tales, such as "Virtue and Convention" (" Ereny 
 es illem")\ "Two Happy Persons" (" Ket bol- 
 dog"); "A//ii Ki/iet" (a proper name), etc.,
 
 1 68 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE, 
 
 Kemeny likewise dwells on that fatalisme raisonne 
 as it might be called, that does not permit 
 him, or very rarely, to tarry over the sunny 
 moments of life. Writers like Kemeny, in quite 
 modern times, have found means of gently veiling 
 their inner despondency by light touches of melan- 
 choly, as is done by Maeterlinck ; or by fine 
 irony, as used by Anatole France. In Kemeny 
 there is no mercy, not even that of irony. His 
 novels are like the gigantic inundations of the 
 Theiss river in Hungary : you see the floods 
 nearing, often noiselessly, but with distressing 
 rapidity, and in all directions ; there is no escaping 
 them ; in their inexorable progress they roll 
 onward like a host of innumerable serpents, 
 stifling life and levelling down everything to the 
 sameness of death. When Kemeny died (1875), 
 on his small paternal estate of Puszta-Kamaras, 
 in Transylvania, he had himself long been buried 
 by the floods of mental derangement. Reality 
 had shown him no pity either.
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 The poets and writers of the Magyars, whom we 
 have been studying in the preceding chapters, were, 
 in a lesser or higher degree, authors of works 
 whose excellence was, to a large extent, of a rela- 
 tive, or national and not of an absolute character. 
 We now approach the study of Alexander 
 Petofi. His was a genius which, perhaps alone 
 amongst Hungarian writers, so completely blended 
 the peculiar national excellencies of Magyar 
 poetry with the broader features of European 
 literary greatness, as to entitle him to the admi- 
 ration of all who can feel poetic beauty, irrespective 
 of nationality or even language. Real poetry, 
 like real music, appeals to all nations, and to 
 all times. In Petofi there is real poetry. Other 
 poets are felicitous in expression, and the 
 musical cadence of their diction endears them 
 to their compatriots. Others again create one 
 or two poetical types the charm of which lends 
 grace and interest to even insignificant verses. 
 Many more poets again play on religious, moral,
 
 i 7 o HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 or patriotic sentiments, and thus appeal to the 
 hearts or imagination of readers with whom such 
 sentiments easily wax overwhelming. In Petofi 
 there is more than all that. His language is 
 rich and beautiful ; yet it is not in his language 
 that he excels. He never or very seldom 
 borrows effect from appeals to morals or 
 religion. He creates poetical phenomena — that 
 is all. Where before him nobody ever surmised 
 any poetic phenomena at all, there he conjures up 
 a whole fairy-world of poetic conceptions, figures, 
 events, or scenes. The true poet discovers the new 
 land by creating it. In Nature herself there is no 
 more poetry than in a grocer's shop. Nor is there 
 a trace of any other thought in Nature. There is 
 no philosophy in it and no mathematics. Heaven 
 alone knows how Nature is carrying on her busi- 
 ness. She is the most wasteful of managers, and yet 
 she is never bankrupt. She is as heedless as the 
 most thoughtless of business men, and yet traces 
 of profound thought appear to be discoverable in 
 her dealings. And so the mathematician, or the 
 physicist arrives at neatly limbed formulae ex- 
 pressing so-called laws of Nature. Yet nothing 
 can be more certain than that Nature herself is 
 not acting on the lines of laws. To us, to 
 human beings, it appears convenient and useful 
 to bracket some o( the happenings of infinite 
 Nature between logical ideas, thereby giving us
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 171 
 
 the satisfaction of " understanding " those happen- 
 ings. Nature abhors being understood, yet by 
 dint of an irrepressible desire of man, thinkers 
 will always attempt at construing her by dressing 
 up natural phenomena in the jackets of formulae 
 and in the petticoats of concepts. 
 
 It is even so with poetry. There is no poetry 
 whatever in Nature. All poetry is invented and 
 created by man, just as all music is. He who 
 invents the greatest number of events, scenes, 
 or types that strike men as being poetical, is the 
 greatest of poets. It is impossible to say how 
 he invents them ; nor can he or anybody else 
 say where, that is, with relation to what spot, 
 creature, or phenomenon of Nature he will invent 
 them. One thing alone is certain, he must invent 
 them. For centuries before Petofi was born, 
 Hungary had had the same mixed population ; 
 the same mountains ; the same mighty rivers 
 and lakes ; and the same mysterious puszta, which 
 to Petofi suggested an astounding number of 
 exquisite poems. He alone " understood their 
 mystic language;" that is, he alone invented the 
 poetry to the substratum of Nature ; he alone 
 wrote the thrilling drama to the dumb flies 
 and staging of Nature in Hungary. He sees 
 an old ram-shackle inn in the midst of the 
 pnszta. To the ordinary mortal the inn is sug- 
 gestive of nothing more than the expectation
 
 172 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 of a poor dinner, of a bad bedstead, of uncanny 
 companions. To an ordinary poet it may suggest 
 images of decay or regret, more or less poetical. 
 To Petofi it suggests intensely poetical scenes of 
 life exuberant or decadent; the inn (" csdrda") is 
 transfigured by him into a living being ; every 
 one of its corners commences to breathe poetry, 
 music, reminiscences and forebodings. So new 
 and individual a creation is thus made of that 
 wayside inn, that the painter may find in it 
 new subjects for his canvas, and the musician 
 new themes for his lyre. Wherever Petofi is 
 touched by nature or society, he responds by 
 the creation of poetic phenomena. The wind 
 blowing over the plains of Hungary is, in truth, 
 inarticulate ; in wafting through the body and 
 soul of the incomparable poet it turns, as if 
 directed through the pipes of an organ at the 
 hands of a Bach, to melancholy fugues and 
 majestic oratorios. And so with everything. 
 Petofi sings love in hundreds of poems, yet he 
 was scarcely ever loved by woman. For nearer 
 as woman is to Nature, she is also more realistic 
 and less charged with poetry than man. What 
 then could she do with one who had unloaded into 
 the chests of his youthful soul all the treasures 
 of poetry, but none of gold ? This, however, far 
 from deterring Petofi or disgusting him, rather 
 stimulated him. He loved much ; that is, he
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 173 
 
 loved little. Love was for him, like the puszta, 
 the Theiss river and the Carpathian mountains, 
 an immense suggestiveness ; an ocean, the crossing 
 of which led to the discovery of new continents 
 of poetry. Nearly all the pretty or interesting 
 women whom he met, whether the lawless gipsy- 
 girl, the actress, the coy bourgeoise, the lady, 
 the peasant-girl or the hostelry-maid, he loved 
 them all or thought he did. And this was 
 owing not to his extreme youth — he died when 
 six-and-twenty — but to his passion for poetic 
 creativeness. Everyone of the types of women 
 just mentioned served him as an occasion for 
 creating one of those scenes as replete with life 
 poetic as are forests or rivers with life natural. 
 In one sense indeed he was right in saying that 
 he was " the wild flower of boundless Nature " 
 (" A korldttalan termcszel- Vadvirdga vagyok en "). 
 His mode of creation was quite on the lines of 
 that of Nature. A poem grew out of his mind 
 as does a violet out of the ground. In him there 
 is no reflection, no machinery, no hesitation. 
 Every line rolls on with the assurance and self- 
 contentedness of a rose-leaf budding forth 
 from the stem. He has the meditated careless- 
 ness of Nature, and also her freshness, her 
 immediateness and spontaneity. More particu- 
 larly, he is like Nature in Hungary. From the 
 heights of thought as lofty as the peaks of the
 
 i 7 4 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 Carpathian mountains, and as chilling as those 
 snow-clad solitudes (see his superb philosophic 
 flashes in the poems written at Szalk Szt Marton, 
 in 1846), he descends into the tiny nest of homely- 
 sentiments as does a lark into the furrow. 
 His indignation, patriotic or otherwise, is as 
 terrible as are the inundations of the Theiss ; 
 and side by side with poems flaming with uncon- 
 trollable fire and restlessness are poems full of 
 oriental calm and staid repose. Yet, in the 
 poet's own opinion, he resembled most the 
 puszta or immense plain of Hungary. Petofi, 
 who had tramped over nearly every part of 
 his country, gave, in a magnificent poem, the 
 palm of beauty to the steppes and pampas of 
 central and southern Hungary. The puszta in 
 Hungary is really a series of some three 
 thousand pusztas, of which the most famous 
 is that of Hortobagy, near Debreczen, the 
 praises of which Petofi has sung in various 
 exquisite poems. These pusztas differ very 
 much in physical character ; some are covered 
 with rich wheat-fields, tobacco plantations, or 
 maize-forests ; others again are swamps, or 
 natron-ponds, or again waste lands, or heaths. 
 This diversity of abundance and penury, ecstasy of 
 nature and dreary desert, squares well with the 
 rhapsodic temper of the Magyars in general, 
 and that of Petofi in particular. After miles
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 175 
 
 and miles of deadly silence, the traveller enters 
 one of the bustling " market-towns," full of the 
 eccentric and picturesque types of the puszta. 
 There is the dignified farmer or peasant, with 
 his smart, coquettish, and light-tongued wife, or 
 mennyecske (" little heaven ") ; there are the various 
 shepherds and keepers of sheep (" bojtdr"), oxen 
 ("gulyds"), swine ("koudds"), or horses Q'csikos"), 
 each in his particular costume and each a different 
 type of the Hungarian Bedouin. The " bojtdr" 
 tending the immense herds of sheep and lambs 
 in the pampas, is mild-tempered, musical and 
 full of secret medical lore. The animals under 
 his care are frequently ill, and he watches their 
 instinctive ways of picking out the herbs that 
 will cure them. So he acquires a knowledge of 
 herbs and an insight into nature which makes 
 him appear a wizard. The "^////vzV tends the 
 big cattle, oxen and bulls, and is naturally a 
 rough fellow, fond of fight and of wild rollicking. 
 He frequently wrestles with enraged bulls that 
 have fled into the swamps, or with the poachers 
 and robbers roaming over the puszta. The 
 " kondds " is the lowest type of those herdsmen. 
 He is sullen, hard of access, and irascible, and 
 easily turns into a robber. The most brilliant type 
 is the " csi'&os." He tends the immense herds of 
 horses browsing in the prairies of Hungary. As 
 the violin and the furulya (or sort of piccolo) are
 
 176 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 the national instruments of the Magyars, so the 
 horse is their national animal. " The Magyar is 
 created for being on horseback " (lora termett a 
 magyar), the Hungarian proverb holds. Peasant 
 or nobleman, all are keen horsemen, and so 
 intense is their love of the horse that, like Arabs, 
 Hungarian poets treat the horse as a poetical 
 character. The csikos is dashing, quick at repartee, 
 an excellent dancer and singer or rather impro- 
 visatore, and grown to his horse. He knows every 
 patch of his puszta, and every trick and dodge 
 of horse-dealing and — horse-stealing. The girls 
 idolize him. In his fluttering, highly-coloured 
 costume, he is the very martial, bold and provok- 
 ing youth whom girls will worship. Amidst these 
 types of the puszta, none the least fascinating is 
 the " szegeny legeny" or " poor lad." He is the 
 robber and brigand of the puszta, and the romantic 
 interest attaching to him grows out of the belief 
 that he took to his lawless profession after 
 having been thwarted in life or baffled in love. 
 But of all the phenomena of the puszta, the 
 Fata Morgana, or mirage, in Hungarian " dHi 
 bdb" is the most striking. On a sultry afternoon 
 in summer, cities appear in mid-heaven, images 
 of towers and castles, immense lakes and forests. 
 They shine sometimes with a peculiar, supermun- 
 dane lustre, and the traveller thinks he is walking 
 in fairy-land. Then suddenly they disappear. 
 Such is the puszta.
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 177 
 
 The influence of the puszta on the Magyar 
 poets is undeniable ; and Petofi, more than any 
 other Hungarian poet, seems to be the high- 
 priest and devotee of the peculiar charms of the 
 great plain. The real relation, however, between 
 the poet and his country is that between the 
 traveller and the mirage. It is in the eyes of 
 the former that the latter is forming, and there 
 alone. Petofi creates the Fata Morgana, with 
 which he fills the vast horizon of his beloved 
 puszta. Although professionally a lyric poet, his 
 lyrics are of the purely objective kind. Many of 
 his best poems might be told in prose, and in 
 any other language, without losing much of their 
 charm. There is, in his best works, an abiding 
 fond of poetry, quite independent of the music 
 or picturesqueness of his words, or the striking- 
 ness of his similes. Heine, in his best moments, 
 rivals without always equalling him. Petofi's 
 poems are mostly very short ; they, as it were, 
 only state the poetic scene which then works on 
 the imagination or heart of the reader quite alone. 
 When Heine speaks of the lonely pine-tree stand- 
 ing on the snow-covered heights of the north, 
 dreaming of a palm perched in the far east on 
 a rock burning with the heat of the sun of the 
 desert, he strikes a chord that will vibrate 
 in us long after and beyond the two simple 
 stanzas in which he tells the story of the
 
 178 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 two trees. This is objective poetry. It is in 
 this that Petofi excels. Already in some of his 
 earliest poems he writes perfect objective poetry. 
 In " The Stolen Horse " (" Lopott 16" 1843) we are 
 told of one of those fleeting scenes in puszta-life, 
 in which the poet by seizing the pregnant point 
 where present, past and future meet, gives us 
 the story of several lives in words so few as to 
 seem insufficient for the telling even of a short 
 anecdote. A csikos dashes on a stolen horse over 
 the vast plain. The rich owner of the noble 
 animal, happening to pass by, recognizes his 
 property, and calls upon the csikos to stop and 
 surrender the horse. The fellow takes no heed, 
 and storms onward. Suddenly he stops, and 
 turning round to the owner, he exclaims, " Don't 
 miss your horse too badly ; you have so many 
 of them. One heart was in my breast, and alas ! 
 your daughter has wrecked it ; " and disappears 
 in the desert. The story of the poor boy's love 
 for the haughty daughter of the rich man, her 
 cruelty, the father's pride, the boy's vengeance, 
 his entrance on the wild life of a " poor lad," 
 or robber ; all that is pictured and suggested 
 in the few words. In another poem, the first 
 line of which is " The wife of the inn-keeper 
 loved the vagabond " (" A csapldrosnc a betydrt 
 szerette, 1844), the whole tragedy of true love 
 thwarted by lawless love is told in a few lines.
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 179 
 
 The vagabond (" betydr" really " robber ") loves 
 the maid of the wife of an inn-keeper in the 
 puszta. The wife loves the robber, and being cut 
 by him, drives away the poor girl, who dies of 
 cold in the puszta. The robber thereupon kills the 
 woman, and dies on the gallows, without regret, 
 for "his life was no longer worth to him a pipe 
 of tobacco." Another poem describes the wild 
 rollicking of the boys in the village inn at night. 
 A knock is heard at the window, and a harsh 
 voice bids the boys to stop lest the quiet of 
 the squire be disturbed. The boys only hold 
 forth all the louder. Another knock at the 
 window is heard. In mild tones a man asks the 
 fellows to stop yelling, for his poor mother is ill. 
 At once all the frolic is at an end, and the boys 
 leave the inn. It is in such scenes, all expressed 
 in the simplest and yet idiomatic language, that 
 Petofi's genius shines forth. Of him indeed it 
 may be said that no colour, tint or instrument 
 with which to touch and stir up the human heart 
 was alien to him. Considering his extreme 
 youth and the intense gravity of his pathos, bis 
 exquisite and genuine humour is nothing short 
 of marvellous. It is the humour of a mature 
 mind, full of ripe suavity and mellow joyousness. 
 Of Petofi's humour we could not use Hood's 
 lines : 
 
 "There's not a string attuned to mirth 
 But has its chord in melancholy." 
 
 M
 
 i So HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 It is playful humour, laughing a broad, sound 
 laugh. He is not as witty as Heine or Byron, 
 but neither is he as cutting. In his famous 
 poem ridiculing the Magyar hidalgo ("A Magyar 
 nemes") there is nothing but broad thrusts of 
 a well-handled sword. There is no pricking with 
 needles, nor any guffaws of a satyr. 
 
 Literary critics in Hungary and elsewhere 
 have, in their anxiety for classification and cata- 
 loguing, placed Petofi amongst the so-called 
 folk-poets, and nothing is more frequent than a 
 comparison of Petofi with Burns and Beranger, the 
 cliaiisonniers of Scotland and France respectively. 
 However, the comparison is untenable. While 
 humour, pathos, tenderness and descriptive powers 
 will readily be accorded, and in great measure, 
 to the Scotch singer, he can hardly be compared 
 to Petofi in that distinctively creative power, 
 which not only touches sentiment, not only finds 
 charming words and images for things external 
 or internal, but also and chiefly discovers new 
 poetic continents, so to speak, new mines of 
 poetic gold. The very range of subjects covered 
 by the poetry of the Hungarian poet is consider- 
 ably wider than that of the Scotch bard ; and in 
 the last two years of his life Petofi was raised, 
 partly by his own genius and partly by the 
 events of his time, to the position of a nation's 
 prophet. This very position acted on his poetic
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 1S1 
 
 gifts with a force that Burns never experienced, 
 and accordingly, every comparison of the two 
 poets is radically false. The same remark 
 applies to Beranger. The entire atmosphere of 
 his famous chansons is so different from that of 
 Petofi's songs, as to render a comparison of the 
 two impossible. Beranger sings the glories of 
 the great Revolution and of Napoleon's time. He 
 is sweet, fresh, graceful, full of elan and smartness. 
 He creates a genre, a mode of poetry, but a 
 limited one. Petofi was impressed by both 
 poets ; he knew Burns and Beranger well, and 
 studied them, together with Shelley, Byron, and 
 Heine, pretty carefully. But he never imitated 
 them, and for the simple reason that he could 
 not do so. He was in the best sense of the 
 word, original, that is, creative. He could imitate 
 no one, and no one could imitate him. Petofi 
 cannot be classified ; he is a class by himself. 
 He cultivates, it is true, the manner and tone 
 of the folk-song ("ncpdal"), and so to superficial 
 critics he may appear only as the best folk- 
 song writer of Hungary. He is infinitely more 
 than that; in 1846, for instance, he did not 
 write a single " nepdal" (folk-song); he is Hun- 
 gary's greatest poet. In him is embodied the 
 entire poetical genius of a nation, in whose 
 single members we may frequently find the gift 
 of improvisation and poetic invention. The
 
 i8a HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 rhapsodic vein so conspicuous in the everyday life 
 
 of Hungary, and the exaggerations of which have 
 
 vitiated many an effort, literary or musical, 
 
 comes out in Petofi in its full vigour and full 
 
 beauty. Like all great poets, he is intensely 
 
 truthful. There is no sham whatever in him, 
 
 no affectation and no false note. His passion 
 
 is terribly real, and his mirth, true joy. 
 
 Nowhere can this absolute truthfulness be 
 
 noticed with greater clearness ; nowhere does it 
 
 shine forth more imposingly than in one of 
 
 Petofi's wildest, and apparently most exaggerated 
 
 poems, "The Madman" (" Az orult"). It is a 
 
 monologue of a mad Titan, whose fine intellect 
 
 has been unhinged by ingratitude of friends, 
 
 treachery of women, and undeserved reverses. 
 
 We do not hesitate to say that there is in the 
 
 whole range of European literature no other 
 
 single poem representing the demoniac charm 
 
 of a mind at once vigorous and diseased with 
 
 equal force and truth. Constantly moving on 
 
 the edges of abysses than which the human 
 
 mind or heart does not know any more appalling, 
 
 the " madman " yet talks with a power and 
 
 lucidity so overwhelming as to send through his 
 
 hearers the holy shivers of religious prostration. 
 
