Az Eszterházy Károly Tanárképző Főiskola Tudományos Közleményei. 2002. Vol. 8. Eger Journal of American Studies.(Acta Academiae Paedagogicae Agriensis : Nova series ; Tom. 28)
Studies - Mária Kurdi: "Hold like rich garners the full-ripen'd grain." On the Scholarly Heritage of Péter Egri (1932-2002)
nature of its style. The cycle, left in torso as it happened to be, is worthy of attention the conclusion of the study runs, because it constitutes the probably most authentic dramatic "witness" to the author's struggle with form on the way toward creating the stylistic synthesis which will distinguish Long Day's Journey. From Comparative Approach to Interdisciplinarity 1988 was also the year when the fourth (and, unfortunately, the last) period of Egri's scholarly career started, with the publication of Literature , Painting and Music: An Interdisciplinary Approach to Comparative Literature. The comparative approach frequently present in his ealier works remained very much characteristic of the unfolding final creative period, though with a difference: from the above book onwards the related and shared aspects of literature and the other arts become viewed together. It is in the later book, Value and Form: Comparative Literature, Painting, and Music , published in 1993, where a kind of "program" for the period gains elucidation, along with the description of a perspective the new studies tend to deploy: The most promising and rewarding type of comparison between literature and painting or literature and music can conveniently be termed axiological parallel. This is comparison based on shared values. Since this method implies the systematic collation of values outside and inside the works of art, and since the two spheres are connected by form which is instrumental in selecting, condensing, reordering, generalizing and assessing primary experience, axiological parallel is concerned both with matter and manner, attitude and form. (9) Turning toward the contextualization of literary works with the help of certain achievements in the domain of the sister arts, Egri redefined the strategy of interpretation and evaluation when emphasizing the need for a sharpened focus on the cultural embeddedness of literature. By its nature, this kind of interdisciplinary approach ignores the limits of time and space, and the subsequent books and essays of the author lead their readers across a range of countries and centuries. Parts of Literature, Painting and Music remain unique in applying Stephen Spender's categories of "modern" and "contemporary" to the works of Hungarian poets Sándor Petőfi, Endre Ady, and Attila József, while looking for parallels in Hungarian 26
