Hungarian Studies Newsletter, 1981 (9. évfolyam, 27-30. szám)

1981 / 27-28. szám

A comprehensive treatment of demographical data. Has a chapter on demographic characteristics and trends in East Germany, Czechoslovakia, Poland, and Hungary. The editor is prof, of geography at UCLA.

Kresz, Mária. THE ART OF THE HUNGARIAN FURRIERS.

Budapest: Corvina, 1980. 79 pages, 16 color plates, 35 black and white pictures, 50 drawings, maps, glossary of place names, biblio. by regions. $6.10 cloth. No. 9 in the Hungarian Folk Art series.

This is yet another volume popularizing Hungarian folk art. It follows volumes on pottery, musical instruments, costumes, and embroidery furnishing, dances, and herdsmen’s art. The decoration and embroidery of garments made of sheepskin has been quite a distinct art in Hungary, as is well demonstrated by the collection of some 500 sheepskin garments in the Hungarian Ethnographic Museum. The author follows the developmental history and dissemination of specific garments such as the bunda, suba, kbdm'ón and szűr, and describes the furriers’ craft, their technique, motifs used, form and cut of garments, especially the use of applique made by cutting pieces of one material and applying them to the surface of another. A regional comparison is part of the author’s perspective, comparing the art in Hungary proper and in adjacent areas. Thus illustrations include examples from Saxons, Romanians, Slovaks, and South Slavs.

Lomax, Bill ed. EYE-WITNESS IN HUNGARY: The Soviet Invasion of 1956. Spokesman Books. Bertrand Russell House, Gamble Street, Nottingham, Great Britain NG7 4ET, 1980 £8.50 cloth.

As the 25th anniversary of the 1956 uprising approaches, it can be expected that several publications will try to reanalyze the event, its dynamics, meanings, and consequences. First of these efforts is this volume written by three British, two Hungarian, and one Polish Communists, all of whom were present in Hungary during the revolution; all developed and expressed sincere compassion with the Hungarian people; all were deeply shaken by the events they witnessed; but not all arrived at the same conclusions. In fact, one of them believes that Soviet intervention was the best possible alternative to chaos. The essays were first written and published in various forms shortly after 1956, “most of them have long since been out-of-print, and some have become indeed collectors’ items.” Contributors are Peter Fryer, special correspondent on Hungary to the Daily Worker (London) and author of Hungarian Tragedy (London, 1956); Dora Scarlett, who worked for the English section of Radio Budapest and is author of Window onto Hungary (Bradford, 1959); Charlie Coutts, editorof World Youth, a publication of the World Federation of Democratic Youth; Wiktor Woroszylski, editor of Nowa Kultura (Warsaw) and author of Diary of a Revolt (London, 1957); Miklós Krassó, a young intellectual, who was elected to one of the Budapest district worker’s council during the revolution; and Balázs Nagy, a historian, secretary of the Petőfi Circle, and author of La formation du Conseil Central Ouvier de Budapest en 1956 (Brussels, 1961). The central theme of the essays expresses approval of Marxism but not of its East European interpretation and application. Thus, “the spirit of the Hungarian revolution marked the birth of the very aims and ideals that had originally inspired the international Communist movement.”

The editor is lecturer in sociology at the Nottingham U., and author of Hungary 1956 (see HSN no. 17, p. 2).

Lőte, Lajos L. et al. TRANSYLVANIA AND THE THEORY OF DACO-ROMAN-RUMANIAN CONTINUITY. Committee of Transylvania, P.O. Box 3869, Rochester, NY 14610,1980.112 pages, maps, biblio. $7.00 paper,overseas air mail $7.50. Vol. 8, no. 1 (special issue) of the Carpatian Observer.

Official Romania maintains that their national history in Transylvania commenced 2050years ago. That the Romanians made this exaggerated claim a central theme in the International History Congress in 1980, evoked widespread criticism of which this book is one testimony. The seven essays of the volume repudiate the Romanian claims for the sake of scientific truth and for peace among people in Transylvania. The editors say that “truth can prevail over falsehood, reason over emotions, reality over myth. In that spirit we look forward to the day when Romanians and Hungarians will join hands and work together for peace.” The essays are as follows: The Daco-Romanian Theory of Continuity: Origins of the Rumanian Nation and Language by André DuNay; The Nationalities of Dacia during the Roman Period by the late László Réthy; Who were the people living in the Carpathian Basin before the Hungarian Conquest, transcript of a roundtable conference of Hungarian historians, translated by Thomas Szendrey; La version la plus recente de la theorie de la continuite Daco-Roumaine [Most Recent version of the Daco-Romanian theory of continuity] by Jean Csonka; Die albanisch-rumänische Wanderungsbewegung (11. -13. Jahrhundert) [Alban-Romanian migration in the 11th to 13th centuries] by Georg Stadtmüller; A Hungarian-Rumanian Dialogue: “At the Danube,” adapted from The New Hungarian Quarterly (Winter 1978); and Ethnocide in Rumania by Michael Sozan. This is an adapted version of an earlier essay published in Current Anthropology (1979). See HSN no. 19/20, p. 9 for review.

Magocsi, Paul R. THE SHAPING OF A NATIONAL IDENTITY: SUBCARPATHIAN RUS’ 1848-1948. Carpatho-Rusyn Research Center, 355 Delano Place, Fairview, NJ 07022, 1978. 655 pages, maps, tables, biblio. $25.00 cloth.

This is a monumental work on the history, language, literature, education, religion, and cultural organization of the region. It includes also the biography of 81 national leaders, vital and other relevant statistics, and a bibliography encompassing 2,200 entries. According to B. K. Király, “The book is both a welcome contribution to the understanding of the Rusyn question and a fine case study of the problems of borderlands. It is likely to remain the standard monograph on Rusyn history, politics, and culture for a long time to come."

The author is research fellow at the Ukranian Research Institute, Harvard U.

Miska, John comp. ETHNIC PROSE WRITTEN IN ENGLISH, 1833-1980: A Bibliography of Secondary Material. Microform Biblios, 3206 South Parkside Drive, Lethbridge, Alta. TIK OE2, 1980. 292 pages. $25.00 microfiche.

This is the second publication compiled by Miska (see HSN no. 26, p. 3 for review of the first volume on ethnic literature), and it contains 3,360 references, i.e. bibliographies, books, series, research papers, graduate theses, book reviews, etc. about English-Canadian fiction. It provides basic bibliographic data, some annotations, cross references, and indices. The microfiche material is arranged under five headings: reference works; general works; fiction, novel, short story, regionalism; individual authors of fiction; and indices. A microform publication on ethnic prose written in French is contemplated toward the end of the year.

The compiler is on the staff of the library of the Research Station, Agriculture Canada in Lethbridge.

NO. 27-28, SPRING, 1981 HUNGARIAN STUDIES NEWSLETTER

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