 Distorted in form, terribly true in substance ; 
 
 such is the character of this unique poem, in 
 
 which all the serpents of scorn and pain seem to
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 183 
 
 wriggle beneath the leaves of the beautiful 
 word-foliage. 
 
 From Petofi emanates the very soul of poetry 
 and of all art : enthusiasm, inspiration. After 
 having written comic epics, love-poems, and 
 genre-pictures with a success never before wit- 
 nessed, Petofi, on the approach of the revolutionary 
 period, wrote those inflammatory patriotic songs, 
 the power of which was officially recognized by 
 the Hungarian Government, who had enormous 
 numbers of Petofi's patriotic poetry printed at 
 their expense and distributed among the soldiers 
 of the revolutionary armies. His poems were 
 then a national event, and they may in justice be 
 compared to a series of different " Marseillaises." 
 
 We began our characterization of Petofi by 
 saying that he, perhaps alone amongst Hun- 
 garian writers, completely blended Hungarian with 
 European elements. We may now state the 
 reason of this his peculiar excellence. Petofi, like 
 all classical poets, while very great as a master 
 of form, owes less to the beauty or ornaments of 
 his language than to the objective beauty of his 
 imagery, personifications and poetic scenes. For 
 such as largely identify literature with great 
 word-feats, Virgil will be greater than Homer (as 
 was commonly believed in the seventeenth cen- 
 tury) ; Tennyson greater than Shelley ; Platen 
 greater than Heine ; and Arany (see page 194)
 
 x8 4 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 greater than Petofi. This is, however, not the 
 judgment of such as gauge poetic greatness by 
 the measure of objective beauty contained in a 
 given work. The importance of form in poetry 
 can hardly be exaggerated, and the necessity of 
 paying the closest attention to the rules of form 
 will be felt by no one more keenly than by the 
 student of Hungarian Literature. Yet in attempt- 
 ing to find a measure of comparison between 
 great poets, who all more or less excel in 
 form, there can be no doubt, that he who is 
 richer in objective beauty is also the superior 
 poet. It is this superiority that raises Petofi 
 head and shoulders not only over the rest of 
 the Hungarian poets, but also above most other 
 poetic writers of modern Europe. The types of 
 the pussta, which we have essayed to sketch 
 above, the women, and events of his time ; all 
 these and many more Magyar subjects were by 
 Petofi so objectivated, and given an independent 
 poetic existence of their own, that they cease to 
 be familiar to Hungarians only. They grow on 
 the German, French or English reader with 
 equal sympathy, and Petofi thus needs less 
 commentary for the foreigner than any other 
 Hungarian poet. His works are like the Hun- 
 garian Rhapsodies of Liszt, which appeal to 
 Americans with the same irresistible force as to 
 Magyars, as the present writer has had abundant
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 185 
 
 opportunity of experiencing in the United States. 
 Yet the same Magyar melodies and turbulent 
 cadences that Liszt, and Liszt alone, succeeded in 
 objectiv citing, utterly fail of effect in countries 
 other than Hungary when played by Hun- 
 garian gypsies in unadulterated Magyar fashion. 
 This, then, is the deepest and truest secret of 
 Petofi's immense power : while embracing mostly 
 Magyar subjects, he so objectivates them as to 
 render them enjoyable and sympathetic to non- 
 Magyar readers too. National poets inferior to 
 Petofi give their nation songs which other nations 
 too possess, and the only difference between them 
 is that of language. Petofi gave Hungary and 
 the rest of the civilized world what no nation 
 other than the Hungarian possesses. As the 
 Hungarian nation itself has an individuality so 
 marked and so different from the other nations 
 of Europe, as to entail upon it an historic and 
 social vocation sui generis, so the poems of 
 Petofi, as the most felicitous exponent of Hun- 
 garian nationality, add to the types of poetry 
 produced by other nations, a type, a species 
 so individual and so richly personal as to endow 
 it with a literary vocation altogether its own. 
 If we are to reduce this peculiarly Magyar 
 element to the precincts of a word, we should 
 say it is the rhapsodic element. By this we 
 mean a peculiar temper of the inspired mind
 
 1 86 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 pervading its joyous, humorous, meditative or 
 despondent moods alike. As Liszt is the greatest 
 exponent of this rhapsodic element in music, so 
 Petofi is in poetry. Most other rhapsodic poets 
 or musicians, Magyar or otherwise, have badly 
 failed, some by degenerating into rant or redun- 
 dancy, others by becoming formless. Petofi 
 alone succeeded in raising rhapsodies to the level 
 of true art. 
 
 It was said above that Petofi's works are not 
 in need of much commentary, even for the 
 foreigner. We may now add that the only com- 
 mentary needed is a knowledge of Petofi's life. 
 Petofi's short life as a poet was coeval with the 
 great awakening of the Magyar nation to the 
 full consciousness of its position and its rights. 
 He was born in 1823, in Kis-Koros, and was 
 the son of a well-to-do butcher, by the name of 
 Petrovics, husband to a Slav woman, called Mary 
 Hruz. For historians who believe in the race- 
 theory, there is ample room for speculation, 
 sympathetic or malevolent, in the fact that the 
 beloved mother of Hungary's greatest Magyar 
 poet belonged to the " race " of the Slavs, whom 
 all staunch Magyars are disinclined to reckon 
 amongst human beings. " Tot nem ember, kdsa 
 nem c'tel" ("The Slav is no human being, and 
 porridge is no meal "), holds the Hungarian 
 proverb. Fully convinced as we are that there
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 187 
 
 is no truth whatever in the race-theory, we 
 can only see in the fact of Petofi being the 
 child of a Slav mother and a Magyar (or 
 Magyar-speaking) father a providential fact 
 creating Hungary's greatest poet from amongst 
 a milieu saturated with both of the main 
 elements of Hungarian society : Magyar and 
 Slav. Young Petofi spent his youth in the 
 large plains between the Theiss and the Danube, 
 and the impressions of that picturesque por- 
 tion of Hungary have left their indelible traces 
 on his imagination. At the age of fifteen, 
 Petdfi was deprived of the comfort he had so 
 far enjoyed, by the financial failure of his father. 
 From that time onward he led a life replete 
 with hardships of all kinds. At school he was 
 a failure, and even in poetics, as he has told us 
 in one of his humorous poems, he was 
 " ploughed." Being somewhat too fond of the 
 inspiration of the wine-cup, or at least being 
 credited with such fondness, he soon fell out with 
 his hosts, his teachers and finally with his 
 father. From the misery of his position he tried 
 to save himself by volunteering as a private in 
 the Austrian army. The very harsh treatment 
 he had to endure as a soldier told on his health, 
 and although he had still moral strength left to 
 scribble his poems on the planks of the sentry- 
 box in which he mounted guard during the
 
 1 88 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 bitter winter, he at last was dismissed from the 
 service on account of symptoms of consumption. 
 In the following two or three years we find him 
 tramping over all Hungary, writing verse, and 
 eking out a miserable livelihood by means of 
 acting on provincial stages. The great poet long 
 believed in his vocation as an actor, and obstin- 
 ately stuck to a determination that met nowhere 
 with any serious encouragement. Meanwhile, 
 however, his verses had made him a well-known 
 poet, and soon the idol of the country. In his 
 travels to the north of Hungary he was received, 
 more especially at Kassa and Eperjes, with 
 honours usually accorded only to royalty. The 
 nation felt that he was the living personification 
 of all the political and poetical aspirations of 
 the Magyars then struggling for manifestation. 
 In 1846 he made, in the county of Szathmar, the 
 acquaintance of that strange and ill-balanced 
 girl, who was to become his wife. Juliet Szendrey 
 was her name. She was the daughter of a 
 steward on one of the great estates of a Hungarian 
 nobleman, and had from early years shown 
 symptoms of that malady which is now more 
 widely known under the name of '''new womanism," 
 or " feminismc." Accordingly, she was eccentric 
 and aimless, and when Petofi made love to her 
 she was at a loss how to respond to a feeling 
 so simple and natural. Having given Petofi
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 189 
 
 some cruel samples of the waywardness of her 
 temper, it occurred to her that she might inflict 
 even more pain on her father by marrying the 
 poor poet, and consequently she did so against 
 the wish of her parent. The young couple lived 
 in very primitive lodgings in Pest, and Madame 
 took her fame as the wife of a great man with 
 very grand airs. She so intensely appreciated 
 the happiness of being wedded to a young genius 
 and an affectionate husband, that she married, 
 not quite a year after Petofi's disappearance on 
 the battlefield of Segesvar, a man in every way 
 infinitely inferior to Petofi. Can anything prove 
 the Fata Morgana character of poetry and of 
 poets more cruelly than the ever infamous con- 
 duct of that highly cultivated woman, who, after 
 having been idolized and, in verses, immortalized 
 by one of the greatest of poets, showed her 
 worthlessness by marrying a mediocrity before 
 a single year had elapsed after the glorious 
 death of her husband, whose infant son still 
 required all her care ? But let us return to 
 the poet. A few months after his marriage 
 Petofi began his political career by announcing 
 to the people of Pest the abolition of the censor- 
 ship, and by reading to the enthusiastic crowd 
 his famous poem, " Rise o' Magyar " (" Talpra 
 magyar /"), on the Ides of March, 1848. Towards 
 the end of the same year he took service in the
 
 i 9 o HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 revolutionary army, and was attached to the 
 Polish general, Bern, a hero wounded in untold 
 battles for liberty, and then serving the cause 
 of the Magyars in Transylvania. Few letters 
 are more touching than the letters written by 
 Petofi in fair French to the old warrior, his 
 " father," as he calls him. Bern, himself a genius 
 of character, at once felt and recognized the 
 genius of Petofi, and with great tact smoothed 
 over difficulties arising from the poet's wild 
 insubordination. Against the advice and in spite 
 of the entreaties of numerous friends, who wanted 
 to save the poet for his country, Petofi took 
 actual part in various battles. He was last 
 heard of in the battle of Segesvar, in Transyl- 
 vania, on July 31st, 1849, where he died as 
 he had long wished, fighting for his country. 
 " To live for love, and die for one's country " — he 
 had not only sung it ... . 
 
 The works of Petofi are both lyrical and 
 epical ; his novelistic attempts, " The Rope of the 
 Hangman" (A h6ht ! r kbtele") are crude, so are 
 his few essays in the drama. Amongst his 
 epics, " Childe John " ("Jdnos vitez ") is the best. 
 It is a comic epic, or rather a fairy-story told 
 with exquisite humour and exuberance of fancy. 
 Another excellent comic epic of his is " Bolond 
 Istok." His lyrical poems are very numerous 
 and cover, as has been already indicated, the
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 191 
 
 whole range of human sentiment. Perhaps it is 
 not superfluous to remark that there is in all the 
 works of Petofi not a word likely to jar on the 
 ear of the most fastidious moralist. Like himself, 
 his works all breathe the purity and health of 
 untainted youth. 
 
 The reader will now perhaps expect a 
 laborious statement of the shortcomings and 
 failings of Petofi as a poet. And many a » 
 Hungarian critic has, apart from his professional 
 duty to fall foul of this or that feature 
 in the literary physiognomy of poets, pointed 
 out some grievous drawbacks in Petofi's works. 
 Thus, most critics have, while lauding the 
 splendid lyrical subjectivity of Petofi, pointed 
 out his alleged incapacity to write anything 
 else than himself. His chief deficiency, it has 
 been asserted, is his lack of objective imagi- 
 nation, such as was possessed by the great epic 
 and dramatic writers of European literature. 
 To this the answer is, it appears to us, very 
 simple. Petofi never wrote a work intended to 
 be an epic proper ; nor were his attempts at 
 dramatic composition really serious. He cannot, 
 therefore, be legitimately reproached with having 
 failed where he did not intend to succeed. He 
 never deliberately worked for such achievements 
 of objective imagination as show in the crea- 
 tion of dramatic personalities. Yet most of his
 
 i 9 2 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 perfect poems manifest, as we have tried to show 
 above, that very objective imagination in the 
 rarest form of strength. Hungarian literary criti- 
 cism is still, we regret to say, in a stage of 
 development considerably lower than Hungarian 
 literary composition. Hence such judgments on 
 Petdfi. Can we pronounce otherwise on the 
 literary critics of Hungary, who have so far 
 produced no single comprehensive study on the 
 works of a poet who is at once their greatest 
 and most famous genius ? Genius has this 
 peculiarity that its works are easy to enjoy but 
 hard to criticise. In reality, it takes another 
 genius, a critical one, to appreciate it adequately. 
 In this respect, foreign literary criticism has 
 been relatively more just to Petofi. In all the 
 countries of Europe and America, Petofi's name 
 has been steadily spreading, and numerous 
 attempts at translations of his works have been 
 made in both hemispheres. We do not think 
 that Petofi is untranslatable. His very objec- 
 tiveness renders him more fit for free and yet 
 faithful translations than, for instance, Arany 
 (see page 194). Another reason is that Petofi 
 lays less stress on form and metre than other 
 poets of an equal rank. He who fully seizes 
 the beauty of the poetic subject-matter in 
 Petofi's poems can render them more or less 
 adequately in any language. More, however,
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 193 
 
 than by translation might be achieved by Hun- 
 garian artists who by picturing the paintable 
 features of Petofi's poems, would contribute most 
 potently to a general appreciation of his genius. 
 There are hundreds of perfect pictures to be 
 taken from his works, provided the painter 
 takes them from him in the way in which 
 1'etofi took them from nature.
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 OUTSIDE Hungary, the name of John Arany is 
 seldom heard ; and western readers will be as- 
 tonished to hear that Arany is considered by many 
 of the best known Magyar critics the greatest 
 of the Hungarian poets. Petofi has never quite 
 pleased the professors of aesthetics and poetry 
 in the various universities and "academies" of 
 Hungary ; and there being no Magyar Saint 
 Beuves or August Schlegels, to guide, with tact 
 sustained by learning, and learning eased by 
 tact, the tastes and literary opinions of the 
 professorial minds in Hungary, it is not rare 
 to hear and read of Arany as the greatest 
 poetic genius of the Magyars. We hasten to 
 add, that we readily bow to the greatness and 
 charm, and still more to the merits of Arany. 
 He is a great poet indeed. Nearly every one 
 of his numerous ballads, epics and smaller 
 poems is replete with the glamour of true 
 poetry. In point of language he is, no doubt,
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 195 
 
 the most idiomatic and richest of all Hun- 
 garian writers. Yet, with all these gifts and 
 excellencies, he is not equal to Petofi. Reaching, 
 as he did, an age nearly three times as protrac- 
 ted as that of Petofi, he could yet not, through 
 any stretch of time or effort, attain to powers 
 which have been bestowed upon very few poets. 
 Pet&fi ranks with the world's greatest poets ; 
 Arany ranks only with the great poets of 
 Hungary. To the strictly Magyar Jingo, as well 
 as to the Magyar professor, Arany may appear 
 greater even than Petofi ; we hope to show that 
 his genius is of a nature at once different from 
 and smaller than that of the incomparable 
 Alexander. 
 
 The reader will, we trust, permit us to premise 
 a short remark which, especially for English 
 readers, seems indispensable for a right appreci- 
 ation of Arany. In England there has long 
 ceased to be a peasantry proper ; at any rate, 
 there has for now over 400 years been no such 
 peasantry in England, as may still be seen on 
 the continent generally, and in Hungary in particu- 
 lar. The type " peasant " is at once the arch-type 
 of narrow-mindedness, sordidness, naivete, and 
 spontaneous poetry. He is conservative in the 
 extreme and slow, yet frequently the source of 
 great upheavals and revolutions. His speech is 
 concrete and " terre-d-terre" yet at the same 
 
 N
 
 196 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 time full of quaint metaphors and conceits. His 
 thoughts are all on the line of synthesis ; and 
 analysis is as strange to him as generalization. 
 He loves Nature ; but he is too much at one 
 with it, part of it, to feel poetically the gulf 
 between Nature and Man. Honour and respect 
 for himself and his ancient customs are as the 
 life-atmosphere of his existence ; and thus in 
 the social architecture of the continental state 
 to him is allotted the staying force of the 
 pillars, beams and rafters of the building.* 
 This, the general picture of the continental 
 peasant, has to be touched up here and there 
 when meant to represent the Hungarian peasant 
 proper. For, luckily for Hungarian poets, the 
 Magyar peasant, while fully as conservative 
 and old-fashioned as his Austrian or German 
 brother, is considerably less sordid, more 
 frank, and altogether more " gentlemanly." Yet 
 he is a peasant, a part both of Hungary's civic 
 and natural complexion. Now it is this Hun- 
 garian peasant, and his social complement, the 
 rural nobleman, who are the centre of 
 Arany's poetry. We say " complement," for it 
 is at present well understood by all close 
 
 * No continental writer has described and analysed the 
 social status of the continental peasant with so much 
 charm and truth as has the late Wilhelm Riehl, the 
 Justus M6ser of our century.
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 197 
 
 students of continental nobility, that the latter 
 is, in essence and sociological drift, if not in 
 appearance, one and the same phenomenon as 
 the peasantry. Both classes form the conserva- 
 tive or static forces of continental states, and 
 both are necessary conditions for the existence 
 of a bourgeois proper. Without them, or with- 
 out one of them, the medium or bourgeois 
 element is altogether wanting, or, as in England, 
 of a complexion totally at variance with the 
 continental middle class. Now in Hungary, and 
 more especially still, in the Hungary of Arany's 
 youth and first manhood (1840- 1870), there was 
 no numerous bourgeois proper ; and Arany, 
 singing in tones and images flowing from and 
 meant for the two other classes only, is for 
 that very reason toto coelo different from most 
 of the German and French and also from 
 English poets. Modern western literature, in 
 Austria and Germany exclusively ; in France 
 almost, and in England largely so, is bourgeois 
 poetry ; poetry written by and for the middle 
 and central classes of the community ; or at 
 any rate expressive of sentiments and mental 
 states growing in the atmosphere of bourgeois 
 life. The poems of Arany, on the other hand, 
 were growing in the fields and farms of the 
 peasant, and in the manors of the landed 
 nobility ; even more in the former than in the
 
 198 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 latter. Theirs is a spirit charming in its rural 
 breeziness and compact humour ; fascinating in 
 its naivete and coyness ; but somewhat out of 
 tune with the modern or bourgeois sentiment. 
 The more the middle or bourgeois class develops 
 in Hungary, the less the fame of Arany 
 will continue unimpaired. His works will be 
 unable to satisfy the poetic needs of a class 
 which he did not know, and with which he 
 had but scant sympathy. His very naivete, his 
 greatest poetic charm, will be found wanting. 
 Naivete, like all other tempers of the heart or 
 mind, has its geography, its locus. It does 
 not grow anywhere or everywhere. It requires 
 a peculiar borderland situated where two social 
 classes meet. In that borderland it grows will- 
 ingly. Such lands are of course to be found 
 only where classes do meet socially. In England, 
 for instance, classes carefully avoid meeting 
 intimately in a social manner ; although they do 
 so frequently in a manner political, commercial 
 and religious. Hence, naivete is scarcely to be 
 found, either in English life or in English 
 poetry. By a parity of reasoning, American 
 poetry, based on a life with practically no classes 
 whatever, can boast still fewer of the blossoms 
 of naive types or naive style. Arany's world, it 
 is true, is one where the two classes, the noble- 
 man and the peasant, do meet intimately, and
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 199 
 
 thus the flowers of naivete are plentiful. It is 
 a naivete shy of display and timid ; a naivete 
 in deeds more than in words ; and finally, a 
 naivete of men rather than of women. It has, 
 when enjoyed in Arany's own exquisite Magyar, 
 a flavour so pure and hearty, so thoroughly 
 true and poetic as to endear everything it 
 touches. Yet it is the naivete of the peasant, 
 not of the bourgeois. It is poor in types, and 
 restricted in emotions. It does not respond to 
 the psychical atmosphere of the ever growing 
 bourgeois class in Hungary, and accordingly the 
 numerous readers of that class look for their 
 reading somewhere else. The peasant and the 
 rural nobleman are both captivating types for 
 poets ; they do not, however, represent more 
 than a minor aspect of that broad humanity 
 which has so far found its noblest expression 
 in tales, dramas and poems grafted on events 
 or sentiments of individuals outside the clans 
 and septs of peasants and noblemen. The 
 Germans, who have the excellent term of 
 " biirgerlichcs Drama " {bourgeois drama), have 
 felt that profound change coming over western 
 literature very keenly ; and the greatness of 
 their literature is owing to that circumstance 
 in no small degree. As in Hungary, nearly all 
 great writers were, first magnates, and then 
 noblemen (even Petofi was a nobleman,
 
