Magyar Hírek, 1985 (38. évfolyam, 2-26. szám)
1985-07-27 / 15-16. szám
Catherine Károlyi with Juli Básti THE RED COUNTESS HUNGARIAN AMERICAN BAPTISTS There are but few people, whose life story could be pieced together from the ways people used to address them. She was born a countess and married a count; people called her comrade; her family nicknamed her Katus. Soon after her marriage she was called Madam President. For the role she played in the period before the 1918 revolution she was called “Vörös Kata” (Red Kate), a term coined by Vilmos Vázsonyi, the then Minister of the Interior, who would have been glad to have her gaoled. The anem of “Vörös Kata” was changed later to “Vörös Grófnő” (Red Countess). This is also the title of the film made of the story of her life by András Kovács. The eyes of Katinka Andrássy, known from old photographs, have not lost their luster even today. When I ask her about the film made about her, the first thing that interests me is how one feels seeing a film version of one’s life, where the “yardstick” can only be the true interpretation of the events, stories, indeed of history one was part of. “First of all—and I also emphasised this to András Kovács—it is not me, but my husband, Mihály Károlyi, about whom a film should be made, for the story of his life was much more interesting. To this the director replied: Your lives were so intertwined that this film is as much about Mihály Károlyi as about Katinka Andrássy, and so, through my story, he could in fact relate also his story.” András Kovács considers the Vörös Grófnő a historic film, yet also a love story in a certain sense. The secret of your happy marriage was mutual respect. Don’t you feel that the representation of this relationship slightly overshadowed the development of the political career, and historic role of your husband? “I am sorry that some more important threads could not be fully demonstrated in the film. More should have been told, perhaps, about Károlyi’s political role and ideas about his break with his own social class, and it is also possible that it was not really necessary to change reality in some minor details in the interest of the dramaturgy of the film. But these are only minor objections compared to the joy I feel, since the film will be of much help to people in getting closer to the great figure of my husband. It is important to me that people should known—and my husband described this clearly in his memoirs— that when the Michaelmas-daisy revolution broke out, and we saw the first lorry bedecked with Miehaelmas-daisies and crammed with soldiers, his conscience was clear. We were sharing in a bloodless revolution and Károlyi did all he could for that. He was aware of the size of the task, which was not less than building the foundations of an independent Hungary.” At the time you were the biggest landowners of Hungary. How could you identify yourselves with the interests of the people, giving up everything? “The most concise answer could be perhaps to quote a passage of my husband’s memoirs, where he scourged the Hungarian aristocracy and put the question to himself: And you? You are also one of them. Then he continued: ‘Yes, I was, for many years, unwittingly ... But when I realized that their patriotism was an empty phrase, their oftspoken of honour but a code of honour without meaning their loyalty to the ruler mere selfishness and their ardent Catholicism a means of their domination over ignorant people, then I could no longer bear that environment and I left them’.” Which were the scenes where you felt that the events were represented exactly as you remembered them? “Having breakfast or lunch with the family. My mother always arrived late and brought papers with her, which she read at table. And the shooting parties were also perfect. Yet the scene, that agreed most with memory was perhaps where I was lying ill in a very nice house on Sváb-hegy expecting my third child. I was so weak they thought I would die. They were praying in the adjoining room and in an almost comatose state I was trembling adjoining with anxiety that my husband should return from Vienna. When at last he arrived I sat up in bed, calmed immediately and my condition improved. That was the scene where I really felt as if I saw an exact image of my memories and I think this was the scene where Juli Básti—who played me—was the most convincing.” The memories obviously tired Mrs. Károlyi. There were many questions I wanted to ask, but she put me off. “Next time”—she said.