A Móra Ferenc Múzeum Évkönyve: Studia Historiae Literarum et Artium, 3. (Szeged, 2001)

Péter László: Tömörkény István: Öregembör napáldozatja Szövegmagyarázat

derűs vonásokkal fölvázolt rajza, életképe, egy megelégedett öregember rokonszenves portréja. Egész életművének ismeretében nyugodtan megvédhetjük őt a romantikus parasztábrázolás vádjától: sok-sok írásában megrendítően örökítette meg a szegénységnek a természettel megküzdő, az ellenséges társadalommal szembeszálló, ám velük szemben többnyire alulmaradó, tragikus hőseit. Máskor ugyanilyen együttérzéssel rajzolta meg a tanyai élet egyszerű örömeit. Vagyis: az emberi élet teljességét. Ortutay Gyula joggal írta: „Szeged népének, Szeged irodalmának egyik leggazdagabb, legmaradandóbb ajándéka a magyar irodalom számára: Tömörkény stílusa" (Tömörkény István. Szeged, 1934. 107.). Talán sikerült e példán bizonyítanom. Öregembör napáldozatja, explanatory text László Péter The life work of István Tömörkény (1866-1917) presents a good example of the role that dialect has played in literary work. It demonstrates the awareness of the author, and although he was not qualified in the science of languages, his views on his practice as a writer were expounded in his work entitled 'Dialect in Literature' (1904). The reason that he has the characters in his writings speak in the Szeged dialect is 'because they are people from Szeged'. He considered linguistic authenticity to be just as important as objective authenticity in his stories. The two most characteristic phonetic features of the Szeged dialect are the sounds ö and ë, the use of which in everyday language is out of all proportion to their use in literary language. It did not pose a problem to mirror this usage in his writings with regard to the sound ö, but the sound ë was only used in specialised linguistic work. István Tömörkény was unaware of this fact, and the printing works did not possess the type to depict these letters. This absence rendered the expression of the dialect inconsistent. The writer's only story written throughout in consistent dialectic style was published in 1898, and went by the title 'Öregembör napáldozatja'. In this novel not only the heroes spoke in dialect, but also the writer himself. This so-called re-imagined method of performance is a characteristic element in the style of stories by István Tömörkény, Ferenc Móra, Zsigmond Móricz and others who wrote on peasant themes, but this particular feature characterises this specific novel by István Tömörkény throughout. This dissertation analyses the story, sentence by sentence, its wording, form, meaning and syntactic characteristics, as well as the ethnographic background of certain phrases. It certifies the historic literary judgement, according to which the life work of István Tömörkény is the largest contribution to the heritage of Hungarian literature: his language. 56