 200 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 although he set no value on that fact), so in 
 Germany all the great writers have been with- 
 out an exception, "Burger" {bourgeois) proper- 
 Now it is the peculiar greatness of Petdfi that 
 many of his poems appeal to the sentiments 
 and mental attitudes of that specifically modern 
 public, the bourgeois readers, with a force and 
 sympathy as strong as is the charm of many 
 others to the "common people" or peasants of 
 Hungary. It is said of Pico de Mirandola that 
 while he excited the awe and admiration of the 
 most learned and thoughtful men at the end of the 
 fifteenth century Rome and Florence, the maidens 
 and young men of the beautiful city on the Arno 
 were singing with delight his exquisite love- 
 songs. Such is Petofi ; such is not Arany. He 
 cannot properly be enjoyed except in his own 
 Magyar, and by readers intimately acquainted 
 with the two classes he belongs to. Not even 
 when he selects, as he sometimes does, foreign 
 subjects, as in his " The Bards of Wales" does 
 he become less "clannish." Of the strongest of 
 all feelings of young humanity, of Love, he has 
 none but epic expression ; he never wrote a love- 
 song proper. The women in his epics are mere 
 phantasms, angels or fiends ; and his men are 
 peasants or heroes, or both. The point on 
 which he excels every other Hungarian poet, and 
 on which will repose his lasting fame, is his
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 201 
 
 language. It has the raciness of the peasant's 
 talk with the moderation of refined style. In 
 other countries writers introduced new elements of 
 poetic speech by means of using words or phrases 
 taken or imitated from one of the dialects of their 
 province or county. Even in Shakespeare there 
 are traces of the then Warwickshire dialect, and 
 probably still more of Warwickshire folk-lore. 
 German writers have legitimated innumerable 
 provincialisms. Hungarian, on the other hand, 
 has no dialects, or none to speak of. The 
 writer who wants to find new linguistic affluents 
 can turn only to the stock used by the peasants 
 in the vast plain of Hungary. Arany, replete 
 as he was with all the wealth of the language 
 used by the peasants, knew how to ennoble and 
 purify the language of the farmers and shepherds 
 of the pussta, and to impart to it much of 
 that Greek simplicity and beauty of which, as 
 a scholar, he was so competent a student. As 
 the French language is not rich in words but 
 in idioms, so Hungarian is not rich in words 
 but in word-formations. Especially the verb 
 admits of a variety of forms and terminations 
 enveloping every shade of thought or move- 
 ment with the glibness of water. It is in such 
 linguistic feats that Arany shows his genius ; 
 and since language in Hungary has an import- 
 ance tenfold more significant than in countries
 
 202 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 composed of less polyglot peoples, it is quite 
 natural that in the literary appreciation of 
 Arany at the hands of Magyar critics the 
 political element has played a very considerable 
 part. This is, as we stated above, his great 
 merit. Language in all modern countries has 
 at first been the make of the peasant classes. 
 In them there is that mysterious and instinctive 
 power which has produced the splendid series 
 of Romance and Teutonic languages which, by 
 literary craft, have come to be formed into the 
 diction of Dante, Cervantes, Moliere, Shakes- 
 peare, and Goethe. Arany, in focussing this 
 power with the strength of a mind at once 
 logopocic and richly stored with knowledge, did 
 an inestimable service to the cause of Magyar 
 Literature and Magyar Nationality. In that 
 respect he occupies in Hungarian Literature a 
 place undoubtedly higher than that of any 
 other Magyar writer. In matter, he could not 
 fully unite the strictly Magyar with the broader 
 European element ; in poetic language, on the 
 other hand, he did achieve that union ; and it 
 is in that achievement of his that we must 
 look for his specific genius and merit. 
 
 Unlike as was Arany's personality to that of 
 Petofi : the former modest and retiring, the latter 
 self-assertive and dashing ; their careers too were 
 equally different from each other. Arany's life
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 203 
 
 (1817 — Oct. 22nd, 1882), was one of quiet work 
 first as a teacher, and later on (i860), as president 
 of the Kisfaludy Society, and since 1864, as 
 Secretary of the Academy of Science. The 
 latter part of his life was distressed by per- 
 sistent ill-health. In character Arany belonged 
 to the select few, who have never stooped to 
 any baseness whatever and never lost sight of 
 the ideals of their youth. He was the intimate 
 friend of Petofi, who at once recognized his 
 greatness, and the tolerant patron of the younger 
 generation of writers. The nation mourned his 
 death as a national calamity. 
 
 Arany is, almost exclusively, a poet of epic 
 songs, epics proper and ballads. Of the former 
 his most finished works are the Toldi Trilogy, 
 consisting of " Toldi" (the name of the hero, 
 published in 1847); " Toldi szcrelmc" ("The love 
 of Toldi," published in 1879) ; and " Toldi estcje" 
 ("The eve of Toldi," published previously in 
 1854). These three epics, written in rhymed 
 six-feet stanzas of eight lines each, tell the 
 life-story of an historic Magyar peasant-hero of 
 the fourteenth century, in the times of King 
 Lewis, justly called the " Great." He is of 
 herculean strength, of violent temper, but good- 
 hearted, simple, a loving son, and a loyal friend 
 and subject. His struggle against his wicked 
 brother ; his love for Piroska, whom, in a passage
 
 2o 4 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 at arms, he foolishly wins for another wooer ; 
 his despair at seeing the idol of his heart 
 the wife of another ; finally, his declining years 
 when he finds himself out of accord with the 
 changed times, and retires home to be put 
 into the grave he had dug for himself. Such 
 is, in the main, the contents of the three epics, 
 into which the wizard language of Arany has 
 infused the charms of real poetry. It would 
 be idle to compare Arany's art with that of 
 Goethe's " Hermann unci Dorothea." Goethe's 
 hero too is rather a peasant farmer than a 
 bourgeois. Yet all the other figures of Goethe's 
 masterpiece are endowed with life so intensely 
 bourgeois, as to secure admiration for the work 
 in all times to come. Arany's hero ; his dear 
 old mother ; his brother ; his love, etc., scarcely 
 leave the boundaries of peasant-world ; and while 
 his epic will thus for ever charm the youth of 
 Hungary, it may in future cease to be an object 
 of lasting admiration on the part of the more 
 mature classes of the nation. 
 
 The same great qualities of linguistic verve and 
 intense poetic sentiment are to be found in the 
 other epical poems of Arany. In the "Death of 
 Buda" {Buda haidia, 1864), he sings the legendary 
 story of Attila's murder of his own brother 
 Buda (Bleda). In this exquisite epic Attila 
 (or Etele, as Arany calls him), is pictured as a
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 205 
 
 hero of the magnificent type, and nothing could 
 be more removed from the poet's " Etele," than 
 the conventional or historic Attila. Tragical 
 energy and incomparable language render this 
 poem one of intense charm. It was intended 
 for one of three great epics narrating the cycle 
 of Hun legends ; of the other two we have only 
 fragments. The romantic story of Wesselenyi 
 and Mary Szecsi (see page 58), was made into 
 a charming epic by Arany, under the title 
 "The capture of Murany" (" Murdny ostroma," 
 1849). In "The Gypsies of Nagy Ida" ("A 
 nagyidai czigdnyok" 1852), Arany gave vent, 
 in form of a satirical burlesque, to his profound 
 sorrow over his country's decadence, after the 
 suppression of the liberal movement in 1S48- 
 1849. His ballads are generally considered to 
 represent the best specimens of Magyar ballad- 
 writing. It must certainly be conceded that 
 few ballad-writers, whether in or outside Hun- 
 gary, have so completely hit the true ballad- 
 tone, or internal ring of thought and word 
 adapted to subjects so utterly out of keeping 
 with our modern sentiment. It may be doubted 
 whether Chopin himself in his ballad in F major 
 has so felicitously intuned the lay of olden 
 romance as has Arany in his mostly sombre 
 ballads, such as " Duel at midnight " (" Ejfcli 
 pdrbaj"), "Knight Pazman " (" Pdzmdn lovag"),
 
 2o6 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 " Marfeast " (" V 'nncprontdk "). As in the best 
 English or German ballads, events are, as a rule, 
 only indicated, not described, and hurry on to 
 their fatal termination with terrible speed. All 
 is action and fierce movement. 
 
 In addition to his activity as a creative poet, 
 Arany also did much for the introduction of 
 foreign and classical literature into Hungary by 
 way of translations. His most successful work 
 in that line were the translations of several 
 dramas of Shakespeare (Hamlet, Midsummer 
 Night's Dream, King John), and more especially 
 still his most exquisite ( — pace all the German 
 philologists ! — ) translation of the comedies of 
 Aristophanes. 
 
 We ought now to devote a considerable space to 
 a poet who, in his time, was generally associated 
 with Petofi and Arany. We mean Michael Tompa 
 ( 1 817-1868). While it is now impossible to rank 
 Tompa with either Petofi or Arany, he yet occupies 
 a very conspicuous place in Magyar literature. His 
 intense love of nature, his profound religious senti- 
 ment, and his fine humour entitle him to be con- 
 sidered as foremost amongst the lesser lyrical 
 glories of Hungary. We can only regret that we 
 cannot give here more than this bare indication 
 of the peculiar individuality of the author of the 
 " Flower-fables " ( Virdgregck).
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 The dramatic literature of the Hungarians, as may 
 be seen from the preceding chapters, was, at the 
 beginning of the twenties of this century, in a most 
 backward condition. For reasons that it is very 
 difficult to ascertain, some of the most dramatic 
 nations, such as the Italians, have rarely or never 
 excelled in drama-writing ; while the English, who 
 do not claim to be either conspicuously emotional 
 or dramatic, have given the world the incomparable 
 dramas of Shakespeare. In Italy, the lack of 
 great dramatists may perhaps be ascribed to the 
 fact, that female parts were, at least down to the 
 end of the last century, played by boys. Yet a 
 glance at the Attic theatre deprives this reason of 
 much of its value. Be this as it may. the cr r eat 
 influence of theatres and acting on dramatists can 
 scarcely be denied. In Hungary, at any rate, the 
 very indifferent condition of the theatre in the first 
 three decades of the century bulks large amongst 
 the causes producing a dearth of good Magyar 
 dramas. This becomes evident when we consider
 
 2o8 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 that the first really great drama of a Magyar writer, 
 " Banus Bank " (" Bank dan), by Katona, passed 
 unnoticed for over fourteen years (18 18-1834), until 
 a great actor, Gabriel Egressy, made it popular. 
 The Hungarians are naturally good actors, and 
 very fond of theatre-going. It will perhaps 
 scarcely be believed in the enlightened west, where 
 so late as November, 1897, one of the leading daily 
 papers of England was permitted to speak of 
 English and French literature as the only two 
 great literatures of the modern world, that in 
 Hungary there has been, and for some time too, a 
 wealth of dramas of an intrinsic value at least as 
 great as that of any British drama written within 
 the last hundred and fifty years, and played by 
 actors and actresses fully the equals of their 
 colleagues at the Comtdie Franqaise. This remark- 
 able growth of dramatic literature in Hungary did 
 not, however, begin before the fourth decade of 
 the present century. The epics and ballads of 
 Vorosmarty, Garay, Czuczor, etc., seemed to 
 captivate the public to the exclusion of all other 
 forms of poetry. The patriotic tune ringing, and 
 expected to ring through all popular works previous 
 to the Revolution of 1848, threw their authors into 
 the worship of the heroic past and thus into 
 Romanticism. It was, accordingly, quite natural 
 that dramatists, in order to catch the public ear, 
 indulged rather in heroic ranting and tirades, than
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 2 c 9 
 
 in dramatic characterization. The heroes of the 
 tragedies of Charles Kisfaludy (see page 116), for 
 instance, are rhetoric blown into the shape of 
 persons. Everything Magyar is perfect ; the 
 Magyars are delicately reminded, in pages full of 
 endless adulation, that they are, to use an 
 American phrase, "the greatest, the best fed, and 
 the best clad nation on the face of the globe." 
 Their heroes are the greatest ; their past the 
 most glorious. This sort of jingoism may be 
 tolerated in epics and ballads, where other redeem- 
 ing features may save the literary value of the 
 work. In dramas it is fatal. Yet it is in the 
 drama where Romanticism may attain to really 
 perfect works. The writer of romantic ballads 
 must, in the end, fall into the snares of an 
 exaggerated patriotism, and thus vitiate his work, 
 rendering it less acceptable to a sober and un- 
 chauvinistic posterity. The dramatic writer, on the 
 other hand, need not necessarily run the same risk. 
 If he has power to chisel out of the given material 
 of a nation's past one or the other truly human 
 character in all its grandeur, and in all its short- 
 comings, then the historic staging and bygone 
 emotional atmosphere of the past will serve only to 
 set off the dramatic beauties of the work all the 
 more plastically. Arany's Edward I. in the " Bards 
 of Wales" (see page 200), is a ruthless and sense- 
 less tyrant that must pall on us in the end. Richard
 
 210 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 III., on the other hand, can never pall on us; for 
 in him we recognize many an unavovved demon 
 ravaging our own souls. Arany's Edward I. 
 is a ballad-figure; Shakespeare's Richard III. is 
 a piece of true humanity. To the dramatic poet it 
 is indifferent from what part of the globe he takes 
 his material ; for humanity is spread all over the 
 planet. So a nation's heroic past too may be 
 quite welcome to him, provided he is a real drama- 
 tist. Katona was such. He is rough and inhar- 
 monious in language, but there is real dramatic 
 life in his men and women. For the first time in 
 Hungarian Literature the true tone of tragedy was 
 heard. The terrible fate of the Banus comes home 
 to hearers, Hungarian or otherwise ; it is yawning 
 out of the abyss of conflicts to which all of us are 
 liable. He is a loyal subject of his king, and yet 
 bursts out in open rebellion ; nay worse, he kills 
 his queen. He is a great patriot ; yet finally 
 makes a rebellious plot with a foreign adventurer. 
 He is a perfect nobleman ; yet ultimately breaks 
 all the laws of true nobility. He is a loving hus- 
 band ; yet contemplates assassinating his beautiful 
 wife. And as he is, so are the other persons of the 
 drama. In them is pictured the conflicting nature 
 of the human heart and character as it really is : 
 rough, unbending, false, yet capable of sublime 
 self-abnegation. Or as Petofi says : " Rain from 
 heaven turning mud on earth." The plot is
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 211 
 
 as follows : Bank, in the absence of King 
 Andrew II. of Hungary justiciar of the country, 
 has reason to believe that Gertrude, the haughty 
 and unpopular queen, countenances the vile designs 
 of her brother Otto on Bank's beautiful wife 
 Melinda. A rebellion of the malcontent nobles under 
 Petur is breaking out. Bank, who ought to quell 
 it by virtue of his office, is thrown out of his moral 
 equilibrium by the news that Melinda has been 
 seduced by Otto. Forgetful of his position, he 
 obeys only the behests of his outraged soul and 
 kills Gertrude. The king returns, the rebellion is 
 put down, and Bank perishes. In Katona's drama 
 there is more power than form. It will easily 
 be understood that his chief model was Shake- 
 speare. He himself did not live to see the great 
 success of his only masterpiece ; he died broken- 
 spirited in 1830 at Kecskemet, in the thirty-eighth 
 year of his luckless life. 
 
 The first remarkable Hungarian dramatist after 
 Katona is Edward Szigligeti (his real name was 
 Joseph Szatmary), 18 14- 1878. From an early date 
 he was in constant contact with the theatre and 
 with actors, and so acquired great practical know- 
 ledge of stage-lore. He had deeply studied the art 
 of stage effect, and all his very numerous dramatic 
 works testify to an extraordinary stage-craft. It 
 would, however, be unfair to compare him to 
 writers like Kotzebue in Germany, or Labiche in 
 
 O
 
 212 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 France. His routine, no doubt, was pre-eminent 
 in many of his pieces ; yet, beside and beyond the 
 mere cleverness of the playwright, he had real vis 
 comica and a profound knowledge of Hungarian 
 society. During his life-time that society was 
 slowly but steadily emerging from the semi- 
 civilized state of the former patriarchalism to the 
 forms and usages of modern life. In such periods 
 of transition there is ample material for anyone 
 gifted with a keen sense of humour. The aping 
 of western manners (ridiculed in u Mama" 1857; 
 "Female Rule" [" Nouralom " 1862], etc. ); the 
 humour of the altered family-life ("Three Matri- 
 monial Commands " [" Hdzassdgi hdrom parancs"\ 
 1850; "Stephen Dalos " [Dalos Pista\ 1855; 
 etc.) ; odd remnants of the former social state, 
 such as tramping actors, the still-life of small 
 towns ; all this Szigligeti knew how to dramatize 
 with great effect. Like Charles Kisfaludy he 
 drew with great felicity on the stores of drastic 
 humour pervading a conservative society com- 
 posed of many a discrepant element and moving 
 onwards on entirely new lines of development 
 He tried his skilful hand at tragedies too, and 
 "The Shadows of Light" ("A fcny drnyai" 1865,) 
 and "The Pretender" ("A tronkereso, 1868,) are 
 said to be meritorious. His rare stage-craft and 
 witty dialogue alone, however, could not have 
 raised his name to the height on which it rests, and
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 21 
 
 .1 
 
 where in all probability it will continue to rest. 
 Szigligeti's name is justly famous for being the real 
 founder of what, for lack of a better name in 
 English, must be called the Hungarian folk-drama. 
 In England there is no such thing, and no such 
 word. Already in our remarks on Arany (see 
 page 195), we essayed to show that the continental 
 peasantry is generically different from any class of 
 small farmers in England. That peasantry is, in 
 reality, a world of its own. It is as much a world 
 of its own, as is the well-known world of the 
 "upper ten." He who has never been in what 
 the knowing call " le monde" will easily confound 
 the sentiments and thoughts of his own world with 
 those of the " monde." Yet the two worlds are two 
 worlds indeed. Their whole tone and rhythm of life 
 is different. They are written not only in different 
 scales but also for different instruments. It is 
 even so with the world of peasantry in Hungary or 
 in Austria. How silly of some painfully enlightened 
 people to ascribe, for instance, the mass of preju- 
 dice and superstition in the Hungarian or German 
 peasantry to a lack of that " Bildung " or school- 
 knowledge which is acquired through books and 
 bookmen ! The current belief in witches, fairies, 
 imps and such-like elf-folk, good and bad, grows 
 with the peasantry of those countries, out of the 
 same roots that nourish in the " higher classes " the 
 craving for and the delight in fairy operas and
 
 2i 4 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 fantastic novels. Each social " world " demands 
 pleasures and distractions of the same kind ; each 
 satisfying that craving in a different manner. The 
 urban gentleman and lady while away tedious 
 winter evenings by visits to theatres, where unlikely, 
 demoniac and over-exciting pieces are an every- 
 day occurrence. The peasants in Hungary have 
 no such theatres ; yet long winter evenings hang 
 just as heavily on their hands. They therefore 
 while away their leisure-hours by stories fan- 
 tastic and demoniac, the literal belief in which must 
 needs grow in direct proportion to the lack of all 
 theatrical stage environment. As with superstitions, 
 so it is with all the other great social needs. The 
 Hungarian peasant, when outraged in his senti- 
 ments, does not, it is true, fight a duel like the 
 gentleman. Yet he, too, becomes a duellist, retiring 
 into the woods, and fighting society at large as 
 a " szegeny legeny" or brigand. Plus cela change, 
 plus cest la mane chose. 
 
