Fraternity-Testvériség, 1959 (37. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)

1959-03-01 / 3. szám

4

FRATERNITY

became Director of the Conservatory of Budapest and later Director of the Royal Hungarian Music Academy, the first head of which was the great Ferenc Liszt. In 1948 he settled in Florida where he now is the piano teacher at the Florida State University.

Dohnányi was one of the dominant figures of Hungarian spiritual circles, and musical life centered around him. He was widely acknowledged as the greatest living Hungarian music interpreter. In 1922 he received the honorary title of Doctor of Music from the Budapest Academy and the “Corvin Lánc”, a high Hungarian decoration given for extraordinary achievements. He was also awarded the Officers’ Cross of the French Legion of Honor.

★ ★ ★

If “music is well said to be the speech of angels” — according to Carlyle, Hungarians contributed a considerable part of cultural heaven to this country.

ENDRE ADY:

TO M Y COUNTRYMEN IN AMERICA

My countrymen, you whom our common curte Has taken from us and has rent afar Perhaps too often in your thoughts we are.

Ah, nathless, Magyar life is overwhelmed,

And from deluge they alone emerge

Whom distant shores from present peril urge.

You far-off Magyars, how I envy you!

At home already all by us is lost;

You, happy folk, are far from ruin tossed.

Translated by:

ANTAL NYERGES