GLEETT - University of Washington

I0mstlethaus "Traum urd Wirklithkeit-Dreain aid Reality, Vienna,
1870-1930", ciçcsef aid designed by Rcbert Waissenberg anf
arthitect Hans Hollein aid stheduled to be ediibited at the
Metropolitan )tzse.im in 1986. For sonebody like am with such a short
tlnm to sperd in the former capital of the ustxt,-Hungarian flipire, this
exhibit presented a dazz1in, athd-bogg1in introduction to the
historical events that led up to two world wars aid the flowering of the
arts aid scieixies that produced artists like Klimt, Sc*iiele, aid Ru'o von
}bfuanrmthal, as well as scientists Ulce Freizi aid Wittgenstein.
I could net help leaving Vienna with mixed eticns - so auth
splerdor, so eii misery aid all of it having had profourd iiipact on the
fate of Eastern aid Western Europe to this date.
Th, train "Wiener Walzer" took ma to &idapest within four hcurs
ithere I was mat at the staticn, toW great relief, by my colleague
Dr. Jozeef Velcerdi. He was holding up a .tiite piece of paper with "A.
Powell" written onit. Hetookme fron Pest toBLda (the two parts of
the city being divided by the river raraibe) to the magnificent castle
splex on the da hun, the scene of ainnet total destruction during
brld War II. One of the beautifully restored palaces r houses the
Orszagos Szethenyi 1yvtar, the National Library of Hungary, named
after 0*mt Szedenyi, a collector of rare books, patriot, reforzmr aid
inventor tho is admired even today as a syebol of Hungary's fit for
nationhood. There I spent six hours, from 3-9 p.m. on Friday, the 21st
of June, in the very pleasant vaulted office of the International. Exctange
Service, aid wee instructed by Dr. Vekerdi about the
Mierican-Hungarian book erthanges. We negotiated a new exithange in
the aast of $500 per emsa for Western-language piblicaticns,
i,ubliebed in Hungary in thHisaanities aid Social Sciences, Iliding
periodicals aid serials (exthange rate $1 - 25 foririt). He also told ma
about Hungarian history, partioularly of the 19th aid 20th centuries. A
crash 1rse, naturally, bot delivered in perfect German with a izisical.
Hungarian ant by a librarian who is a Sarm)Tit sdnlar aid expert on
the Hungarian gypsies whose language is related to Sans1it. Dr. Vekerdi
has collected aid just p.ibll.shed the fairy tales of the Hungarian gypsies.
He is, like so many of the other East European librarians I mat, a
etholar-librarian also turned cut to be a perfect aid selfless tour
guide. On Sunday we went by suborban train to Szeriterdre, eanething of
a Hungarian Wilhiaamburg. This village an the Irvbe was settled by
Serbian pigfaxmers , in the irse of tire, built several beautiful
baroque Serbian-orthcdox thurthes with original Serbian
iccecetases, painted aid gilded in the Byzantine style. The little
village houses are painted in all ehades of orange or other, the latter
being the color f lids mast frequently thra4xut the
Mietro-Hungarian eapire. Dr. Vekerdi is the ba' owner of a lovely small
19th century country house, called dateba In Eastexn Europe, which is
very near Szenterdze. There he treated am to hot tea, seasoned with
Ixanegrown sour cherries aid heavily perpered, a perfect our, for my
beginning bronchitis which followed ma an thrcuh Yigoslavia.
Seourely put an the mlnight train to Belgrade by Dr. Vekerdi, I
arrived at the Yugoelav capital early in the sorning with almest ne voice
left. Th. first Iapressicn of Belgrade was distinctly "eastern" or
"turkish", as the people in the Western part of Yugoslavia like to may. I
managed to fini my Rrt on Suohotel on foot aid was soon of f to the
Serbian cadmay of Sciences for a two-hour meeting with Spcmtenka
Ninic, the librarian for Merican excthanges, Olgica )tzeoilovic, who Is
responsible for German inprints aid Mile Zegarac, who is the library
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