 It will now be perhaps somewhat clearer that the 
 Hungarian peasantry, qua peasantry, lends itself to 
 dramatization in the same way as does any other 
 of the " worlds of men." The common humanity 
 of men is to be found in that peasantry too ; but it is 
 modified, coloured, and discoloured, " timbred " and 
 attuned in a different mood. It admits of tragedies 
 proper; of comedies; and of burlesques. It is 
 Szigligeti's great merit to have discovered this new
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 215 
 
 dramatic ore. Without in the least trying to 
 diminish his glory, we cannot but add, that 
 through the great revolution coming over Hungary 
 as over the rest of Europe, in the period from the 
 third to the seventh decade of this century, a 
 revolution social no less than political, the peculiar 
 and distinct character of the world of peasants 
 became, by contrast to the rising bourgeoisie and 
 the changing nobility, much more easily discernible 
 than it had been ever before in Hungary. Yet 
 Szigligeti was the first to seize on that dramatic 
 res nullius ; and both for this discovery and the 
 excellent specimens of folk-dramas which he wrote, 
 he deserves all credit. His most remarkable folk- 
 dramas are: "The Deserter" (" Szokbtt Katona" 
 1843); "The Csikos " (1846); and "The Found- 
 ling" {Lelencz" 1863). 
 
 We can here only mention the dramas of 
 Sigismund Czako, who for some time before his 
 voluntary death in 1847, was very popular; of 
 Charles Obernyik (1816-1855); and of Ignatius 
 Nagy ; the two latter being very popular before 
 the Revolution of 1848, owing to their excessively 
 "patriotic" dialogues. A far higher place in 
 Hungarian dramatic literature is due to the noble 
 Count Ladislas Teleky, who also died by his own 
 hand. His " The Favourite" ("A Kegyencz" 1841), 
 the subject of which is taken from the time of the 
 Roman Emperor Valentinian III., is credited with
 
 2 i6 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 great force of irony, dramatic truth and power of 
 imagination. In Charles Hugo {recte Charles Hugo 
 Bernstein), 18 17-1877, the Hungarian drama might 
 have gained a dramatic power of rare quality, had 
 the overweening self-infatuation of the author, 
 together with his poor knowledge of Magyar, not 
 rendered him a victim to his first success. He 
 is one of the numerous Titans of the Hungarian 
 capital, who cannot do anything half-way credit- 
 able unless they fail to gain reputation. No 
 sooner do they become " famous," than they cease 
 to be either interesting or productive. Hugo's 
 " Banker and Baron " (" Baukdr es Bdro ") had not 
 only a great, but an extraordinary success. Not 
 only incense was strewn before the poet, but, to 
 use Lessing's phrase, the very censer was hurled at 
 his head. The enthusiastic crowd carried the 
 author bodily from the theatre to his favourite 
 Cafe. This unhinged poor Hugo's mental equi- 
 librium. He considered himself a second Victor 
 Hugo ; and so never wrote any other great drama. 
 The merit of " Banker and Baron " is very con- 
 siderable. It is one of the then few attempts at 
 writing a real bourgeois drama, in which the 
 common human heritage of virtues and vices, 
 affections and passions, is presented with great 
 force and dramatic vivacity. 
 
 Of a style and tone quite different from the 
 preceding dramas is the " dramatic poem," as
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 217 
 
 the author calls it, entitled " The Tragedy of Man," 
 by Emericus Madach (1829- 1864). In that great 
 poem there is revealed all the sombreness of 
 profound melancholy, wailing over the bootless 
 struggle of Man since the unlucky moment of his 
 creation. As the reader may have noticed in the 
 course of the present work, the Hungarians, as a 
 nation, are strongly inclined to pathos ; just as the 
 English are to satire and the French to irony. In 
 the youthful members of the Magyar nation that 
 bent is at times so strong as to dominate all the 
 other modes and faculties of the soul. Hence the 
 astounding wealth of grave Largos in Hungarian 
 music, and the melancholy and despondent tone in 
 many a great work of Hungarian poetry. Few 
 poems can compare in unaffected sadness and thus 
 twice saddening effect with Arany's " Epilogiis!' 
 Madach's "Tragedy of Man" ("As ember trage- 
 didja") is, as it were, the funeral march of humanity. 
 It would be utterly wrong to compare it to Goethe's 
 " Faust." Although there is a general similarity in 
 the drift of the two works, yet the poem of the 
 luckless and suffering county official of an obscure 
 Hungarian province is essentially different from 
 the drama of the Jupiter of German literature. 
 Madach's poem is, reduced to its skeleton, a 
 philosophy of History. He takes us from the hour 
 when Adam and Eve were innocently walking in 
 the Garden of Eden, to the times of the Egyptian
 
 2i8 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 Pharaohs ; then to the Athens of Miltiades ; to 
 sinking Rome ; to the adventurous period of the 
 Crusaders ; into the study of the astronomer 
 Kepler in the seventeenth century ; thence into the 
 horrors of the French Revolution ; into greed-eaten 
 and commerce-ridden modern London ; nay, into 
 the ultra-socialist state of the future, in which there 
 will be no family, no nation, and no individuality 
 amongst the countless individuals ; and where the 
 ideas of the preceding ages, such as Religion, Art, 
 Literature, will, by means of scientific formulae, be 
 shown up in all their absurdity ; still further, the 
 poet shows the future of the earth, when ice will 
 cover the whole of its surface, and Europeans and 
 other human beings will be reduced to the state of 
 a degraded brute dragging on the misery of exis- 
 tence in some cave. In all these scenes, Adam, 
 Eve and the arch-fiend (Lucifer) are the chief and 
 constantly recurring pcrsontz dramatis. In fact, 
 all these scenes are meant to be prophetic dreams 
 of Adam, which Lucifer causes him to have in 
 order to disgust him with humanity in advance, 
 and so, by driving him to suicide, to discontinue 
 humanity. In paradise, Adam learns and teaches 
 the lesson of man's incapability of enduring 
 bliss ; in Egypt, Adam, as Pharaoh, experiences 
 the bottomless wretchedness of tyranny, where 
 " millions live for the sake of one ; " in Athens he is 
 made to shudder at the contemptible fickleness of
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 219 
 
 man when part of a crowd ; in sinking Rome he 
 stands aghast at the corruptibility of mankind, and 
 in the Crusades at their fanaticism ; in the study 
 of Kepler he comprehends the sickening vanity of 
 all attempts at real knowledge, and in Paris he is 
 shown the godless fury of a people fighting for the 
 dream called Liberty. So in the end, Adam, 
 despairing of his race, wants to commit suicide, 
 when, in the critical moment, Eve tells him that 
 she is going to be a mother by him ; whereby his 
 intention of discontinuing his race by suicide is 
 baffled. Adam then prostrates himself before 
 God, who encourages him to hope and trust, 
 making him feel that man is part of an infinite 
 and indestructible power, and will struggle not 
 quite in vain. Like Goethe's Faust, the great 
 poem of Madach was not meant for the stage ; yet, 
 like Faust, it has proved of intense effect on the 
 stage too. It is, as may be seen, a philosophic 
 poem excelling rather in the beauty and loftiness 
 of the thoughts conveyed or suggested than by 
 power of characterization or dramatic vigour. In 
 general literature we should like to compare it 
 most to the " De rerum natiira " of Lucretius. The 
 powerful melancholy of the Roman is of a kind 
 with the gloom of the Hungarian ; and while the 
 former dwells more on the material and religious 
 aspect of man, and the latter on social phenomena 
 in all their width and breadth, yet both sing the
 
 22o HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 same tempestuous nocturne of Man's sufferings and 
 shortcomings, illuminating the night of their 
 despondency by stars of luminous thought. 
 Madach died at too early an age to finish more 
 than this one masterpiece. His other poems are 
 inferior. 
 
 Dramatic literature in Hungary in the last thirty 
 years has been growing very rapidly ; and both 
 the drama of the " world " folk, and that of the 
 " world " monde has met with very gifted, nay, in 
 some cases, exceedingly gifted writers. During 
 that period, Hungary has completely regained its 
 absolute autonomy, and the Hungarian State, from 
 having had an annual revenue of not quite sixteen 
 millions in 1867, has now a revenue of over forty 
 million pounds a year. Budapest has grown to 
 be a town of over six hundred thousand inhabi- 
 tants ; and the general progress of Hungary, 
 material as well as intellectual, social and political, 
 has been such as, relatively, that of no other coun- 
 try in Europe in the same period. In the midst 
 of the dramatic movement of all organs of the Hun- 
 garian commonwealth, the drama proper could not 
 but make great strides too. It is here impossible 
 to do justice to each of the very numerous 
 and talented Hungarian dramatists of our clay. 
 We should only like, in treating of a necessarily 
 small number of modern Hungarian writers of 
 dramatic works, to premise a remark in the interest
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 221 
 
 of a better understanding of their literary value. 
 The English or American public are, as a rule, 
 very much inclined to think little of things of 
 which they have " never heard." We are not 
 blaming them for that. Reading as they do great 
 newspapers every day, they naturally come to 
 think that, to alter the old legal phrase, " what is 
 not to be found in the 'paper,' that does not exist." 
 Hungarian dramas are seldom or never translated 
 for the English stage ; they are never talked about 
 in the press ; hence, the general public will 
 tacitly assume that they can be worth but little. 
 However, it is with Hungarian dramas as with 
 Hungarian fruit. Although Hungary produces 
 exquisite fruit of all kinds, and in enormous 
 quantities too, the English consumer of fruit has 
 never heard of "Hungarian apples" or "Hun- 
 garian grapes," while he is quite familiar with 
 American or Tasmanian apples of an inferior 
 quality. The reason of that is simple : the Hun- 
 garians are still in the infancy of the great art of 
 export. It is even so with the Hungarian drama. 
 It is not being cleverly enough exported ; it wants 
 active agents and middlemen to bruit it about. We 
 venture to say that the western nations are the 
 losers by ignoring or overlooking, as they do, the 
 modern Hungarian drama. In taking the trouble 
 to make the acquaintance of the dramas of 
 Eugene Rakosi, Edward Toth, Gregory Csiky,
 
 222 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 Lewis Doczi, Lewis Dobsa, Joseph Szigeti, John 
 Vajda, Arpad Berczik, Stephen Toldy, Anton 
 Varady, Lewis Bartok, etc., etc., they would find 
 that together with the greatest European mines for 
 ore proper, Hungary has also many a profound 
 mine of ore dramatic, no less than fine specimens 
 of coins minted out of that ore. There is now a 
 " tradition " of no inconsiderable duration in the 
 art of acting ; and several actors of the very first 
 quality, such as Rose Laborfalvy (the late Mrs. 
 Jokai), Louise Blaha, Lendvay, Egressy, etc., have 
 set examples and models, inspiring both the poet 
 and the actor. The theatres at Budapest are 
 magnificently equipped, and being, as they are, 
 part of the great national treasure, they partake 
 to a great extent of the nature of a temple, and 
 are visited, not as places of sheer distraction, but 
 as localities of national rallying and spiritual 
 elevation. 
 
 Most of the leading dramatists of the last five- 
 and-tvventy years are still alive, and it is, therefore, 
 twice difficult to pass a final judgment on their 
 works. Mr. Eugene Rakosi, both as a journalist 
 and a drama-writer, occupies a very conspicuous 
 place, and if better known in the west of Europe, 
 would certainly be read, and his pieces seen, with 
 marked interest. Like Mr. Doczi, who is a high 
 official in the common department of Austria- 
 1 Iungary, he has that subtle and unanalyzable force
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 223 
 
 of surrounding his scenes, and also frequently his 
 persons, with the splendour of poetic suggestive- 
 ness. In his " Endre and Johanna," " Wars of 
 Queens" (" Kirdlyntk karcsa"), "The School of 
 Love" (" Szerelem iskoldja "), he does not make it his 
 chief point to create, entangle, still more embroil, 
 and then finally solve a " problem," although he is 
 a master of scene and situation-making. Nor do 
 he and Mr. Doczi care to be " realists." They are 
 satisfied with being poets. Mr. Doczi has in his 
 "The Kiss" (" Csok") ventured on writing in words 
 what hitherto has only been a success in the tones 
 of Mendelssohn : a drama moving in mid-air, in 
 midsummer night, with gossamery persons and 
 fairy-ideas, away, far away from our time and land. 
 In that he has been signally successful, and 
 Mendelssohn's overture to the " Midsummer Night's 
 Dream " is not sweeter and airier than Mr. Doczi's 
 " Kiss." Like Mr. Rakosi, Mr. Doczi is a master 
 of Hungarian and he wields the German idiom too 
 with the same grace and energy. 
 
 In our opinion Gregory Csiky (born 1842, died 
 recently) was the strongest dramatic talent amongst 
 the modern dramatists in Hungary. He is what 
 people are pleased to call a " realist ; " that is, his 
 shafts are sunk into the dramatic mines of the 
 society in the midst of which he lives. His 
 strong satire and broad humour, his finely- 
 chiselled language and the bold and true way of
 
 224 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 his dramatization raise him to the level of the best 
 of contemporary dramatists in any country. In his 
 " The Proletarians" ("A Proletdrok") he has seized 
 on a large class of declasscs in Hungary, who by 
 the precipitated legislative reforms after 1867 were 
 deprived of their previous means of living, and so 
 turned to parasitic methods of eking out an exis- 
 tence. That class is brought to dramatic life full 
 of humorous, sad, and striking phenomena. There 
 is not in this drama, any more than in Csiky's 
 other dramas ("Bubbles" [« Budor/tok"] "Two 
 Loves" ["AY/ szerelem"], "The Timid" ["A 
 szegyenlos"\ " Athalia," etc.) the slightest trace of 
 that morbid psychologism which has made 
 the fortune of Ibsen. It is all sound, fresh, 
 penetrating and vibrating with true dramatic life. 
 Last, not least, there is much beauty of form 
 and construction. Csiky, who has published very 
 valuable translations of Sophocles and Plautus, 
 is thoroughly imbued with the classic sense of 
 form and with the real vocation of the drama 
 as the art-work showing the emotional and mental 
 movements of social types, and not of some 
 pathologic excrescence of society. In other words, 
 he does not muddle up, as Ibsen does, the novel 
 with the drama. 
 
 Amongst the writers of "folk-dramas," Edward 
 Tuth (1844- 1 876), occupies a very high place. 
 His "The Village Scamp" (" A falu rossza") tells
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 225 
 
 the touching story of a young peasant who, dis- 
 appointed in love, loses all moral backbone and 
 is finally saved by the fidelity of a woman. The 
 drama is full of scenes taken from Hungarian 
 peasant life, which is far more dramatic than 
 peasant life in Germany. The Hungarians have, 
 till quite recently, never had a Berthold Auer- 
 bach, or a novelist taking the subject of his 
 novels from peasant life. They have dramatists 
 of peasant life instead ; and a short comparison 
 with the peasant dramas written by Austrians, 
 such as those of Anzengruber, will show the 
 decided superiority of the Hungarians. One 
 strong element in the folk-dramas of Toth and 
 of Francis Csepreghy (1842-1880, author of "The 
 Yellow Colt" ["A sdrga csi/eo"l "The Red 
 Purse" [" Piros bugvel/dris"]), is the folk-poems 
 and folk-songs, sung and danced. By this 
 incidental element of tone and verse, which, 
 as a sort of inarticulate commentary on the 
 dramatic scenes does duty for the philosophic 
 reflections of the non-peasant drama, the hearer 
 is brought into intimate touch with the very 
 innermost pulsation of the life of the " folk."
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 In now approaching the modern novel in Hungary 
 we are at once met, touched, almost overwhelmed 
 by the dazzling light and lustre of one commanding 
 genius of the Magyar novel, Maurus Jokai. His 
 name is at present well-known all over the world, 
 and his novels are eagerly read by Hungarians and 
 non-Hungarians alike. The number of his works 
 is very great, and although over fifty years have 
 elapsed since the appearance of his first novel 
 (in 1846), he is still enriching Hungarian and 
 European literature with ever new works. Nearly 
 everything has changed in Hungary during the 
 last forty years ; but the love and admiration for 
 the genius of Jokai has never suffered diminution. 
 In his checkered life there is not a blot, and in his 
 long career there is not a single dark spot. Pure, 
 manly, upright as a patriot, faithful and loving as 
 a husband, loyal as a subject, kind as a patron, 
 an indefatigable worker, and, highest of all, a true 
 friend both to men, fatherland, and literature, 
 he has given his nation not only great literary
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 227 
 
 works to gladden and enlighten them, but also a 
 sterling example of Magyar virtue and Magyar 
 honour. It is, especially in Hungary, no common 
 thing to meet with men of Jokai's immense power 
 and love of work. His journalistic articles alone 
 would fill many a folio volume. His political 
 activity in the Hungarian Parliament, in the 
 Lower House of which he was up to January, 
 1897, when the king called him to the House of 
 Magnates, was likewise very extensive. And in 
 addition to that, he was constantly writing novels, 
 turning out volume after volume, until the total ex- 
 ceeded two hundred and fifty. In fact, as has been 
 already hinted at, from an historic point of view 
 he has, by his unparalleled productiveness, done 
 some harm less to himself than to other Hungarian 
 novelists. He himself, although not equally at his 
 best in every one of his novels, has in the course 
 of fifty-one years of creative authorship scarcely 
 lost anything of the distinctly individual greatness 
 of his genius ; and even the later and sometimes 
 hurried productions of his pen are, to say the least, 
 most excellent, because intensely interesting read- 
 ing. On the other hand, his very popularity 
 rendered it almost impossible for any other Magyar 
 novelist to publish novels other than small sketches 
 or essays. The reading public in Hungary is not 
 numerous enough to demand lengthy novels from 
 more than one favourite author. Jokai almost 
 
 P
 
 228 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 supplanted Josika (see page 140) and all other 
 writers of lengthy novels. 
 
