Hungarian Studies Newsletter, 1984 (12. évfolyam, 39-42. szám)

1984 / 39-40. szám

Changing Patterns in Eastern Europe. Specialists in econo­mics, politics, and strategic studies contributed information and ideas on recent and future developments in intra-bloc relations. The essays are therefore “think pieces” rather than research papers. Each contributor has eschewed both the technical terms and the assumption of specialist background knowledge that might have been appropriate in papers addressed to colleagues of the same discipline. The period of time considered, for most of the essays, is the Brezhnev era up to early 1980 and the 1980s in prospect. Hungarian references are not overwhelming. The 1956 events are mentioned by Dawisha in the historical background chapter introducing the volume to the reader, and further in Peter Summerscale's essay on “The Continuing Validity of the Brezhnev Doctrine.” George Schopflin analyses domestic conditions in his paper on “The Political Structure of Eastern Europe as a Factor in Intra-Bloc Relations;" and Malcolm Mackintosh reviews military aspects in “Military Con­siderations in Soviet-East European relations.” Dawisha is lecturer at the Department of Politics, U. of Edinburgh, and Hanson is senior lecturer in Soviet econo­mics, at the Center for Russian and East European Studies, U. of Birmingham. Csoóri, Sándor. MEMORY OF SNOW. Trans, by Nicholas Kolumban. Penmaen Press, RD 2, Box 145, Great Barrington, MA 01230,1983.67 pages. $8.50 paper, $22.50 cloth, $125.00 signed, deluxe. These 38 poems are about the “soul” of the author and his relationship to the turbulent world into which he was cast by fate. His parents were humble, religious peasants whose existence depended on the vagaries of the weather, year after year. When World War II swept through Hungary, his village changed hands no less than seventeen times within a 3% months period. His years of adolescence coincided with those of the brutal war and its aftermath. His first writings were born of indignation. They had more moral worth than aesthetic. They, as his later works, were testimonials to his stated life goal: trying passionately to preserve the individual (the “I") in “our war against dehumanizing impersonal­­ization.” This slim volume, his first in English, contains a potpurri of remembrances of things of the past and more recent times, all deeply felt and clearly expressed. He already published seven volumes of poetry and the same number of prose in Hungarian. In collaboration with Ferenc Kosa, he haswrittensixfeature-lengthfilms, including Ten Thousand Days, which brought him the Grand Prize at the Cannes Film Festival. Close cooperation with the translator resulted in an unusually smooth and powerful text. A woodgraving of the poet by Michael McCurdy decorates the cover. The author is one of the foremost poets of contemporary Hungary. Haiman, György, NICHOLAS KIS; a Hungarian Punch- Cutter and Printer, 1650-1702. Bibliography compiled by Elizabeth Soltész. Jack W. Stauffacher/The Greenwood Press, in association with John Howell-Books, 434 Post Street, San Fancisco, CA 94102, 1983. In cooperation with Akadémiai kiadó. (Title of the original Hungarian edition: Tóthfalusi Kis Miklós, a betüművész és a tipográfus.) 451 pages, about as many facsimile, 8 color plates, 9 separate enclosures, biblio. $60.00 plus postage. A printing type made from an ancient matrix came into use again in the early 1920s. Its aesthetic appeal caught the attention of experts and bibliophiles. Somewhat later the NO. 39-40, SPRING-SUMMER 1984 HUNGARIAN STUDIES NEWSLETTER letter was named “Janson” and it became widely known and used. In 1954, Harry Carter and György Buday identified it as the work of Nicholas Kis, a Hungarian theologian and teacher, who lived in Amsterdam between 1680 and 1689. He had gone there to work on the publication of a Hungarian edition for the Bible. Later on he opened a punch-cutter workshop and issued his Amsterdam type specimen contain­ing his still famous 37 types. In 1964, he started a print-shop at Kolozsvár with definite educational goals in mind, but his efforts of reforming the translation of the Bible and the Hungarian grammar, were ill-received. He acquired critics who attacked him personally and even threatened his life. Thus, in 1698 he wrote Apologia Bibliorum in which he defended his goals and work. (Several facsimile are included in the volume under review.) The book acquaints the reader with Kis' adventurous life, his role in the development of Dutch Baroque letters, and his influence in Hungary and other European countries, the use of his letters, the “pseudo- Janson,” in Europe and in the U.S. The volume is generously illustrated with samples of his work from many of his Amsterdam and Kolozsvár publications. Those interested in art, literature, and printing will find the volume extremely pleasing. The author is a printer, designer, author of work on the history of type and typography, and chairman of the Dept, of Typographies at the Hungarian Academy of Applied Arts. Király, Péter, ed TYPOGRAPHIA UNIVERSITATIS HUN­­GARICAE BUDAE 1577-1848. Budapest: Akadémiai kiadó, 1983.503 pages, tables, biblio., indexes. $28.00cloth. Original Hungarian title: “A budai Egyetemi Nyomda szerepe a kelet­európai népek kulturális, társadalmi és politikai fejlődé­sében.” (The role of the Buda University Press in the cultural, social, and politcal development of the East European peoples.) This multilingual publication is based on a colloquium commemorating the 400th anniversary of the Hungarian University Press at Nagyszombat. Cardinal Péter Pázmány, of whom the university was later named, signed the founda­tion charter of the university on May 12, 1635, and Maria Theresia transferred the institution to Buda in 1777. The general part of the book comprises 19 essays mainly in French and German. One in English was written by Géza Buzinkay on “The University Press and the Development of Medical and Scientific Literature in Hungary.” (pp. 143-146). The general part is followed by languages-specific essays on the University Press’ publications in Bulgarian, Croatian (2 essays have English summaries), neo-Greek, German, Hebrew, Hungarian, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Slovak, and Yiddish. The one essay in Hungarian is Robert Dan’s “Early Hebrew Prints in Buda” (pp. 225-230). A select bibliography of publications of the Buda University Press conclude the volume. Kirschbaum, Stanislav J. ed. SLOVAK POLITICS: Essays on Slovak History in Honour of Joseph M. Kirschbaum. Slovak Institute, 2900 East Boulevard, Cleveland, OH 44104, 1983. xviii + 383 pages, table, name index. $18.00 cloth. Few topics of recent European history have been as much understudied as that of the short-lived Slovak Republic of 1939-45. The task was left mainly to few specialists in the West and to Marxist historians in the East. “Although ideologically one-sided, their studies have confirmed that the Slovaks were aware that they could not always choose between the best possible options. Small nations rarely do. (Continued on Page 4) 0

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