Fraternity-Testvériség, 1952 (30. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
1952-12-01 / 12. szám
TESTVÉRISÉG 11 never strove for cheap effects. In our present world of spiritual blackout, devoid of pure joy and love, Petőfi seems like an extinct species; perhaps this is what makes him inimitable. He had many epigones—only one, Kálmán Tóth, must be credited with poetic talent, and some others were above mediocrity—but he could not be imitated, as he could not be intimidated. The Hungarian poet should not be classed as a minor Shelley or Burns, but as a first rate lyric poet in his own right. Like every real poet he could transform reality, thus creating a singular relationship between the actual and the imaginary. There are no strained images in his poems, no preciosity, no versifying hullabaloo, regardless of whether he writes about love, weddings, dancing, spinning, taverns, horses, cattle, storks, or whether he gives a graphic description of the countryside, of harvest in full swing or of foliage turned red. Recalling Oscar Wilde’s aphorism about nature imitating art, one may say that in this sense Petőfi added color and depth to the Hungarian landscape. His poetry “has the authenticity of lyrical realism. Petőfi had his Byronesque period, but as he himself remarked he “had ample reason” to be embittered. He had a wholesome spirit and was one of those, who were sad only then when there was reason for sadness.” 27 Even his martial songs are not bombastic or stereotyped; one hears the voice of the genuine lyrist. The element of surprise, which according to T. S. Eliot’s acute observation is so essential in poetry,28 is evidenced in many of his poems. In his epic poetry Petőfi knew how to weave his wistful smiles into a story, his selflessness, the natural order of things, the spirit of the common people. In spite of his youth he was conscious of the fact that tragedy is an inevitable part of human life; some of his reflective poems prove this. It is interesting to note that while he was a contemporary of Leconte de Lisle, the leader of the French Parnassians who stressed “im- passibilité,” Petőfi shows no “emotionless objectivity” either in his epic or lyric poems. There was no art for art’s sake formalism in his work, nevertheless a respect for form; no moral precepts, but the morality of the creative spirit which by its very nature was concerned with truth. He was organically so constituted that he could not be merely an observer; he had to participate in life. It is practically impossible to try to extract passages from his writings in which one could not 27 Mihály Babits, Az Európai Irodalom Története. Budapest, 1937. pp. 558-559. 28 T. S. Eliot, Selected Essays, 1917-1932. New York, 1932. pp. 267. 29 Scott Buchanan, Poetry and Mathematics. New York, 1929. pp. 38. see the man himself. His sense-awareness, combined with his imagination, was such that he could not be indifferent to anything. Some objections were raised to his “too simple” means by which he achieved his effect. Many of his poems exemplify the validity of art which consists in concealing art. He was accused of “naiveté.” This is a stupid condemnation. “Even a short poem that gives words to a mood discovers and reveals a structure, at once simple and very complex.” 29 The “simplest” poem is apt to be a combination of symbols, images, ideas, feelings and concise language. There were no literary salons in Hungary where he could have been acclaimed for “lofty” or “sophisticated” reasons. Petőfi accepted his own place as a poet and citizen, and wrote and lived thusly. He was young, and youth bestowed upon him the dangerous gift of candor. He lacked the cunning of the hard- headed merchant or the shrewdness of the peasant; he also lacked the stoic dullness of the defeated intellectual and the speculative mind of the systematic philosopher. Without complete formal education, endowed, however, with a linguistic intelligence which, for example, enabled him to acquire a working knowledge of French, English and German, and with an irrepressible imagination, his achievements must be considered extraordinary indeed. Of course, he had his defects too. He wrote a bad novel and two inferior plays. Economic and social pressures and the fact that— except for his military life in Austria and Croatia —he was never outside of Hungary, at times affected the horizon of his judgment. Occasionally he was susceptible to views which made him impetuous or arbitrary in his decisions and led to vehement disagreements with some of his most valued friends, such as Vörösmarty and Tompa. While his poems gained intensity through the expression of the immediate, sometimes there is a harsh note in them. But on the whole it must set one to ponder how, without much encouragement in his early years and writing in a language whose poets rarely enjoyed patronage, he could do so much in the brief span of his years and do it so well. Since 1854, when Pál Gyulai, the eminent critic, defined his position in his essay, entitled Petőfi Sándor és lírai költészetünk (Sándor Petőfi and our lyric poetry), no essential revaluation of his work seemed necessary, and his place as the foremost nineteenth' century Hungarian lyrist has never been challenged. His poetry has stood the test of time. Petőfi is the beloved poet of the Hungarian nation. It is to be hoped that the time will come when not only discriminating critics, but the general public of the world will read and appreciate his poetry according to its true merit.