 His novels and sketches treat of nearly every 
 aspect of Magyar life, in the past and in the 
 present. The heroic deeds of the ancient or 
 mediaeval Magyars are subjects of his novels as 
 well as the doings and thoughts of official and 
 non-official Hungary of the present century. It 
 would, however, be quite incorrect to ascribe to 
 him any intention of writing the " ComcJic 
 humaine" of Hungary. No such vast system 
 underlies his countless stories. He has no system ; 
 in reality, nothing is more removed from his mind 
 than any such big structure of ideas and facts. 
 He has frequently chosen non-Magyar subjects ; 
 and when treating of Magyar events or institutions, 
 he has no philosophical aim to pursue, and no 
 patriotic theory to uphold. He writes novels out 
 of sheer love of telling tales. In the feeblest 
 of his works the reader cannot but notice that 
 singular alertness and freshness of an author 
 hugely enamoured of his profession — and gaily at 
 work. The narrating is of much the greater 
 interest to him ; the tale itself does not always 
 claim his full attention. Whether or no, the plot 
 is consistently thought out to the end ; or, whether 
 or no, the persons always proceed on the lines of 
 their characters ; all that does not too much 
 ruffle Jokai's joyous composure of authorship.
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 229 
 
 For, to put it in one word, he is an improvisatore ; 
 in fact, the greatest of all known improvisatori. 
 This is the key to all his excellencies, as well as 
 to his alleged failings. The Teutonic nations, and 
 amongst the Latin ones the French are, as a rule, 
 entirely unfamiliar with that most fascinating of 
 talking virtuosi, the improvisatore. Even in the 
 wild excitement of the French Revolution there 
 was only one orator, Danton, who improvised his 
 speeches ; the rest, even Mirabeau, read them. 
 The vast amount of parlature done in Hungary, to 
 which we called attention at the very outset of this 
 work, has given rise both to marvellous artists of 
 the living word, and to audiences passionately 
 fond of listening to good talk, and on all possible 
 occasions too. The good talker in America is 
 a man who a propos of any occurrence, is reminded 
 of a story that happened " in Denver, Colorado, 
 or Columbus, Ohio." No such individual would be 
 endured in Hungary. The good talker there is 
 an improvisatore proper. He is never " reminded " 
 of an old story ; he invents on the spot or extracts 
 from the actual topic of conversation all the 
 sparks of wit and humour that fall upon the prose 
 of life like clew upon dry flowers. The gift and 
 long habit of improvisation thus makes some of 
 those mostly unknown artists most charming 
 companions and astoundingly clever talkers. He 
 who has not lived amongst them, cannot possibly
 
 2 3 o HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 imagine their ease of invention, their humour, 
 their power of description and their imagination. 
 They are not, as in Italy, professional improvisa- 
 tori ; and perhaps nobody would be more 
 astounded than themselves at the application of 
 that term to them. Yet, a comparison with the 
 man in France, who is " bon causeur" and with the 
 man in London, who has " remarkable conversa- 
 tional powers," will show any unprejudiced 
 observer the truth of the above characterization 
 of the Magyar talker. Just as Mark Twain's 
 humour is only the improved and, by print, fixed 
 humour noticeable in many an American, even 
 so Jokai's narrative genius is the highest form of 
 that genius for improvisation which in Hungary 
 may be met with frequently in lesser perfection. 
 This explains Jokai's permanent hold on the 
 Hungarian nation. He has carried one great 
 gift of his nation to the heights of real greatness. 
 We repeat it : he is the greatest of all improvisa- 
 tori in prose. Nothing can approach his miracu- 
 lous facility in building up a fascinating scene ; in 
 irradiating the heaviest and most cumbrous subject 
 with light and humour ; and in wafting over the 
 whole tale the Fata Morganas of an exuberant 
 imagination. Young and old ; Hungarian, English- 
 man or German ; man or woman ; they must all 
 stand still and listen to the charmer. That Jokai 
 is the best exponent of the Hungarian genius for
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 231 
 
 improvisation in words will be readily believed and 
 accepted, when we point out his startling similarity, 
 almost identity, with another famous Hungarian, 
 who excelled in works of the same quality but 
 written in tones instead of in words. We mean 
 Liszt. Jokai is the Liszt of Hungarian Literature ; 
 we might almost say, of European literature. The 
 marvellous musician, who, both as a pianist and as 
 a composer, held the civilized world under his 
 spell for far over seventy years — (Liszt was born 
 in 181 1 and died in 1887) — was the king of 
 all musical improvisatori. When he played 
 Beethoven or Chopin, Bach or Schumann, he im- 
 pressed the most cool-headed hearers as if he had 
 just improvised the pieces he played ; that one 
 circumstance being at the same time the secret 
 of his unrivalled powers as a pianist. When he 
 composed — and many, very many of his composi- 
 tions are works of lasting merit — the result was 
 almost invariably an improvisation. It has that 
 indefinable charm of rapturous glow kindled at 
 the fire of the moment, which endows improvisa- 
 tions with a character unique and exceptional. 
 It excels in major keys far more than minor 
 moods ; it has much unity of character and 
 Stimmung rather than unity of form ; it always 
 borders on the Fantasia, and never crystallizes 
 into a sonata proper ; it cultivates side-issues, 
 such as flourishes and fioriturc with startling skill
 
 232 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 and vast effect, while the bass, or the underlying 
 element of thought, is not laboured nor signifi- 
 cant ; it appeals to happy people rather than to 
 such as bear heavy burdens ; and it works for 
 brilliancy more than for reticent beauty. Liszt's 
 E flat major concerto, for instance, is an absolutely 
 faithful replica of some of Jokai's best novels. 
 Both authors excel in brilliancy, technical routine, 
 wealth of imagination, sparkling rhythms and 
 rapturous descriptiveness. There is nothing majes- 
 tic in them, nothing grave, nothing truly sad or 
 melancholy. Jokai disposes of an inexhaustible 
 humour. This, as will be admitted, cannot be 
 readily imitated in music. In Liszt, humour 
 becomes irony and demoniac scorn. His Polonaise 
 in E major, for example, with its appalling irony 
 at Polish excessiveness, is the musical counterpart 
 to Jokai's humour. But where Liszt comes 
 nearest to Jokai is in his Rhapsodies. As in 
 Jokai, so in Liszt, there is a constant change of 
 panoramic views ; an exquisite wealth of tinkling, 
 sparring and glistening rhythms ; a shower of 
 glittering devvdrops and an irridescence of sheets 
 of coloured lights. In a measure, all Jokai's 
 novels are placed in fairyland ; as all Liszt's music 
 is on the heights of exultation. And, likewise, 
 the final secret of Jokai's irresistible charm is in 
 the improvisatory character of his novels. Jokai's 
 reader does not feel that he is being lectured or
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 233 
 
 moralized or instructed. On the contrary, he 
 feels that he himself, in inspiring, as it were, the 
 author, is co-operating with him in the work, just 
 as the listeners to an improvisatore are doing. 
 The reader is accorded part of the exquisite 
 delight of literary creation and so feels twice 
 happy. 
 
 This peculiar and inimitable feature and excel- 
 lence of Jokai is but another manifestation of the 
 rhapsodic character of the Magyars. Petofi, and 
 he alone, was in his best poems, both rhapsodic and 
 classical. He not only expressed Magyar rhapso- 
 dism lyrically, as has Jokai novelistically and 
 Liszt musically, but he also imparted to it that 
 inner form of moderation and harmonious beauty 
 which, if coupled with perfect expression and 
 metre, renders poetry classical. It will now be 
 easily seen why Jokai must needs have the failings 
 of his virtues. The very nature of rhapsodic 
 improvisations works chiefly for effect : it is sub- 
 jective art, not objective. The production of the 
 artist is not severed from his personality ; it is 
 intimately allied with and dependent on it. In 
 Liszt, whose art admits of combining both pro- 
 duction and presentation of the work at one and 
 the same time, the subjective or personal factors 
 became so strong as to render him without any 
 doubt the most fascinating artistic individuality 
 of this century. It is, therefore, in vain to expect
 
 234 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 in Jokai that patient and self-denying care of the 
 objective artist for the structural beauty of his 
 work. It is not the great number of his novels 
 that has prevented him from giving them as much 
 objective proportion and consistency as they have 
 lustre and charm. Mozart died at five-and-thirty, 
 and left more works than Jokai has written ; yet 
 nearly every one of the better ones was objectively 
 faultless. It is Jokai's very art that necessitates 
 that failing in Art. If he had tried to mend it, 
 he would have stunted some of that peerless pro- 
 fusion of fancy which has endeared him to un- 
 told millions. He may displease a few hundreds ; 
 he will always transport the millions. Yet one 
 remark cannot be suppressed. Hungary, we are 
 convinced, has not yet arrived at the stage of 
 literary development when critics and the public 
 look backwards for the best efforts of the nation's 
 intellect. There are still immense possibilities for 
 Hungarian Literature ; and all the constellations 
 of literary greatness have not yet risen above the 
 horizon. It will thus not be surprising when we 
 here venture to urge the necessity of viewing even 
 a genius such as Jokai's historically. His merits 
 are as boundless as his charm. The judgment of 
 all Europe has confirmed that. For Hungarians, 
 however, it will be wise to remember, that Jokai 
 in literature, as Liszt in music, are the highest 
 types indeed, but of one phase only of the many-
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 235 
 
 souled national genius of the Hungarian people. 
 Their work is great and inimitable ; we hasten to 
 add : nor should it be imitated. It is the work, 
 not of the last, but of one of the early stages in Hun- 
 garian Literature. It has, when over-estimated, 
 a tendency to do harm to the nation. People, 
 who in music are taught to expect the maddening 
 accents of rhapsodies, will rarely calm down to the 
 enjoyment of less spiced, if more perfect music. 
 It is even so with novels. Who now reads the 
 novels of Kemeny (see page 157) ; and who ought 
 not to read them ? Readers intoxicated with 
 Jokai, we readily admit, cannot fairly rally to 
 enjoy Kemeny. Yet Hungary is badly in need 
 of a more modern Kemeny, as she is of a Brahms. 
 Or has it not been noticed yet, that while Hun- 
 garians are proverbially musical, and known to be 
 so in all countries, thay have so far — if we for 
 the moment disregard Liszt — not produced a 
 single creative musician of European fame or con- 
 siderable magnitude ? There can be little doubt 
 that Liszt himself is one of the chief causes of 
 the sterilization of musical talent in Hungary. 
 Vainly endeavouring to imitate him, the composers 
 failed to proceed on different lines. Desiring 
 to hear Hungarian music in no other form than 
 in that of Lisztian rhapsodies, the public failed 
 to encourage the production of new musical 
 works. And so the vast treasure of Hungarian
 
 2*6 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 ■j 
 
 music has not yet been done full justice. The 
 Bohemians, also a very musical nation, have had 
 no Liszt ; but they have, at least, their Smetanas 
 and their Dvoraks. As a reader and patriot, no 
 less than as a student of poetry and art, we joy- 
 fully recognize the surpassing talent of both Jokai 
 and Liszt. As historian of the literature of our 
 nation, we cannot but make the remark that it will 
 no longer do for Hungarians to leave the historical 
 position of these two great authors entirely out of 
 consideration. It is different with countries out- 
 side Hungary. They may and shall read Jokai 
 unmolested by any such reflections. For them he 
 is delight pure and unequalled ; and we beg their 
 pardon for not having suppressed the above 
 remark. But as to the interests of Hungary we 
 dare to assume that Jokai himself, great in 
 modesty as he is in so many other ways, will 
 not disavow our idea, but gladly acknowledge 
 that, great as he may be, there ought to be 
 room for novelistic greatness of another kind 
 in Hungarian Literature, and appreciation of 
 other modes of novelistic art in the Hungarian 
 public. 
 
 Jokai was born on the nineteenth of February, 
 1825, at Komarom (Komorn). At Papa, when 
 still a student, he made the acquaintance of 
 Petofi, whose intimate friend he became. He took 
 an active, if moderate part, in the revolution, and
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 237 
 
 came near falling into the hands of the victorious 
 Austrians, from which fatal predicament, however, 
 he was saved by his lovely wife Rose Laborfalvy, 
 one of the greatest of Hungarian actresses. From 
 that time onward he has devoted his life partly to 
 parliamentary activity, but chiefly to literature and 
 the political press. In the latter field he has acted 
 as editor of, and frequent contributor to, several of 
 the leading journals of Hungary ; and, moreover, 
 as founder and editor of the " Ustokos" the Hun- 
 garian "Punch." In Hungary, where political and 
 parliamentary life has long been in existence, a 
 paper a la " Punch " was a natural and much 
 needed literary product. Nor do we hesitate to 
 assert that several of such papers — for instance, 
 Jokai's " Ustokos " (" The Comet "), and the incom- 
 parable Porzo's (Dr. Adolf Agai) " Borszem Janko" 
 (a name) not only equal, but, as a rule, decidedly 
 surpass German or French "Punches," and not 
 infrequently the London paper too. Wit in Hun- 
 gary is of a peculiar kind, and Jokai is one of its 
 most gifted devotees. It is wit, not only of situa- 
 tions, or humorous contrasts, but also of linguistic 
 contortionism, if we may so express it ; so that 
 none but a master of the language can handle it 
 with real success. On the other hand, it is fertile 
 in humorous types, and clces not indulge — un- 
 willingly at least — in caricature. 
 
 Amongst Jokai's novels, "An Hungarian Nabob "
 
 238 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 (" Egy Magyar nabob" 1856, translated into English) 
 is one of his earlier masterworks. It tells the story 
 of one of those immensely wealthy Hungarian 
 noblemen who, in pre-revolutionary times, lived like 
 small potentates on their vast estates, surrounded 
 by wassailing companions, women, gamblers, fools, 
 gypsies, and an indefinite crowd of hangers-on. 
 The old Karpathy, the nabob, in spite of habitual 
 excesses of all kinds, is, at bottom, an upright and 
 proud man. The intrigues made against him by a 
 profligate nephew, hitherto his only heir, and who 
 wants to precipitate his death, are baffled by the 
 nabob's marriage with a young and innocent girl, 
 who makes him the father of a boy, Zoltan. 
 Within this apparently very simple framework 
 what a wealth of scenes, of types, of humour, and 
 descriptive gems ! We are taken from the half- 
 savaee manor-life of the old nabob to brilliant 
 Paris, then again to Pozsony and to Pest. The 
 language is winged, winning, and gorgeously 
 varied. The continuation of the " Nabob " is 
 given in "Karpathy Zoltdn" a novel which, both in 
 its pathos and in its humour, is one of the most 
 engaging pieces of modern narrative literature. 
 Full of historic interest are Jokai's " The Golden 
 Era of Transylvania " (" Erdely arany kora" 
 translated into English by Mr. Nisbet Bain) ; 
 "The Sins of the Heartless Man" "(A koszivu 
 ember Jiai") ; "Political Fashions" {Politikai
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 239 
 
 divatok"); "The Lady with the Sea-Eyes" ("A 
 tengerszemu holgy ") ; and in " The New Landlord " 
 (" Az w foldesur") Jokai has, without so much as 
 posing as a political moralist, achieved one of the 
 best effects of patriotic moralizing. " The New 
 Landlord " is perhaps one of the most finished and 
 architectonically perfect of the Hungarian master's 
 works, although the workmanship of " What we 
 are growing old for " {Mire megvenuliink ") is also 
 remarkable. Other novels in which Jokai's splen- 
 dour of imagination and narrative genius may be 
 enjoyed at their best are : " Love's Fools " 
 (" Szerelem bolondjai ") ; " Black Diamonds " (" Fe- 
 kete gyemdntok" translated into English) ; " There 
 is no Devil" (" Nincsen ordog"); "The Son of 
 Rakoczy " (" Rdkoczy fia ") ; " Twice Two is Four " 
 (Ketszer ketto negj"), etc. Besides works of 
 fiction, exceeding two hundred and fifty volumes, 
 Jokai has written an interesting History of Hun- 
 gary ; his memoirs ; the Hungarian part of the 
 late Crown Prince Rudolfs great work on Austria- 
 Hungary, etc. He is still enriching Hungarian 
 Literature with ever new works of fiction.
 
 CHAPTER XXXI. 
 
 In the preceding chapters we have essayed to give 
 some idea of the work of the leading poets and 
 writers of Magyar literature. The very narrow 
 limits of this sketch of the literary life of the 
 Hungarians have prevented us from giving more 
 than mere outlines ; and in now approaching the 
 activity of modern Hungarian poets and writers of 
 less prominent position, although not infrequently 
 of very considerable value, we are forced to restrict 
 ourselves to still more limited appreciation. 
 
 Amongst the Novel-writers we cannot omit to 
 mention Louis Kuthy (18 13-1864), Ignatius Nagy 
 (18 10-1856), and Gustavus Lauka. The two latter 
 excelled in light, humorous novels. In the 
 humoristic sketches and tales of Gereben Vas 
 {nom dc plume for Joseph Radakovics, 1823- 1867) 
 there is a continuous and, as to its language, 
 admirable display of the fireworks of folk-wit and 
 racy fun. Amongst his best works are " Great 
 Times — Great Men " (" Nagy idok nagy emberek") ; 
 "Law-Students' Bohemian Life" {"Jurdtus clet").
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 241 
 
 Albert Palffy (born in 1823), after a long career 
 as an influential politician and journalist, has 
 published, since 1892, a great number of sound, 
 readable novels. Aloisius Degre (born in 1820), 
 of French extraction, has always been a popular 
 writer with readers of society-novels. Charles 
 Berczy (1823- 1867) is the founder of sport- 
 literature in Hungary ; in his novels he follows 
 chiefly English models. A peculiar position is 
 occupied by Ladislas Beothy who, in the evil 
 decade of Austrian reaction (1 850- 1860) amused 
 and consoled his despondent countrymen by his 
 eccentric humour and originality. In the historic 
 novels of Charles Szathmary (1830-1891) there is 
 more patriotism than literary power. Both as a 
 journalist (as editor of the " Fovdrosi Lapok") and 
 as an author of elegant and thoughtful novels, 
 Charles Vadna (born 1832) has won a conspicuous 
 place for himself. Alexander Balazs (1830- 1887) ; 
 Arnold Vertesi (born 1836); Lewis Tolnai (born 
 1837); William Gyory (1838-1S85); M iss Stephania 
 Wohl (1848-1889); Emil Kazar (born in 1843); 
 have in numerous novels, many of which would 
 merit particular attention, painted the sad or gay 
 aspects of life. Louis Abonyi (born in 1833), 
 Alexander Baksay (born in 1832), Odon Jakab, 
 and Bertalan Szaloczy count among the best 
 Hungarian novelists whose subjects are taken 
 from the life of the Magyar peasantry. As we
 
 242 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 have already suggested, the number of Hungarian 
 writers venturing on a novelistic poetisation of life 
 on a grand scale, is not very great at present. 
 Most of the modern novelists just mentioned work 
 on a smaller scale ; and thus the Hungarian Bret 
 Harte did not fail to make his appearance. His 
 name is Coloman Mikszath (born in 1849). His 
 short and thoroughly poetic tales from the folk- 
 life of Hungary are in more than one respect 
 superior to those of the American writer. For, to 
 the latter's sweet conciseness of plan and dialogue, 
 Mikszath adds the charm of naivete. Some of 
 his works have been translated into German, 
 French and English ; and the enthusiasm for his 
 art will no doubt spread from Hungary to all other 
 countries where the graces of true simplicity can 
 still be enjoyed. 
 
 Amongst the numerous writers of ^w^-sketches 
 
 and feuilletons, " Porzo " or Dr. Agai is facile 
 
 princcps ; not only in Hungary, but also, we 
 
 venture to add, in all Europe. He is quite 
 
 unique.
 
 CHAPTER XXXII. 
 
 The number of lyrical poets is very great in 
 modern Hungary. It may be stated that, as a 
 rule, a Magyar poet has more chances of attracting 
 public attention by a good lyrical poem than by a 
 good novel. Perhaps the female portion of Hun- 
 gary are not as anxious for novel-reading, as are 
 their sisters in more western countries ; and thus 
 the balance of attention to poetic works is spent on 
 the drama and on lyrics. This fact is on a line 
 with the predilection of the Hungarian public for 
 songs and airs, as against native musical works of 
 a more extensive description. The great Hun- 
 garian lyrical poets of modern times may properly 
 be divided into several groups, of which the first 
 is the school of poets with whom the beauty and 
 purity of Form is the principal concern of their 
 art. Considering the innate Magyar tendency to 
 rhapsodic and shapeless exuberance, the relative 
 value of the works of that group is very great. 
 The Hungarian language, just on account of its 
 
 Q
 
 244 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 large share of musical elements, has somewhat of 
 that indistinctness and vague emotionality which, 
 like that of music, must be strictly kept within 
 the bounds of Form. Even in the more advanced 
 poetry of the Teutonic nations, whether German or 
 English, the significance of poets cultivating pre- 
 eminently the chaste beauty of Form, is still very 
 considerable. Fortunately for Hungary, both Paul 
 Gyulai (born in 1826) and Charles Szasz (born in 
 1829) have, especially the latter, untiringly worked 
 at providing their countrymen with works of 
 poetry, original or otherwise, in which the law and 
 beauty of Form predominate over emotionalism. 
 Szasz has thus deserved very highly of Hungarian 
 Literature. His delicate sense of metre, rhythm and 
 architectonics, in his original epics and lyrics, as 
 well as in his exceedingly numerous translations 
 from the works of great western poets, is on a par 
 with the wealth of his linguistic resources ; and 
 while English poetry may perhaps afford to be less 
 encouraging to the adepts of Form, Magyar 
 literature is to be congratulated upon having at 
 once recognized and thereby not missed the 
 numerous works of her Richard Garnett. 
 