* JANOS BODNÄR * Slightly abridged from an interview printed in the Hungarian section of our previous issue. A few days before her death, Mrs. Catherine Károlyi returned the proofs of the Hungarian version with minor modifications; this version contains her corrections. We received two interesting books on the history of Hungarian Baptists. The first was published in 1958, it covers half a century, and was written by a team. The author of the second is Dr. Mihály Almási, a Baptist preacher. It was issued in 1984 and sums up the chronicle of eighty-five years of the Hungarian Baptist Mission in Cleveland. Much of the Cleveland volume is thus a continuation and new chapter. According to the foreword of the first volume Ferenc Vér started to collect the material. “As a young man he had been there at the heel of the pioneering preachers, a witness to wents.” The Federation had asked the congregations to write their own stories, and Ferenc Vér —assisted by Gábor Petre and György B. Baka—made a book of the stories. Attraction and repulsion The first migrants were sent on their way by deprivation and once the dollars started to trickle back, the others followed suit. What attracted them was not only the chance to make a good living but also that Baptists were a respected denomination in the U.S. and not a “despised sect, oppressed by the churches”. The American Baptists helped, assisting their co-religionists to overcome the unavoidable initial difficulties. A powerful congregation was formed in Homestead, in 1900 the Federation of Hungarian Baptists in America was founded in 1908, and with it a literary society and newspaper. The second conference founded a Hungarian Baptist Sickness Benefit Society as well. Ten years later there were twenty-two congregations and mission stations with 1227 members and there was a seminary as well with three teachers and ten students. And yet the decade could not be called a triumphal procession. They had to fight against the envy of other denominations. More than once those who preached the word of the Lord were stoned, rotten eggs and overripe tomatoes were thrown at them. At first they met in private homes or rented premisses for divine service, later they built their own chapels. At first most of them did not intend to settle in America. They meant to save up a nest egg in a few years and return home to buy land. Little by little the old folk as well grew fond of the new country, and those who returned found it difficult to adjust to Hungarian conditions. “Anyone able to do so hurried back to America and was prepared to be called a hunky all his life to make sure of a future for his kids.” There were many conflicts amongst the Baptists. The rigorous moral norms often proved unattractive to the voung, and the attraction of English speaking congregations was also powerful. Assimilation grew apace. There were not enough lay preachers. As they died off English speaking preachers replaced them. Between the two Wars Sunday Services were still, almost exclusively, conducted in Hungarian but English gained preference in Sunday School and wherever young people met. The Elders recognised that they would have to switch to English if they wanted to keep a hold of the young, and intermarriage also hastened change. There were more changes after the Second World War. The Hungarians dispersed, chapels ceased operation. Sometimes they fell victim to the urban sprawl, elsewhere they died out or were absorbed by the English speaking congregation. Links with Hungary were of all sorts. After the Great War, for instance, they supported the folks at home, sending clothes, food parcels or money. Some prepared to return for some time. They bought land in their village of origin, and built a handsome church, but few made it back to the Old Country. Cleveland Dr. Sándor Haraszti, the President of the American Hungarian Baptist Conference, wrote a preface to the Cleveland chronicle. “I think it a matter of great importance that a small community is ready to make sacrifices in its search for the past, collecting memories that have strayed all over America ... The preacher exchange has new been operating for close on fifteen years and the third preacher from Hungary now serves the gospel and with it the holy cause of the survival of our people, culture and native language, here in Cleveland one of the metropoles of the Hungarian diaspora.” The author, Dr. Mihály Almási, has been collecting the documents of the history of American Baptists for many years. He has divided the eighty-five years into the following sections. The first, that of organization, lasted until 1908. At first the Cleveland Hungarian congregation was a missionstation supervised by a German chapel. In the course of the Golden Age, until 1944—always excepting the difficult years of the Depression, in grew out of that, its work becoming ever richer. 1944 to 1959 was the time of unions, followed by that of crisis and a new start. And what is there now? “We have a Hungarian paper and we publish Hungarian books, we have a Hungarian Bible College and historical collection. We have congregations, preachers, choirs and orchestras, young people (a youth camp as well!). We have children. We have a past, and have a present. Thank to the preacher exchange we have renewed contacts with the Old Country. Baptist preachers and theologians from Hungary have produced a kind of theological and linguistic blood transfusion. In spite of the fact that there has been a dissolution of Hungarian colonies throughout America, and many others are close to it, a sense of national belonging is strong enough for our brethren to travel fifty or a hundred miles of a Sunday to take part in a Hungarian service or even a thousand for a Hungarian conference of meeting. The joy of meeting easily makes up for the financial cost.” MIKLÓS SZÁNTÓ 61
