Hungarian Studies Newsletter, 1980 (8. évfolyam, 23-26. szám)
1980 / 26. szám
BOOKS (Continued) Tardy, Lajos. BEYOND THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE: 14th-16th Century Hungarian Diplomacy In the East. Trans, by Janos Boris. Attila József U., Szeged, 1978. Distributed by John Benjamins B.V., Amsteldijk 44, P.O. Box 52519, 1007 HA Amsterdam, The Netherlands. 260 pages, plate, map. Hfl. 50.00 (about $25.00) paper. (No. 13 in the Studia Uralo- Altaica, edited by P. Hajdú, T. Mikola, and A. Róna-Tas.) This is an expanded version of the author’s Régi magyar követjárások Keleten [Hungarian oriental diplomacy of yore]. Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, 1971, describing the anti- Turkish policies and activities of Hungarian diplomacy in the east. Though all of Europe had been threatened by the imperialist expansion of the Ottoman Empire, it was the Hungarian kings and Transylvanian princes, who initiated anti-Ottoman alliances with Asian powers and with the “Golden Horde of the Volga.” These efforts, although they did not have a decisive influence on the country’s history, are still part and parcel of Hungary’s past. The study begins with description of the early oriental missions of King Andrew II (1205-1235) and King Bóla IV (1235-1270). Activities of the latter were especially important, because they related to the prevention of an incipient Mongol invasion. News of such intent reached Hungary years ahead of the actual event, and King Béla IV tried to find allies to prevent the catastrophe. This was one of the motives of Friar Julian’s mission to Bashkiria (1235-1237). The author authentically describes the long chain of missions such as Hunyadi's contact with the Crimean towns, King Matthias' ambassador’s journey to the Persian Court, Hungarian missions to Egypt, and many more. The travel of envoys, always extremely hazardous, produced travelogues and diaries, excerpts of which were included in the volume with an entertaining effect. A list of abbreviations and a name index are useful additions. Vago, Robert M. THE SOUND PATTERN OF HUNGARIAN. Georgetown U. Press, School of Languages and Linguistics, Georgetown U., Washington, DC 20057, 1980. 150 pages, tables, diagrams, biblio. $7.95 paper. This study, based on the author’s doctoral dissertation (Harvard, 1974), describes in technical linguistic terms the phonological components of the Hungarian language. When compared with previous studies which were much narrower in scope, this book may be recognized as the first attempt at a thorough generative analysis of Hungarian sound patterns. Perhaps “the most significant and controversial theoretical assumptions in this study are the abstractness of underlying (lexical) representations, the extrinsic ordering of rules, and the nonlinear ordering of rules. Hungarian phonology has significant consequences for each of these issues.” The author devotes the first chapter to analyzing the process of vowel harmony evident in suffixes (ház-ban, tömeg-ben). Chapter two is devoted to the phonological assimilation rules which apply to consonants (egész-ség,kalap-ban). Next, the inflectional suffixes and the stem classes of verbs (olvasok, olvasom) are discussed. The personal suffixes and epenthetic vowels are worked out in detail. In conclusion, the system of case and possessive suffixes and the stem alterations of nouns (szó, sza-vá-ban) as well as the pronoun system are discussed. The author is assoc, prof, of linguistics at Queens Coll, CUNY. ARTICLES (j PAPERS Csikós-Nagy, Bela, “Hungarian Economic Reform after Ten Years,” Soviet Studies 30 (October, 1978) 540-546. The reforms, usually referred to as the New Economic Mechanism, had their roots in 1957, i.e. in the uprising of 1956. The 1968 reforms were actually the culmination of a series of steps that had been taken to abolish discrimination against private smallholdings, and to replace compulsory produce deliveries by free state purchasing. This laid the base for vigorous agricultural development. The successful experiment allowed the planners to initiate similar changes on a larger scale. The system of the new social benefits, such as a shorter work week and increased child care allowance, which were introduced about the same time as the economic reforms, caused some temporary problems which since then have been resolved. The 1973 oil price explosion upset a balanced development, and new price policy had to be implemented to neutralize inflation. A comment on this article appeared in the April 1979 issue of Soviet Studies. Hugo Radice found that most of the points were well presented and that the assessment was generally valid: however, he went on to point out that some problems were not mentioned in Csikós-Nagy’s article, such as, the monopoly position of many large enterprises, the sectoral ministries as an institutional power system, the difficulties caused by lack of reform in intra-Comecon trade regulations, and the persistent problem of the balance of payments. Radice points out that Csikós-Nagy’s article was followed by one on remodeling the Polish economic system byJ.Stanisz-4 kis in which the writer sets forth six pre-conditions, all implemented in the Hungarian reforms set in motion at least ten years earlier. The author is head of the National Material and Price Management Office in Budapest. (EMB) □ Deli, Peter, “Jean-Paul Sartre and Hungary 1956, “Survey, 24 (Winter 1979) 32-44. Sartre made it clear in his first editorial in Les Temps Modernes that it was to be a journal with commitment to Marxism. The Hungarian revolution of 1956 forced a reevaluation of this commitment, which the author analyzes in detail. Sartre’s belief in Marxism has not changed, but he did seek to explain the Soviet intervention as the Soviet Union’s attempt not so much to save socialism in Hungary but rather to preserve it in the Soviet Union itself. In a series of articles he argued with French communists and repudiated the idea that fascists were responsible for the revolution. He pointed out that if the Soviet had not fired on the workers on October 23/24, the tendencies toward the right that worried certain Kremlin leaders, would never had a chance against genuine left-wing elements he saw in the workers’ councils, for example. He had to come to the conclusion that the Soviet Union had destroyed the bonds that linked it to the international proletariat. Sartre continued to believe in the historical role of the Soviet Union in international communism, but argued that it had failed to live up to expectations. Thus, the way was open for a new model, which Sartre found in Poland where a successful renewal of the party took place from within. (EMB) □ NO. 26, WINTER 1980-1981, HUNGARIAN STUDIES NEW5LETTER