 To this group belongs also Joseph Levay (born 
 in 1825), whose popular works move in the sphere 
 of elevated serenity. 
 
 Another group of lyrical poets is formed by the 
 nationalists, who vied with one another in sounding
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 245 
 
 exclusively the note of Magyar sentiments and 
 ideas proper. Local colour seemed to be every- 
 thing, and in language and subject nothing was 
 used outside the purely Magyar elements. The 
 most gifted of that class was Coloman T6th (1831- 
 1881); next to him ranks perhaps Andrew Toth 
 (1824-1885); nor must Coloman Lisznyay (1823- 
 1863), Joseph Zalar (born in 1827J, and Joseph 
 Szekely (born in 1825) be omitted. 
 
 Quite by himself stands John Vajda (born in 
 1827). He is to Hungarian poetry proper, what 
 Kemeny (see pp. 153, etc.) is to Hungarian 
 novelistic literature. His is the gloom and power 
 of pessimism ; and in his fight with Destiny he 
 conjures up all the furies of scorn, despair, rage 
 and hatred : see especially his " Szerelem dtka " and 
 " Gina emlike." 
 
 The lyrical poets of the sixties and seventies of 
 this century tried to avoid excessive nationalism, 
 true to the spirit of the time when Hungary 
 through the final regulation of her constitution as 
 an autonomous state, assumed a European attitude 
 herself. The more prominent names are Bela 
 Szasz ; Victor Dalmady ; Joseph Komocsy ; Lewis 
 Tolnai ; Ladislas Arany, Alexander Endrodi, 
 Julius Reviczky, etc. In Joseph Kiss there is 
 much of that power of discovering poetic riches 
 in subjects hitherto ignored by poets, which goes 
 to make the really great poet. The emotional
 
 2 4 h HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 conflicts between orthodox Jews and Christian 
 peasants living in the same village, conflicts of 
 love and hatred alike, have been worked into 
 powerful ballads by Kiss.
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII. 
 
 It would be impossible, to write even the shortest 
 sketch of Hungarian Literature without dwelling on 
 one of the less conspicuous, yet chief sources of 
 suggestion and inspiration of Hungarian poets. 
 We mean the folk-poetry of the Hungarian people. 
 Now that we can study that poetry in numerous 
 and comprehensive collections, published by John 
 Erdelyi (1848), Paul Gyulai and Ladislas Arany, 
 John Kriza (1863), Lewis Kalmany, Coloman 
 Thaly (in English, the collection of L. Kropf and 
 W. Jones, " Magyar Folk-tales," 1884), etc., etc., we 
 cannot but acknowledge the profound effect that 
 these countless poems, ballads, songs, fables, epics, 
 and ditties must have had on the minds of 
 Hungarian poets who spent their youth in the 
 midst of people singing, reciting or improvising 
 them. In intensity of colour, in fire and varied 
 picturesqueness, Hungarian folk-poetry is certainly 
 not inferior to that of the people of Italy. In 
 humour and exuberant audacity it is probably its 
 equal. But while Italian folk-poetry frequently
 
 24 8 Hungarian literature. 
 
 stoops to the indecent and obscene, it may be said 
 without fear of contradiction, that such stains are 
 unknown to the folk-poetry of the Magyars. In it 
 lives the whole life of that nation, its sorrows and 
 humiliations, as well as its moments of triumph 
 and victory. The complete ethnography, historic 
 and present, of the Magyars could be gleaned from 
 that poetry. Nay, so intense is the poetic feeling 
 of those lowly and obscure peasant-poets, that 
 every object of the rich nature of Hungary has 
 been framed and illumined by them. The paszta, 
 and the two mighty rivers of the country ; the 
 snow-clad Carpathians, and the immense lake of 
 the Balaton ; the abundant flora and fauna of their 
 land — all is there, instinct with poetic life of its 
 own, and embracing, sympathizing or mourning 
 the life of the shepherd, the outlaw [betydr), the 
 lover, the priest, the trader, the Jew, the constable, 
 the squire, the maiden, the widow, the child. 
 There is in that folk-poetry a tinkling, ringing and 
 pealing of all the bells and organs of life. Like 
 the music that almost invariably accompanies it, it 
 is teeming with intense power, and hurries on over 
 the cascades of acute rhythms, and the rapids of 
 gusts of passion. As if every object of Nature had 
 revealed to it the last, brief secret of its being, it 
 describes scenes and situations in two or three 
 words. Its wit is harmless or cruel, just as it 
 chooses ; and in its humour the laughing tear is
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 249 
 
 not wanting. Chief of all, as the great pundits of 
 Cairo or Bagdad, whenever they are at sea about 
 some of the enigmas of the idiom of the Koran 
 and the Makamat, send for advice to the roving 
 Bedouins of the Arabian deserts : so the Hungarian 
 poets have gathered their best knowledge of the 
 recondite lore of the Magyar idiom, in the pusztas 
 of the A If old, between the Danube and the Theiss, 
 where the true Magyar peasant is living. 
 
 Hungarian folk-poetry is not a thing of the past. 
 Almost day by day, new and ever new " notdk" or 
 songs are rising from the fields and forests — nobody 
 knows who composed them — and as if carried by 
 the winds of east and west, they quickly find their 
 way into the heart of the whole nation. There is 
 thus an inexhaustible fountain of poetry and 
 poetic suggestiveness in the very nation of the 
 Magyars. Great as some of the Hungarian lyrical 
 poets have been, it is fair to assume, that with such 
 an undercurrent of perennial folk-poetry to draw 
 upon, there are, for this reason alone, still many 
 more great poets in store for us.
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV. 
 
 In conclusion, a few words on the Hungarian 
 literary productions outside belles-lettres proper. 
 From the pre-eminently political character of the 
 Magyars, it may be inferred almost a priori 
 that questions bearing on legal and constitu- 
 tional matters have at all times been a favourite 
 subject with the writers and statesmen of Hungary. 
 Previous to 1830, in round numbers, these questions 
 were treated mostly in Latin works. Since then, 
 however, a very considerable number of politico- 
 legal and politico-historical writers in Magyar has 
 arisen. The most important amongst them, both 
 for the authority they commanded in practical 
 politics, and for the weight and power of their 
 arguments, are Count Stephen Szechenyi ; Baron 
 Nicolas Wesselenyi ; Count Aurelius Dessewffy ; 
 Baron Joseph Eotvos (see pp. 142, etc.) ; the 
 famous Lewis Kossuth, probably the greatest politi- 
 cal orator of the century ; and Francis Deak. 
 They were all practical statesmen, and not mere
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 251 
 
 scholars. Yet most of their works on the consti- 
 tution of Hungary, and especially on the constitu- 
 tional relation of Hungary to Austria, are also 
 valuable as sources of solid and scholarly informa- 
 tion. Thus Deak showed the extensiveness of his 
 legal and politico-historical erudition in his famous 
 controversy with the Austrian professor Lustkandl, 
 in no lesser degree than his tact and wisdom in 
 the conclusion of the final treaty between Austria 
 and Hungary in 1867. Eotvos enriched Magyar 
 political literature with an elaborate and thoughtful 
 work on " The Influence of the Dominant Ideas of 
 the Nineteenth Century on the State" ("A xix. 
 szdzad uralkodo eszmeinek befolydsa as dlladalomra" 
 1851-1854). In more recent times a very great 
 number of politico-legal monographs has been 
 published in Hungary. The student will find lists 
 of them in the works of Stephen Kiss and E. 
 Nagy, both entitled " Constitutional Law of Hun- 
 gary " (" Magyarorszdg kozjoga" the former in 
 1 888, the latter, third edition, 1896). Of older 
 works on the constitutional law of Hungary, the 
 most useful are those of count Cziraky (185 1, in 
 Latin), and of Professor Virozsil (also in Hungarian 
 and German, 1865). Amongst the numerous 
 Magyar writers on Jurisprudence, Professor Augus- 
 tus Pulszky is well-known in England through his 
 able work, written in English, on " The Theory of 
 Law and Civil Society" (1888).
 
 25 2 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 In the department of History, and especially the 
 history of Hungary, the activity of the Magyars 
 has been one of astounding intensity. In the 
 well-known annual bibliography of history, edited 
 by Jastrow, in Berlin {Jahresberichte, etc.), the 
 annual report on the historical literature published 
 in Hungary, occupies a conspicuous space. The 
 older historians of Hungary, such as G. Pray (1774, 
 3 vols, fol.), Katona (1779-18 17, 42 vols.), who 
 wrote in Latin; and Engel (1814), Fessler (1825, 
 10 vols.), count John Majlath (1853, 5 vols.), who 
 wrote in German, can now be used only for occa- 
 sional reference. Of Magyar writers on the history 
 of Hungary, Bishop Michael Horvath (1809- 1878), 
 and Ladislas Szalay (18 13- 1864), have had the 
 greatest influence on the reading public and 
 Magyar historiography up to the end of the 
 seventies. The bishop treats history in the style 
 of fine and dignified ecclesiastical allocutions. 
 Szalay's is a talent for the political and legal 
 aspects of history rather than for the personal and 
 military element thereof. In both historians there 
 is a noble patriotism, and their works, even if dis- 
 carded as wanting in systematic research, will 
 always claim a high rank as literary productions. 
 Hungary is still waiting for the true historian 
 of the whole of her history ; but what other 
 country is not? Writers of historic monographs 
 there are many, and they have done excellent
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 253 
 
 work. Some of the most prominent are Count 
 Joseph Teleki (1790- 185 5) ; Francis Salomon (born 
 1825); Anton Csengery (1822-1880); Charles Szal><> 
 (1824-1890) ; Alexander Szilagyi (born 1830), the 
 historian of Transylvania ; William Fraknoi (born 
 1843, died recently), on Pazmany and King 
 Matthew; Julius Pauler (born 1841), whose great 
 work on the history of Hungary under the Arpads 
 (till 1 301) is characterised by a most careful study 
 of all the original sources ; Coloman Thaly (born 
 1839), whose "speciality" is the age of Francis 
 Rakoczy II.; Emericus Krajner (very valuable 
 works on constitutional history) ; Lewis Thalloczy 
 (on relation to Balkan nations) ; Ignatius Acsady 
 (on civilization and finance of xvi. and xvii. cent.) ; 
 Henry Marczali (on the age of Emperor Joseph 
 II.); Lewis Kropf, whose domicile is in London, 
 and who, in a long series of accurate and scholarly 
 monographs has elucidated many an important 
 point of Hungarian history; G. Ladanyi (constitu- 
 tional history) ; Sigismond Ormos (institutional 
 history of the Arpadian period) ; K. Lanyi 
 (ecclesiastical history) ; Alex. Nagy (institu-' 
 tional history) ; F. Kubinyi (institutional history) ; 
 S. Kolosvary and K. Ovary (charters) ; 
 L. Fejerpataky (charters) ; Arpad Kerekgyarto 
 (history of Magyar civilization) ; F. Balassy 
 (institutional history) ; Professor Julius Lanczy 
 (institutional and Italian history) ; Baron Bela
 
 254 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE, 
 
 Radvanszky (Magyar civilization) ; Emericus 
 Hajnik (constitutional history) ; Frederick Pesty 
 (constitutional history); Wertner (most valuable 
 works on Hungarian genealogy), etc. Great also 
 is the number of periodicals systematically 
 embracing all the aspects of Hungarian history ; 
 and local societies effectively aid in the marshalling 
 of facts, and in the publication of ancient monu- 
 ments. When the history of Austria, Poland, 
 and the Danubian countries has been written 
 in a manner superior to what we now possess 
 in that respect, the history of Hungary too, 
 will, we have no doubt, find its adequate master 
 among Magyar historians. The progress in 
 Magyar historiography has, in late years, been 
 little short of that made in any other country. 
 
 In the department of literary history we notice 
 the same lack of a satisfactory general history 
 of Hungarian Literature, and the same abund-- 
 ance of meritorious monographs on single points. 
 Francis Toldy (formerly Schedel, 1805-1875), 
 started a comprehensive history of Hungarian 
 Literature, which, however, he never completed. 
 In numerous essays and minor works he worked 
 hard at various sections of such a history, and 
 his relative value as an initiator in that branch 
 cannot be disputed. The laborious works of 
 K. M. Kertbe.iy are purely bibliographical, and 
 as such, useful. His attempts were quite thrown
 
 HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL. 255 
 
 into the shade by the great works on Hungarian 
 bibliography of Charles Szabo, G. Petrik, and J. 
 Szinnyei. The handiest and bibliographically 
 richest history of Hungarian Literature is that 
 by Zsolt Beothy (sixth edition, 1892). Under 
 Beothy's editorship a richly-illustrated history 
 of Hungarian Literature was published, in two 
 volumes, in the year and in honour of the 
 Hungarian Millennium, 1896. Among the better 
 writers of monographs on literary history are 
 Julius Zolnai (philology) ; J. Szinnyei (biog- 
 raphy) ; Sigism Simonyi (philologist) ; L. Negyessy 
 (prosody) ; Alex. Imre (popular humour and 
 mediaeval style) ; R. Radnai (history of Magyar 
 aesthetics) ; M. Csillagh (on Balassi); Sigism 
 Bodnar (history of Hungarian Literature) ; H. 
 Lenkei (studies in Petofi) ; K. Greska (on the 
 epic of Zrinyi) ; T. Szana (history of literature), 
 etc. 
 
 The study of aesthetics has always been one of 
 the favourite pursuits of Magyar writers during the 
 present century. The most conspicuous of Hun- 
 garian students of aesthetics are Augustus Greguss 
 and Paul Gyulai, whose works have advanced not 
 only Magyar views, but the study of aesthetics in 
 general. 
 
 The best known students of Hungarian philology 
 are John Fogarasi ; Joseph Lugossy ; the late 
 Sam. Brassai, who in his multifarious studies
 
 256 HUNGARIAN LITERATURE. 
 
 reminds us of the great scholars of the seven- 
 teenth century ; Paul Hunfalvy, Joseph Budenz, 
 Ferdinand Barna (Finnish philology) ; Gabriel 
 Szarvas and Sigismund Simonyi ; and the well- 
 known Arminius Vambery. 
 
 In the departments of Science proper there has 
 been very considerable progress in Hungary 
 during the last thirty years. Reports of the 
 general results of scientific researches made by 
 Hungarians are also published, for the greater 
 convenience of the western nations, in special 
 periodicals written in German. 
 
 THE END.
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 
 
 For general and accurate information about Hungary : 
 
 ••/'at/as" Encyclopaedia (in Hungarian) in sixteen 
 volum23, just (March, 189S) completed. 
 
 History of Hungarian Literature : 
 
 See the chapter at the end of the present work. In 
 German there is the able work of Professor J. 
 H., Schwicker (" Geschiclite der ungarischen 
 Litteratur" Leipsic, 1889). In Italian we have 
 the short history of G. A. Zigany, " Letteratura 
 Ungherese" (Milan, 1892, one of Hoepli's 
 •' Manuals.") 
 
 Selections from Hungarian poets : 
 
 Paul Erdelyi, A tnagyar koltSszet kincsesh&za (Buda- 
 pest, 1895). 
 
 Complete Catalogues of Hungarian books since the 
 invention of typography : 
 
 Charles Szabo and Arpad Hellebrant " Rdgi Magyar 
 Kbnyvtdr" (1879-1896, 3 vols.), comprising the 
 books printed down to 1711. 
 
 Geza Petrik, Bibliographia Hunganc? 1712-1860, 
 catalog/is libroriim in Hungaria, et de rebus 
 p.itriam nostram attingentibus extra Hungarian 
 
 editorum (Budapest, 18S8-1892), with subject 
 and author's indexes.
 
 258 BIBLIOGRAPHY. 
 
 Periodical Literature; index to Hungarian : 
 
 Szinnyei Jozsef, " Hazai es kiilfolJi folydiralok 
 magyar tudom&nyos repertorinma" 3 vols. (1874- 
 1885), two of which give the list of articles, 
 both in Hungarian and foreign periodicals, 
 on Hungarian history, and the third, articles 
 on mathematical and natural sciences. This 
 excellent work comprises even most of the 
 political daily papers. 
 
 Periodical devoted to the study of the history of 
 Hungarian Literature: 
 
 " Irodalomtortineti kozlemenyek? edited first by 
 Aladar Ballagi, and now by Aron Szilady (since 
 1891 ; full, well edited, with careful indexes). 
 
 Literary biography : 
 
 Joseph Szinnyei, the younger, "Magyar irok elete 
 es munk&i" Most exhaustive, with complete 
 bibliographies to each writer and his works, 
 comprising even articles written in daily papers. 
 (Budapest, since 1891, still unfinished). 
 
 The Magyar Language : 
 
 The most comprehensive work is by Professor 
 Sigismund Simonyi, "A magyar nyelv" (2 vols., 
 Budapest, 1889, 8vo).
 
 INDEX 
 
 Abonyi, Louis. (Folk-Novelist) 
 
 Academy of Science, founded by Szechenyi and others 
 
 ,, ,, its publications 
 
 Acsady, Ignatius. (Historian) 
 Alvinczi, Peter. (Controversialist) 
 Amade, Baron Ladislas. (Poet) 
 America has no epic ; the reason of this 
 American literature hampered by their language 
 
 ,, ,, has no naivete, reasons 
 
 Andrassy, Count George, a founder of the Academy 
 Andrew II., King of Hungary 
 
 Anyos, Paul. (Poet) 
 
 Anzengruber. (Austrian Dramatist) 
 
 Apor, Peter. (Historian) 
 
 Arany, John — his Hungarian reputation 
 
 ,, ,, compared with Petofi 
 
 ,, ,, reason why his work is not bourgeois 
 
 ,, ,, a Magyar and a class poet 
 
 ,, ,, his charm of language 
 
 ,, ,, his position in Magyar literature 
 
 ,, ,, his life 
 
 „ ,, his work 
 Arany, Ladislas. (Poet) 
 
 ,, ,, his collection of folk-poetry 
 
 Arpad Dynasty of Hungary . . 
 
 ,, ,, in the epic 
 
 A thencBitm, Hungarian periodical 
 Auerbach, Berthold. (German Folk-Novelist) 
 A urora, periodical 
 Austrian Empire, its heterogeneity 
 
 Bacsanyi, John. (Poet) 
 
 Bajza, Joseph. (Critic and Poet) 
 
 Baksay, Alexander. (Folk-Novelist) 
 
 Balassy, F. (Historian) 
 
 Balassi, Baron Valentin. (Poet) (I.) 
 
