Esztergom Évlapjai 2000

LEEL-ŐSSY Lóránt: Balassi Bálint pszicho biográfiája

Lóránt LEEL-ŐSSY PSYCHOBIOGRAPHY OF BÁLINT BALASSI (1554-1594) Bálint Balassi was the „first Hungárián poet" in the renaissance era. His personality can be characteráed like the typical medieval knight. As he was the son of a rich lord of the manor he received a military education. The main enemy of Hungary was the Turkish Empire in that time and the Balassi fought almost constantly against it. The life of B. Balassi was adventurous. He sometimes looked for dangerous situations, but he alsó preferred the ladies although one of these women ruled really always over his heart. This love has not been fulfilled which took possession of his poems. Beside of his martial and love-poems he alsó wrote beautiful religious verses and songs. His typical medieval renaissance - way of living which associated with many - sometimes - adventures, were expiated in his so called god-fearing poems. He was alsó genetically predestinated for a labile renaissance life of a knight together with the effect of his circumstances in different litigious matters. These latter affairs affected him very much and they made him very suspicious person. Somé people mentioned a severe head trauma suffered from a soldier which was followed by epileptic seizures. These sometimes caused his unjustifíed aggressive behaviour and his sensitive attitűdé. As Kosztolányi (a famous Hungárián poet and writer) said: „We are not entitled to give a verdict on Balassi because he was first of all a very excellent poet, a gentleman, an artist and a brave soldier at the transition between the Middle Age and the Renaissance." His capricious, vehement conduct and sometimes unexplained behaviour should not diminish meríts of this outstanding person not even if we are in opinion that this renaissance way of living may - in psychological sense - be adequate in these modern days to the acts and gestures of a psychopath. 26