The Eighth Tribe, 1975 (2. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
1975-03-01 / 3. szám
Page Two THE EIGHTH TRIBE March, 1975 SÁNDOR PETŐFI 1823 -1849 The 19th century has given to history many outstanding poets and writers on the subject of freedom, patriotism, and representative government. An outstanding example for a poet consumed by passion for these ideas both for his people and all humanity, a poet which has a timely message for us even today is the Hungarian poet Sándor Petőfi. Sándor Petőfi was bom on January 1, 1823, in Kiskőrös. His father’s name was Petrovics, his mother Maria Hruz. Petőfi can be called the prototype of the Hungarian soul. Petőfi’s mere existence refutes thq empty theories that seek to prove nationality in terms of blood, of flesh, or genes. To be Hungarian is first of all a commitment of soul and fate, not the result of artificial biological ‘laws’. Sándor Petőfi is the best proof of this. He grew up in Félegyháza on the Great Hungarian Plain. He never lost his spiritual and poetic bonds with his native surroundings and throughout his short life remained proud of his humble rural origins in the Puszta lowland. The son of a butcher, an innkeeper and a peasant woman, he proved his talents in his early childhood, and deserved his father’s trust who sent him to high school to further his education. The young boy excelled in his studies, began to write poetry, executed fine drawings and developed an almost insatiable hunger for knowledge. However, in a new school, he experienced a shock—caused by a teacher who attempted to turn him against his beloved Hungarian nation—left the school and volunteered for military service. Luckily, a good-natured army doctor took advantage of a lung condition and managed to get his release from further rigors of the Austrian army drill, hardships that might have ended the life of the talented youth. Petőfi, a veteran of two years of army service at nineteen, followed the advice of his friends, left the theatrical group he had been associated with for a short time, and finished his high school studies. Then, being without any means, and since his father, too, was just going through a period of financial difficulties, the young man took to the road. He went to Pozsony, the seat of the Hungarian Diet, and participated in the editing of the Diet News (Országgyűlési Tudósítások), an informational paper launched several years by Hungary’s great political leader, Louis Kossuth. By this time, albeit a very young man, Petőfi’s name was well known in Hungary’s literary circles, for he had published a few poems in the leading literary journal, Athenaeum. His reputation brought him a few contracts for translation of some popular foreign novels, and he soon found himself established as assistant editor of one of Hungary’s leading ladies’ journals. Beginning with 1844 he started publishing his own works, and, by 1847, he found a publisher for the impressive volume of his Collected Poems, which became an instant success. Time passed more rapidly now than ever before. Events in the multinational political arena of Europe changed the international as well as the domestic political climate of Hungary. Petőfi, just married to Julia Szendrey, felt the tensions around himself, and these opened the bright windows of his great spirit to the new currents of intellectual and political thought. He published a flow of poetry, which reflected joy, grief, love and fury, displayed feelings of unprecedented depth and affirmed uncompromising standards on private and public issues. He even started to translate Shakespeare’s works into Hungarian. His name began ringing from one end of his country to the other. The year of 1848, when groups of educated youth belonging to the old European society began to sound demands for constitutional and democratic reforms, Petőfi threw himself headlong into the fast currents of Hungary’s political life—resurrected by Count Stephen Széchényi two decades earlier—and urged, in prose and poetry, the implementation of reforms as well as the recognition of Hungary’s historical rights to national unity, libery and equality. His National Song, which captured the souls and minds of the citizenry in Hungary’s capital city on March 15, 1848, became the battle song of the subsequent war of independence which Hungarians, under Kossuth’s leadership, fought against the armies of the Emperors of Austria and Russia. Later, even up to the present time it became an annually featured presentation number in the programs of the March 15th celebrations held by Hungarians all over the world, including this country of ours. THE EIGHTH TRIBE Editor ..............................................................Sándor E. Chomos Contributing Editor ...............................................Albert Wass Published and printed monthly by The Bethlen Press, Inc. P.O. Box 637, Ligonier, Pa. 15658, U.S-A. Second Class Postage paid at Ligonier, Pa. 15658, UJS.A. Subscription: $8.00 yearly. Authorized representative in Cleveland, Ohio is: Sándor Szabadkai. 1794 W. 30 Street, Cleveland, Ohio 44113.