 „ (II.) .. 
 Balassi stanza, the 
 Balazs, Alexander. (Novelist) 
 
 poetry 
 
 18, 124, 
 
 PAGE 
 241 
 112 
 112 
 253 
 
 55 
 
 67 
 
 123 
 
 14 
 198 
 
 112 
 19 
 80 
 
 225 
 
 68 
 194 
 
 195 
 197 
 200 
 
 200, 201 
 202 
 202 
 
 204, 209 
 
 245 
 
 247 
 
 26, 129 
 
 40, 41 
 
 134 
 
 225 
 
 116 
 
 76 
 
 86 
 
 133 
 241 
 
 253 
 49 
 
 58 
 
 50 
 
 241 
 
 R
 
 2 6o INDEX. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Balzac. His genius not fully recognized . . . . 157 
 
 ,, Kemeny compared to him .. .. 157, 161 
 
 „ compared to Shakespeare . . . . . . 158 
 
 Baranyi, Ladislas. (Poet) . . . . . . . . 80 
 
 Barcsai, Abraham. (Translator) . . . . . . 80 
 
 Bards . . . . . . • • • . . . 40 
 
 Barna, Ferdinand. (Philologist) . . . . . . 256 
 
 Baroczi, Alexander. (Translator) . . . . . . 80 
 
 Bartok, Lewis. (Dramatist) . . . . . . . . 222 
 
 Batizi, Andreas. (Poet) . . . . . . . . 46 
 
 Beck, Charles. (Poet) . . . . . . . . 12 
 
 Bel, Matthew. His view of Magyar . . . . . . 37 
 
 Bellarmin influences Pazmany . . . . . . 54 
 
 Bern, General, and Petofi . . . . • • • . 190 
 
 Beniczky de Benicze, Peter. (Poet) . . . . . . 58 
 
 Beothy, Ladislas. (Humorist) . . . . . . 241 
 
 Beothy, Sigismund. (Poet) .. .. .. 135 
 
 Beothy, Zsolt. His History of Hungarian Literature . . 255 
 
 Beranger compared to Petofi . . . . . . 181 
 
 Berczik, Arpad. (Dramatist) . . . . . . 222 
 
 Berczy, Charles. (Novelist) . . . . . . . . 241 
 
 Bernstein, Charles Hugo, see Hugo, Charles 
 
 Berzsenyi, Daniel. (Poet) .. .. .. 81,103,109,121 
 
 Bessenyei, Alexander. (Translator) . . . . . . 80 
 
 Bessenyei, George. (Dramatist, &c.) . . . . . . 79 
 
 Bethlens, the .. .. .. •• 51.164 
 
 Bible, the, published in Magyar . . . . 46, 55 
 
 Bibliography .. .. .. .. 254,255,257 
 
 Biro de Deva, Matthew. (Lutheran " pope ") .. .. 46 
 
 Blaha, Louise. (Hungarian Actress) . . . . . . 222 
 
 Bod, Peter. (Literary Historian) . . . . . . 69 
 
 Bodnar, Sigismund. (Literary Historian) . . . . 255 
 
 Bohemian Music . . . . . . . . . . 236 
 
 Bonfini, Anton, at work in Hungary . . . . . . 43 
 
 Brassai, Samuel. (Philologist) . . . . . . 255 
 
 Brutus, Michael. (Historian) . . . . . . 164 
 
 Budenz, Joseph. (Philologist) . . . . 36, 255 
 
 Burger's influence on Csokonai . . . . . . 89 
 
 Burns compared to Petofi . . . . . . • • 180 
 
 Butler, E. D., of the British Museum (the foremost amongst 
 
 British students of Magyar philology and literature) Prefc.ce 
 
 Cesinge, John. (Hungarian Scholar) .. .. ..44 
 
 Cowley compared to Virag . . . . . . . . 80 
 
 Critical genius, its part in literature . . . . . . 92 
 
 Crusaders, unfit heroes of epics . . . . . . 42 
 
 Csengery, Anton. (Historian) .. .. .. 253 
 
 Csepreghy, Francis. (Dramatist) . . . . . . 225 
 
 Cseri de Apaca, John. (Author of Encyclopaedia) . . 62 
 
 Cserei, Michael. (Historian) . . . . • . 68 
 
 Csiky, Gregory. (Dramatist) .. .. 221,223 
 
 Csillagh, M. (Historian) .. .. .. ..255 
 
 Csipkes, George Komaromi. (Translator of the Bible) .. 55 
 
 Csokonai, Michael Vitez. (Poet) .. .. 88,211
 
 INDEX. 261 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Csoma de Koros, Alexander. (Philologist) . . . . 36 
 
 Czako, Sigismund. (Dramatist) .. .. .. 215 
 
 Cziraky, Count. (Authority on Hungarian Constitutional Law) 251 
 
 Czuczor, Gregory. (Poet and Philologist) .. 112,129 
 
 Czwittinger, David, his list of Hungarian writers . . . . 68 
 
 Dalmady, Victor. (Poet) . . . . . . . . 245 
 
 Dayka, Gabriel. (Poet) . . . . . . 86 
 
 Deak, Francis. (Statesman and Author) . . 26, 27, 250, 251 
 
 Debreczen, the Geneva of Hungary . . . . . . 46 
 
 Decsi de Baranya, John. His collection of proverbs .. 48 
 
 Degre, Aloisius. (Novelist) .. .. .. .. 241 
 
 Dessewffy, Count Aurelius. (Political Writer) .. .. 250 
 
 Dialects provide new elements of poetic speech . . . . 201 
 
 Dobsa, Lewis. (Dramatist) . . . . . . . . 222 
 
 Doczi, Lewis. (Dramatist) . . . . . . 222, 223 
 
 Drama, the .. .. .. 46,67,116,117,127 
 
 ,, opening of the National Theatre .. .. 113 
 
 ,, in the nineteenth century . . . . . . 207 
 
 ,, want of good actors . . . . . . . . 207 
 
 ,, Hungarian dramas unknown outside Hungary .. 221 
 
 Dugonics, Andreas. (Novelist) . . . . . . 83 
 
 Edes, Gregory. (Versifier) . . . . . . . . 84 
 
 Education in Hungary, see under Hungary 
 
 Egressy, Gabriel. (Actor) . . . . . . . . 208 
 
 Ekkehard's Chronicles record Magyar epics .. .. 41 
 
 Endriidi, Alexander. (Poet) .. .. .. 245 
 
 Engel. (Historian) . . . . . . . . 252 
 
 England and Hungary, their histories parallel . . 19, 21 
 Eotvos, Joseph. (Novelist) .. .. 140,146,250,251 
 
 ,, ,, character of his work .. .. 149 
 
 ,, ,, his power as an orator . . . . 156 
 
 Epic poetry, its character .. .. .. 122,126 
 
 Erdosi, or Sylvester, John. (Grammarian) . . . . 48 
 
 Faludi, Francis. (Poet) . . . . . . 67 
 
 Faust, its points of resemblance with Madach's "Tragedy of 
 
 Man " . . . . . . . . . . 219 
 
 Fazekas, Michael. (Author of a chap-book) . . . . 84 
 
 Fejerpataky, L. (Historian).. .. .. .. 253 
 
 Felix of Ragusa, at work in Hungary . . . . . . 44 
 
 Fessler. (Historian) . . . . . . 12, 252 
 
 Fiction in the sixteenth century . . . . . . 47 
 
 ,, in the eighteenth century .. .. .. 88 
 
 „ in the nineteenth century .. 118, 137, 226, 240 
 
 ,, (see also Novels) 
 
 Fischart, as virtuoso of language . . . . . . 45 
 
 Flygare-Carlen, Mme , her popularity in Hungary . . 137 
 
 Fogarasi, John. (Philologist) .. .. 112,255 
 
 Foldi, John. (Writer on Prosody) . . . . . . 84 
 
 Folk-Drama in Hungary .. .. .. 213,221 
 
 ,, ,, compared with the folk-drama in Austria . . 225
 
 262 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 TAGE 
 
 Folk-Novels and Tales 
 
 Folk-Poems of Hungary 
 
 ,, „ the chief inspiration of Hungarian poets 
 ,, ,, published collections 
 
 Fontius, Bartholinus, at work in Hungary 
 
 Forgach, Francis. (Hungarian Author) 
 
 Fraknoi, William. (Historian) 
 
 France, her constitution 
 
 ,, her national homogeneity 
 
 France, Anatole, his veiled pessimism 
 
 Fata Morgana of the Pusztas 
 
 French literature compared with Hungarian 
 ,, ,, its influence on Hungarian 
 
 „ „ has enjoyed advantages of criticism 
 
 241 
 
 242 
 
 134 
 247 
 247 
 
 44 
 164 
 
 253 
 153 
 159 
 168 
 176 
 
 31 
 117 
 
 133 
 
 Galeotto, Marzio, at work in Hungary . . . . 43 
 
 Garay, John. (Poet) .. .. .. ..131 
 
 Garnett, Richard ; the work of Szasz resembles his . . 244 
 
 Gati, Stephan. (Eighteenth century writer) .. .. 83 
 
 Gergei, Albert. (Poet) . . . . . . 47 
 
 German literature at the Reformation . . . . . . 45 
 
 „ ,, its influence on Hungarian .. 78,94,117 
 
 ,, „ influenced by Greek ideas . . . . 96 
 
 ,, ,, its bourgeois character .. .. 199 
 
 Goethe's Hermann und Dorothea . . . . . . 204 
 
 Golden Bull, the — the Hungarian Magna Charta . . . . 19 
 
 Greek not studied in the eighteenth century . . . . 65 
 
 „ Kazinczy's labours to introduce Greek models . . 95 
 
 Literature, born of Greek parents . . . . 96 
 
 ,, influence on German literature . . . . . . 96 
 
 „ ,, Hungarian Literature .. .. 128 
 
 „ Greek literature comparatively unknown in Hungary . . 132 
 
 Greguss, Augustus. (Writer on ^Esthetics) . . . . 255 
 
 Greska, K. (Literary Critic). . .. .. ..255 
 
 Griinwald, Bela. (Political Historian) . . . . . . 152 
 
 Gvadanyi, Count Joseph. (Poet and Novelist) . . . . 83 
 
 GyongyQssi, Stephen. (Poet) . . . . . . 5 8 
 
 GycJry, William. (Novelist) . . . . . . . . 241 
 
 Gyulai, Paul. (Poet) . . . . . . . . 244 
 
 ,, ,, his collection of folk-poetry . . . . 247 
 
 ,, ,, as a writer on ^Esthetics . . . . . . 255 
 
 Habsburg Dynasty, their work in Hungary 
 
 Hajnik, Emericus. (Historian) 
 
 Haner. (Hungarian Author) 
 
 Heine compared to Petofi 
 
 Heltai, Caspar. (Chronicler and Translator) 
 
 Holty, the Hungarian — Dayka 
 
 Horvat de Pazmand, Andreas. (Poet) . . 
 
 Horvath, Adam. (Poet) 
 
 Horvath, Bishop Michael. (Historian) 
 
 Hugo, Charles. (Dramatist).. 
 
 21, 24, 43, 51, 52, 
 
 [64, 66, 74, 115 
 
 254 
 
 164 
 
 177, 180 
 
 47, 48, 164 
 
 86 
 
 129 
 
 82, 109 
 
 252 
 
 216
 
 INDEX. 
 
 2G3 
 
 Hunfalvy, Paul. (Philologist) 
 Hungarian bards 
 
 constitution 
 language, its origin 
 
 ,, its influence on native literature 
 ,, its capabilities 
 ,, made the official language . . 
 ,, agglutinative 
 
 its characteristics 
 ,, cultivated by Protestants 
 
 its decadence in the eighteenth century 
 ,, cultivated as national palladium 
 ,, the labours of Kazinczy 
 „ schools of philology 
 
 foundation of the Hungarian Academy 
 ,, the Academy Dictionary 
 ,, Szechenyi's work . . 
 ,, the vehicle of instruction 
 ,, used in Parliament 
 ,, in Vorosmarty's hands 
 „ has no dialects 
 „ the influence of Arany 
 Literature of recent growth 
 ,, its extent 
 
 „ influenced by want of middle-class 
 ,, its parallel in Hungarian music 
 ,, compared with French 
 „ its originality impaired 
 ,, its four periods 
 ,, its most ancient products 
 „ its epics and legends 
 ,, receives an impulse at the Reformation 
 ,, influenced by the Renascence 
 ,, impeding causes at the Reformation 
 ,, controversial literature 
 
 Magyar Bible published 
 ,, sixteenth century poets 
 ,, the first drama 
 ,, early fiction 
 „ chronicles 
 „ obstacles to progress in the 
 
 century 
 ,, produced by the nobles only, 
 ,, controversial 
 ,, seventeenth century poets 
 „ Kurucz poetry 
 „ 1711-1772, a period of decline 
 ,, reason of this decline 
 ,, poets .. 
 ,, historians 
 ,, revival of 1772 
 ,, causes of revival . . 
 ,, Magyar periodicals 
 „ the three "schools" 
 ,, awakening individuality 
 
 34. 201, 
 
 77. 
 
 114, 
 
 PAGE 
 
 36, 256 
 
 40 
 
 19, 21 
 
 io, 34 
 13 
 15 
 25 
 33 
 245 
 54 
 63 
 87 
 93 
 97 
 112 
 112 
 
 "3 
 136 
 
 115 
 126 
 201 
 202 
 11 
 12 
 30 
 29 
 3t 
 32 
 38 
 38 
 39 
 43 
 43. 45 
 45 
 46 
 46 
 46, 49 
 46 
 
 11. 
 24, 
 
 47. 
 
 seventeenth 
 then 
 
 77 
 79 
 
 4 S 
 47 
 
 5i 
 53 
 54 
 56 
 60 
 
 63 
 64 
 67 
 68 
 70 
 72 
 88 
 
 85 
 
 85
 
 264 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Hungarian Literature a patriotic bulwark against Austria 
 ,, Kazinczy's work .. 
 ,, the romantic school 
 „ loses by patriotism of its exponents 
 ,, of slow growth, 1772-1825 
 „ effect of want of literary centres 
 ,, hampered by political fetters 
 
 brilliant revival, 1825-1850 .. 
 ,, foundation of the Academy . . 
 ,, the " Kisfaludy Society " 
 „ epics produced 
 ,, ballads 
 
 „ want of effective criticism . . 
 „ Bajza's work 
 
 reasons of late development of prose 
 „ Petofi's pre-eminent work 
 „ Hungary's contribution to typical poetry 
 ,, literary criticism still crude . . 
 „ rise of the drama in the nineteenth 
 
 century 
 ,, recent fiction 
 lecent poetry 
 ,, folk-poems 
 „ political works 
 ,, history 
 ,, historical societies 
 ,, history of 
 music .. .. 10, 28, 29, 61, 103, 114, 
 
 ,, its influence on the nation 
 
 pedigrees 
 wit 
 
 writers in other languages . . 11, 12, 68, 109, 
 
 Hungarians establish themselves in Hungary 
 
 their national character . . . . 28, 
 
 „ „ ,, influenced by their music 
 
 Hungary, its natural situation 
 
 occupied by divers tribes 
 
 the Hungarians establish themselves there 
 
 her history resembles English history 
 
 her constitution 
 
 preserves her liberties 
 
 the Turks expelled 
 
 effect of their dominion 
 
 her want of a middle-class 
 
 her history in the eighteenth century 
 
 rebellion against Austria 
 
 incorporated with the Austrian Empire . . 
 
 national reaction of i860 
 
 her present relations with Austria 
 
 her Parlature as compared with her literature 
 
 custom of speaking in several languages 
 
 detached from the Eastern Church 
 
 the Virgin, her patron saint 
 
 the Reformation there 
 
 PAGE 
 87 
 
 94 
 o, 117 
 107 
 108 
 109 
 no 
 no 
 112 
 
 113 
 124 
 
 131 
 132 
 
 134 
 
 136 
 169 
 
 185 
 192 
 
 207, 220 
 
 226, 240 
 
 •• 245 
 
 . . 247 
 
 250 
 
 252 
 
 254 
 
 254. 255 
 
 231, 236 
 
 30 
 
 36. 254 
 
 ■■ 237 
 
 250, 251 
 
 18 
 
 147. 
 
 the Renascence 
 
 217 
 30 
 17 
 17 
 18 
 19 
 
 19. 153 
 
 21 
 
 22,23 
 
 22, 23 
 
 23, 30 
 24 
 26 
 26 
 26 
 27 
 
 31, 229 
 
 32 
 
 41 
 
 4i 
 
 43, 45. 46 
 
 43—45
 
 INDEX. 
 
 265 
 
 Hungary, Universities in 
 
 schools 
 
 literature left to the nobles 
 
 influence of the revolution 
 
 character of its population 
 
 abolition of serfdom and expansion of civic 
 
 dissolution of monasteries 
 
 policy of Joseph II. 
 
 its effect in awaking Hungarian patriotism 
 
 the national stage 
 
 lacked literary centres 
 
 the Academy supplies this want 
 
 Pesth becomes a centre 
 
 local learned societies spring up 
 
 Parliament, the soul of its body-politic . . 
 
 diversity of types of character 
 
 her need of an epic as an incitement 
 
 character of the youth 
 
 independence of local government 
 
 the political training of her people 
 
 her national heterogeneity 
 
 the horse, the national animal 
 
 the rebellion of 1848 
 
 the Hungarian peasant 
 
 has no bourgeoisie proper 
 
 transitional state of society, 1850-1860 .. 
 
 the national tendency to pathos 
 
 its political strides since 1870 
 
 the theatres in Budapest 
 
 popularity of lyrical poems 
 Huszar, Gal. (Poet) 
 Hutten, as an author 
 
 life 
 
 PAGE 
 44. 52 
 52, 53. 63, 66 
 53 
 72 
 72 
 73 
 75 
 76 
 
 77 
 
 77 
 
 109 
 
 112 
 
 113 
 114 
 
 115 
 
 18, 137 
 
 123 
 
 147 
 150 
 153 
 159 
 176 
 189 
 
 195 
 197 
 
 212 
 217 
 220 
 222 
 
 245 
 46 
 
 45 
 
 Ibsen's morbid psychology unknown in Csiky's plays 
 
 Ilosvai, Peter. (Poet) 
 
 Improvisation unknown to Teutons and French 
 
 ,, in Hungarian 
 
 ,, its dangers in literature 
 
 Imre, Alexander. (Literary Historian) 
 I stvanffy, Nicolas. (Hungarian Author) 
 
 224 
 
 48 
 229 
 229 
 233 
 255 
 164 
 
 Jakab, Odon. (Folk-Novelist) 
 
 Jesuits in Hungary 
 
 ,, concerned in education 
 
 " Jingoism " in Hungary ; its influence 
 
 Jokai, Maurus. (Novelist) . . 
 ,, his reputation 
 
 ,, his character 
 
 ,, his power of work 
 
 ,, character of his work 
 
 ,, the Liszt of literature 
 
 ,, his life 
 
 Jones, W. His " Magyar Folk-Tales" 
 
 on literature 
 
 241 
 
 52 
 52, 66 
 209 
 140 
 226 
 226 
 227 
 228 
 231 
 236 
 247
 
 266 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Joseph II. of Austria 
 
 Josika, Nicolas. (Novelist) . . 
 
 ,, ,, character of his work 
 
 Juhasz, Peter. (Pope of the Magyar Calvinists) 
 
 PAGE 
 
 25- 73. 75. 77 
 
 44, 140, 228 
 
 144 
 
 46 
 
 Kerekgyarto, Arpad. 
 Kerenyi, Frederick. 
 
 Kalevala, the Finnish epic 
 
 Kalmany, Lewis. His collection of Folk-Poetry 
 Karman, Joseph. (Novelist).. 
 Karolyi, Caspar. (Translator of the Bible) 
 Karolyi, Count George, a founder of the Academy 
 Katona. (Dramatist) 
 Katona. (Historian) 
 Kazar, Emil. (Novelist) 
 Kazinczy, Francis. (Translator and Critic) 
 ,, „ his influence and work 
 
 Kemeny, Sigismund. (Novelist) . . . . 140, 
 
 his Balzacian genius 
 
 his pessimism 
 
 his erudition 
 
 as an historian . . 
 
 his work as a novelist . . 164, 
 
 his journalistic work 
 
 (Historian) 
 (Poet) .. 
 Kertbeny, K. M. (Literary Bibliographer) 
 Kis, John, founds Magyar Literary Society 
 Kisfaludy, Alexander. (Poet) 
 Kisfaludy, Charles. (Poet) .. .. 116,121, 
 
 ,, ,, his dramas 
 
 Kisfaludy Society, the 
 Kiss, Joseph. (Poet) 
 
 Kiss, Stephen. His " Constitutional Law of Hungary " 
 Klein, J. L. (The Historian of the Drama), a Hungarian 
 Klopstock's Messias 
 Kohari, Count Stephen. (Poet) 
 Kolcsey, Francis. (Orator and Poet) ... . . 98, 104, 
 
 Kolosvary, S. (Historian) 
 Komocsy, Joseph. (Poet) 
 Konigsberg Fragment, the 
 Konyi, John. (Eighteenth Century Writer) 
 Kossuth, Lewis 
 
 Krajner, Emericus. (Historian) 
 Kraus. (Hungarian Historian) 
 Kriza, John. His collection of Folk-Poetry 
 Kropf, Lewis. His " Magyar Folk-Tales " 
 
 ,, „ (Historian) 
 
 Kubinyi, F. (Historian) 
 Kurucz Poetry, patriotic ditties 
 Kiithy, Louis 
 
 40 
 
 247 
 
 86 
 
 46 
 
 112 
 
 210 
 
 252 
 
 241 
 
 93. i°9 
 
 • 94. 97 
 
 157. 235 
 
 157. J 58 
 
 161 
 
 163 
 
 163, 164 
 
 166, 168 
 
 165 
 
 253 
 
 135 
 
 254 
 
 77 
 
 109 
 
 212 
 
 117 
 
 113 
 
 ^45 
 
 251 
 
 12 
 
 123 
 
 •58 
 
 121 
 
 253 
 
 245 
 
 39 
 
 83 
 
 250 
 
 253 
 
 164 
 247 
 247 
 253 
 253 
 60 
 240 
 
 101, 
 209, 
 n6, 
 
 107, 
 
 Laborfalvy, Rose. Hungarian actress, wife of M. J6kai 222, 237 
 
 Ladanyi, G. (Historian) . . . . . . . . 253 
 
 Lanczy, Julius. (Historian).. .. .. .. 253
 
 INDEX. 
 
 267 
 
 14. 
 
 Language, its influence on literature 
 
 Lanyi, K. (Historian) 
 
 Latin used in Hungary . . 12, 52, 63, 64, 66 
 
 Lauka, Gustavus. (Novelist) 
 
 Lenau, Nicolaus. (Hungarian-German Author) 
 
 Lendvay. (Actor) 
 
 Lenkei, H. (Literary Critic) 
 
 Leopold II. of Austria 
 
 Lessing, a genius both critical and creative 
 
 Levay, Joseph. (Poet) 
 
 Lewis the Great, of Hungary 
 
 Liberty affected by Reformation 
 
 Listhy, Baron Ladislas. (Poet) 
 
 Lisznyay, Coloman. (Poet) 
 
 Liszt, Francis .. .. .. 114 
 
 Literature of a nation, as compared with its parlature 
 
 ,, influenced by language 
 
 ,, can only thrive in a republic of minds 
 
 ,, an urban growth .. 
 
 ,, the influence of critical genius upon 
 
 ,, born of Greek parents 
 
 „ universality of great writers .. 
 Lugossy, Joseph. (Philologist) 
 Lucretius' " De rerwn natural" compared with Madach's 
 
 " Tragedy of Man " 
 Lustkandl. (Austrian Professor) 
 Luther, Martin, as an author 
 Lytton's novels, their popularity in Germany and Austria 
 
 PAGE 
 
 15. 136 
 
 253 
 
 68, 109, 250 
 
 240 
 
 12 
 
 222 
 
 •• 255 
 
 25 
 
 93. 216 
 
 244 
 
 44 
 20 
 
 58 
 
 245 
 
 128, 231, 236 
 
 31 
 
 14 
 
 52 
 
 109 
 
 92 
 
 96 
 
 107 
 
 255 
 
 72 ; 
 
 219 
 
 251 
 
 45 
 
 137 
 
 Madach, Emericus. (Poet) . . 
 Maeterlinck, his veiled pessimism 
 Magyar, see Hungarian 
 Majlath, Count John. (Historian) 
 Marczali, Henry. (Historian) 
 Margit, Saint, daughter of Bela IV. 
 
 ,, ,, her life extant 
 
 Maria Theresa, her government of Hungary 
 Matthew Corvinus, King of Hungary 
 Metastasio's influence on Csokonai 
 Metres used in Hungarian Poetry 
 
 50, 59, 78, 81, 84, 97, 101, 103, 
 Metternich, Prince, his work in Hungary 
 Middle Classes, a product of Feudalism 
 Mikes, Clement, his " Letters" 
 Miko, Francis. (Hungarian Author) 
 Mikszath, Coloman. (The Hungarian Bret Harte) 
 Mirandola, Pico della 
 
 Molnar de Szencz, Albert. (Grammarian) 
 " Moralities," Hungarian 
 Music, see Hungarian Music 
 
 217 
 168 
 
 252 
 253 
 
 42 
 
 42 
 
 • • 73. 75 
 
 43. 143 
 
 89 
 
 104, 119, 130 
 
 25, 100 
 
 24 
 
 67 
 
 164 
 
 242 
 
 200 
 
 55 
 
 47 
 
 Nagy, Alexander. (Historian) 
 
 Nagy, E., his "Constitutional Law of Hungary" 
 
 253 
 
 251
 
 268 INDEX. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Nagy, Emeric. (Poet) .. .. .. •. 135 
 
 Nagy, Francis. (Translator) . . . . . • 83 
 
 Nagy, Ignatius. (Novelist) .. .. .. 215,240 
 
 Nagy de Banka, Matthew. (Poetical Chronicler) . . . . 47 
 
 Naivete, its origin and locus in life and literature. None in 
 
 America, little in England, reasons, ib. . . . • 198 
 
 Nalaczi, Joseph, (Poet) . . . . . . . . 80 
 
 Nature's " Laws," a convenient fiction .. .. .. 17° 
 
 Negyessy, L. (Author on Prosody) . . . . . . 255 
 
 Neo-Latin poets, the reason of their failure . . . . 14 
 
 Novelists of Hungary .. .. .. 137. l ?fi< Ho 
 
 ,, popularity of foreign in Hungary .. .. 137 
 
 Novels, Hungarian, their peculiarities . . . . . . 139 
 
 ,, „ reviews of individual works. {See also 
 
 Fiction) .. .. .. 141, 146, 149. l66 > 2 37 
 
 Obernyik, Charles. (Dramatist) .. .. ..215 
 
 Olah, Nicholas. (Hungarian Author) . . . . . . 164 
 
 Orczy, Baron Lawrence (Eighteenth century writer) . . 79 
 
 Ormos, Sigismond. (Historian) .. .. •• 253 
 
 Ovary, K. (Historian) . . . . . . • • 253 
 
 Palffy, Albert. (Journalist and Novelist) .. ..241 
 
 Pannonius, Janus, see Cesinge, John 
 
 Pap, Andreas. (Poet) .. .. .. 135 
 
 Pd.riz-Pa.pai, Francis. (Lexicographer) .. .. 62 
 
 Parlature, as contrasted with Literature .. 31,229 
 
 Parliament, the soul of political life in Hungary and England 115 
 
 Pathos, the Hungarian tendency to . . . . • • 217 
 
 Pauler, Julius. (Historian) .. .. .. •• 253 
 
 Pazmany, Peter. (Cardinal and controversialist) . . . . 54 
 
 Peasantry of Hungary .. .. .. 195.213.225 
 
 Pecs University . . . . • . ■ • 44 
 
 Pessimism, the outcome of thought . . . . • • 163 
 
 Pesth, suspension bridge connecting it with Buda . . . . 127 
 
 Pesty, Frederick. (Historian) . . . . • • 254 
 
 Pesti, Gabriel. (Lexicographer and Translator) .. ..47,48 
 
 Peczeli, Joseph. (Translator) . . . . • • 80 
 
 Periodical literature in the eighteenth century . . . . 77, 88 
 
 ,, „ the periodical press in the nineteenth cen- 
 
 tury .. 113, 116, 134, 237 
 
 Pettho, Gregory. (Hungarian History) . . .. .. 164 
 
 Petofi, Alexander, the greatness of his poetry . . 169, 172 
 
 ,, „ its spontaneity . . . . • . 173 
 
 character of his work 177, 181, 183, 190, 200, 233 
 ,, ,, his objectivity .. .. i77> l8 3 
 
 ,, his humour .. .. •• 179 
 
 ill-judged comparisons with Burns and 
 
 Beranger .. .. ..180 
 
 his patriotic poems distributed by Govern- 
 ment .. .. ..183 
 
 ,, appreciated in America .. 185,192 
 
 ,, his poetry, the exponent of Hungarian 
 
 nationality . . . . . . 185
 
 INDEX. 269 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Petofi, Alexander, sketch of his life .. .. ..186 
 
 „ his growing European reputation . . 192 
 
 " „ compared with Arany .. •• 195 
 
 Petrarch's influence on Kisfaludy - • • ■ . . 101 
 
 Petrik, Geza. (Bibliographer) . . • • 2 55 
 
 Petroczi, Baroness Catherine S. (Poetess) . . . . 5 8 
 
 Platen compared to Berzsenyi, as writer of odes . . . . 104 
 
 Podhorszky, his view of Magyar . . . . • • 37 
 
 Poetry not inherent in Nature, but a human creation .. 171 
 
 ,, its greatness to be gauged by objective beauty .. 184 
 
 Poetry and Poets of Hungary, sixteenth century . . . . 47, 49 
 
 „ seventeenth century . . . . 5 6 
 
 " „ eighteenth century . . 67, 79, 80, 84 
 
 " ,, nineteenth century 
 
 116, 127, 129, 135, 169, 245 
 
 Poland, continuity of its liberties • - • • • • 2I 
 
 Pope's influence on Csokonai . . . . . . 89 
 
 European character of his work . . . . . . 106 
 
 Porz6 (Dr. Adolph Agai), prince of feuilletonists . . . . 237 
 
 Pozsony University . . • • • • . . 44 
 
 Pray, G. (Historian) . . • . • • • • 2 5 2 
 
 Printing in Hungary . . • • • • . . 44 
 
 Priscus, the Byzantine, records Magyar epics .. •• 41 
 
 Prosody, see Metres 
 
 Pulszky, Augustus. (Hungarian Jurist) .. ■• 251 
 
 " Punch," the Hungarian .. .. •- •• 237 
 
 Pusztas the, of Hungary .. .. •• ..174 
 
 „ types of the dwellers there . . .. 175 
 
 the Fata Morgana .. .. ..176 
 
 Pyrker, Ladislaus. (Hungarian-German Author) .. .. 12 
 
 79 
 
 255 
 
 254 
 
 80 
 
 60 
 
 Radakovics, Joseph, see Vas Gereben 
 
 Raday, Count Gedeon. (Eighteenth century writer) 
 
 Radnai, R. (Art-historian) 
 
 Radvanszky, Bela. (Historian) 
 
 Rajnis, Joseph. (Poet) 
 
 Rdkoczy March, the 
 
 Rakoczy Francis, II. .. •• •• 23,144 
 
 Rakosi, Eugene. (Dramatist) .. •• 221,223 
 
 Ramler compared to Virag . . • • • • . . 80 
 
 Ranzanus, Peter, at work in Hungary . . . . 43 
 
 Realism inimical to art . . . - • • - • J °5 
 
 Reformation, the, in Hungary . . . . 43. 45. 46 
 
 Reguly, Anton, his views on Magyar . . . . • • 36 
 
 Reicherstorffer. (Hungarian Author) . . . . . . 164 
 
 Renascence, the, its influence in Hungary . . • • 43. 45 
 
 Revai, Nicolas. (Philologist) . . • • . . 80, 97 
 
 Reviczky, Julius. (Poet) . . • • • • • • 245 
 
 Revivals in dead languages, a failure . . • • • • J 4 
 
 Revolutionary spirit in Europe . . • • • • 7° 
 
 Hungary .. .. 7 2 
 
 Rhapsody in the music and poetry of Hungary .. ..185 
 
 „ its dangers . . . • • • • • 2 33
 
 170 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Riehl, Wilhelm, his writings on continental peasantry . . 196 
 
 Kimay de Rima, John. (Poet) . . . . . . 58 
 
 Romantic School, the, in England, France, and Germany . . 100 
 
 " Sabbatarians," their religious poetry .. .. .. 55 
 
 ,, in Transylvania . . . . . . 167 
 
 Sajnovics, John. (Philologist, 1770) .. .. .. 36 
 
 Sarosy, Julius. (Poet) . . . . . . . . 135 
 
 Salomon, Francis. (Historian) . . . . . . 253 
 
 Sand, George, her popularity in Hungary . . . . 137 
 
 Schesaeus. (Hungarian Historian) . . . . . . 164 
 
 Scott compared to Josika .. .. .. .. 144 
 
 Shakespeare better known in Austria than England . . 107 
 
 ,, his influence on Katona .. .. .. 211 
 
 Shelley studied by Petofi .. .. .. •• 181 
 
 Simonyi, Sigismund. (Philologist) .. .. 35.255 
 
 Sobieski, John, King of Poland . . . . . . 22 
 
 Somogyi (Ambrosius). (Hungarian Author) . . . . 164 
 
 Sonnets first written by Kazinczy . . . . . . 97 
 
 Stephen, Saint, King of Hungary .. .. ..18,41 
 
 Sylvester, John, see Erdosi 
 
 Szabo, Baroti David. (Poet) . . . . . . 80, 81 
 
 Szabo, Charles. (Historian) . . . . 253, 255 
 
 Szalardi, John. (Chronicler) . . . . . . 62 
 
 Szalay, Ladislas. (Historian) . . . . . . 252 
 
 Szaloczy, Bertalan. (Folk-Novelist) ... . . . . 241 
 
 Szamoskozy, Stephen. (Hungarian Historian) . . . . 164 
 
 Szana, T. (Literary Historian) . . . . . . 255 
 
 Szarvas, Gabriel. (Philologist) . . . . . . 256 
 
 Szasz, Bela. (Poet) . . . . . . . . 245 
 
 Szasz, Charles. (Poet). (The Hungarian Richard Garnett), ib. 244 
 Szathmary, Charles. (Novelist) .. .. .. 241 
 
 Szatmary, Joseph, see his assumed name, Szigligeti, Edward 
 Szechenyi, Count Stephen 
 
 ,, ,, his patriotism and political views 
 
 ,, a founder of the Academy 
 
 Science 
 ,, ,, ,, connects Buda and Pesth with 
 
 suspension bridge 
 Szekely, Alexander. (Preacher and Poet) 
 Szekely, Joseph. (Poet) 
 Szekely de Benced, Stephen. (Chronicler) 
 Szeker, Joachim. (Educationalist) 
 Szemere. (Joint Author of Felelet) 
 Szendrey, Juliet, wife of Petofi 
 Szigeti, Joseph. (Dramatist) 
 Szigligeti, Edward. (Dramatist) 
 Szilady's Collection of Hungarian Poets 
 Szilagyi, Alexander. (Historian) 
 Szinnyei, Jozsef. (Bibliographer) 
 Sztarai, Michael. (Dramatist) 
 
 37. 250 
 in 
 
 of 
 
 112 
 
 a 
 
 127 
 122 
 
 245 
 48 
 
 83 
 
 98 
 188 
 222 
 211 
 
 39 
 253 
 255 
 
 47 
 
 Teleki, Count Joseph. 
 
 (Historian) .. .. 99.253 
 
 first President of the Academy . . n 2
 
 
 
 PAGE 
 
 
 
 .. 215 
 
 47 
 
 139 
 
 139 
 
 253 
 
 •• 253 
 
 247 
 
 47. l6 4 
 
 134. 254 
 
 222 
 
 241. 245 
 
 . . 
 
 
 206 
 
 . 
 
 
 • • 245 
 
 • 
 
 
 • . 245 
 221, 224 
 .. 105 
 
 
 
 72, 109 
 
 192, 
 
 238, 
 
 239, 242, 247 
 
 INDEX. 271 
 
 Teleky, Count Ladislas. (Dramatist) .. 
 
 Temesvary, Stephen. (Poetical Chronicler) 
 
 Tennyson, not popular abroad 
 
 Thackeray, not popular abroad 
 
 Thalloczy, Lewis. (Historian) 
 
 Thaly, Coloman. (Historian) 
 
 „ „ his collection of Folk-poetry 
 
 Tinody, Sebastian, his " Chronicle " 
 
 Toldy, Francis. (Historian of Literature) 
 
 Toldy, Stephen. (Dramatist) 
 
 Tolnai, Lewis. (Novelist and Poet) 
 
 Tompa, Michael (Poet) 
 
 T6th, Andrew. (Poet) 
 
 Toth, Coloman. (Poet) 
 
 T6th, Edward. (Dramatist) 
 
 Toth de Ungvarnemet, Ladislas. (Poet) 
 
 Town life necessary to develop a literature 
 
 Translations from Magyar 
 „ into Magyar 
 
 47, 48, 55, 80, 81, 82, 83, 86, 94, 112, 128, 206, 244 
 
 Transylvania, her efforts for independence .. .. 5 1 
 
 ,, the home of patriotism .. .. ..140 
 
 ,, her history in Kemeny's novels . . . . 163 
 
 Turks driven out of Hungary . . . . 22, 23, 56 
 
 ,, effect of their dominion .. .. 22,23,51 
 
 Ugoletus, Thaddeus, at work in Hungary . . . . 44 
 
 Ugrian group of languages . . . . . . 35 
 
 United States, its constitution .. .. .. 152 
 
 Vachott, Alexander .. .. .. ■ • J 35 
 
 Vadna, Charles. (Novelist) .. .. .. ..241 
 
 . Vajda, John. (Dramatist and Poet) . . . . 222, 245 
 
 Vambery, Arminius. (Philologist) . . . . 36, 256 
 
 Varady, Anton. (Dramatist) . . . . . . 222 
 
 Varjas, John. (Versifier) .. .. .. ..84 
 
 Vas, Gereben (Joseph Radakovics). (Humorist) .. 240 
 
 Vay, Baron Abraham, a founder of the Academy .. .. 112 
 
 Verantius. (Hungarian Historian) .. .. .. 164 
 
 Verseghy, Francis. (Poet) .. .. .. ..85,98 
 
 Vertesi, Arnold. (Novelist) .. .. .. ■• 241 
 
 Vienna, siege of, 1683 . . . . • . . . 22 
 
 Viennese, character . . . . • • . . 87 
 
 Virag, Benedictus . . . . • . . . 80 
 
 Virozsil, Professor. (Authority on Hungarian Constitutional 
 
 Law) .. .. .. .. ..251 
 
 Vitkovics. (Folk-Poet) .. .. .. ..109 
 
 Vorosmarty, Michael, his character as a poet . . 120, 127 
 
 ,, „ his epic poem .. .. .. 124 
 
 his power of language .. 126,127 
 
 ,, „ his dramas .. .. .. 127 
 
 „ ,, contributor to the A thenccum .. 134 
 
 Wertner. (Genealogist) . . . . . . • . 254 
 
 Wesselenyi, Baron Nicolas. (Political Writer) . . . . 250
 
 272 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Wit of Hungary 
 Wohl, Stephania. 
 
 (Novelist) 
 
 Zalar, Joseph. (Poet) 
 
 Zichy, Count Peter. (Poet) 
 
 Zolnai, Julius. (Philologist) 
 
 Zrinyi, Count Michael. (Poet and Patriot) 
 
 " Zrinyiad," the 
 
 ,, its national influence 
 
 Zsamboky. (Hungarian Author) 
 
 PAGE 
 
 237 
 241 
 
 245 
 58 
 
 255 
 56 
 56 
 
 57 
 164 
 
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