The Canadian-American Review of Hungarian Studies - Vol. 4 ... - EPA

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limitations of Bowring and others: their inability to overcome the "becsispanyolfal, amelyre 'Mikosch' vagy 'Ungar Janosch' torzkepe voltrafestve." 6 Bowring had to depend on Carl Georg Rumy, Ferenc Toldyand finally, on Karl Maria Kertbeny for his information. Not knowingany Hungarian himself, he used the German anthologies published bythese men, or he obtained German versions of Hungarian songs. Sincethese sources were not critical in their selections, and since the Germantranslations were often inaccurate, Bowring and the others formed adistorted picture. Admittedly, the exoticism of Hungarian literature,real or imagined, was emphasized in the English versions. This is whatthe readers expected, and this is what they were given. As Hankiss hasstated, "A muvelt kiilfoldi ragaszkodik a magyar taj idilli zartsaganak,ember es fold szoros osszetartozasanak foltetelezesehez." 7As early as 1827 Bowring published one of Sandor Kisfaludi's "folksongs"in the May issue of the Monthly Review. Undoubtedly, he wasworking from one of the many German anthologies or periodicals thatcarried numerous examples of the suddenly popular "Magyar" folksong.Later. Bowring turned to Georg Rumy's Magyarische Antho/ogieas a source. It is ironic — and was unfortunate for the acceptance ofHungarian literature in Western Europe — that these sources representedthe "distortions" rather than the true poetry of Hungary. Theyemphasized the sentimentality and exoticism of Pre-Romanticism at atime when both Hungarian writers and European tastes had progressedbeyond this. Consequently, while Petofi and his friends fought againstthe cheap success of unrealistic and sentimental verse, it was preciselysuch poems that became known abroad as Hungarian literature.The ambiguous or divided response to Hungarian literature canperhaps best be illustrated by the reactions to specific works. Bowring'sPoetry of the Magyars, for example, received generally good reviews.The quality of the translations was uneven, the selection was stronglyinfluenced by popular taste, but the introductory essay on the Magyarlanguage and the estimate of Hungarian literature was surprisinglyaccurate. Yet, though interest in the book was lively enough, it failed tohave any real impact. This occurred chiefly, 1 believe, because enthusiasmfor things Hungarian was mostly emotional, based on Englishsympathies for the Revolution of 1848 49. Such emotional commitmentshad a counter-effect, too: Frazer's Magazine, departing from thegeneral trend of eulogy, published a review slanted at least as severely inthe negative direction which illustrated its thesis by citing garbled lettersequencespurporting to be the Hungarian text. 8 Similarly, the Athenaeumdisplayed prejudice or at least ignorance when it spoke of Janos
Vitez as "a confusion of aimless marvels, strung together withoutskill." 9 The reviewer had expected a realistic work and refused to readthe poem as the allegorical fairy tale it is.Inasmuch as Bowring came to rely on Kertbeny more and more in hislater work, his translations suffered. The false but persistent image ofHungarian literature as primitive, sentimental and exotic owes much tothese early distortions. Even the later association with Hungarianemigres such as Ferenc Pulszky and Louis Kossuth failed to overcomethis early impression.In the 19th century, the impact of the Hungarian Revolution wassuch that others besides Bowring became interested in Hungary. Both inEngland and in the United States periodicals carried freely translatedversions of Hungarian poetry, especially that of Petofi. For example,Howitt '.v Journal had already published some of Bowring's verse translationsin 1847, and in 1852 the National Era printed a few Hungarianpoems based on rough English texts given to the journalist and novelistGrace Greenwood by one of Kossuth's aides. 10Such popularity, however, only served to reenforce the extant imageof Hungary and Hungarian literature and totally failed to draw theattention of any of the major poets — even of those who, like MatthewArnold, Walter Savage Landor, Charles Swinburne or John GreenleafWhittier — wrote about the Hungarian Revolution. This is not surprising,given the quality of these early translations of Hungarian works.Not even the translations of the late 19th century and of the early 20thcorrected the situation. A gradual change came when two importanttranslators emerged in North America. 1 he first, William Loew, undertookto make the poetry of Petofi and selected other 19th century poetsavailable to English speakers. His versions were accurate but unpoetic."Watson Kirkconnell's Magyar Muse (1933) was better, thoughthe selection was heavily weighted in favor of minor contemporarypoets. 12As in the mid-nineteenth century political events had inspired a waveof interest in Hungary, so too, in the mid-twentieth century the HungarianRevolution again drew attention. The anthology. From theHungarian RevolutionJ 1 edited by David Ray, collected poems on theRevolution by various non-Hungarian poets as well as the poetry ofmany of the Revolution's participants which had first appeared inHungarian in the volume Fiiveskert. This, however, was only thebeginning; since the 1960's other works have appeared in English: areprint of Frederick Reidl's History of Hungarian Literature, JosephRemenyi's Hungarian Writers and Literature, and David Marvyn
Page 1 and 2: Canadian-American Review of Hungari
Page 9 and 10: the best possible settlers who woul
Page 11 and 12: than a decade later they were follo
Page 13 and 14: Sociologists have yet to explain sa
Page 15: fifteen minutes, and spent the rest
Page 18 and 19: from the "Canadian poetry" of Icela
Page 20 and 21: garian community of Western Canada,
Page 22 and 23: lowed translations from other, more
Page 24 and 25: which took place in the pages of th
Page 27 and 28: from teaching in 1968, Kirkconnell
Page 29 and 30: Magyar poets and writers to the rea
Page 31 and 32: tive of his helpful attitude and un
Page 33: 33. Kirkconnell, A Slice of Canada,
Page 36 and 37: The groaning of the slaves on Egypt
Page 38 and 39: ecause most such lines are imbedded
Page 40 and 41: ;Two spheres contend with one anoth
Page 42 and 43: matched it to this feeble hurdy-gur
Page 44 and 45: NOTES1. The only full-length study
Page 46 and 47: terest in Hungarian literature, has
Page 50 and 51: Jones' Five Hungarian WritersJ 4 Su
Page 53 and 54: REVIEW ARTICLEHungarian Poetry in E
Page 55 and 56: ooks written in English. A table of
Page 57 and 58: passive, or into noun phrases in En
Page 59 and 60: REVIEW ARTICLEHungarian Religious P
Page 61 and 62: magas és a mély magánhangzójú
Page 63 and 64: SPECIAL SECTIONToldiAn Epic Poem (1
Page 65 and 66: CANTO ONE"He lifted, with one hand,
Page 67 and 68: "Who should be squire of this whole
Page 69 and 70: What meant this hubbub in a widow's
Page 71 and 72: "Lad, here's your share! Don't say
Page 73 and 74: The heavy stone flies on: where wil
Page 75 and 76: The homes of moorhen, plover, gull
Page 77 and 78: Perhaps I'll shed my blood, some no
Page 79 and 80: CANTO FIVENicholas went wandering a
Page 81 and 82: Her tongue was like a coulter in th
Page 83 and 84: Rosemary pots mourned on its window
Page 85 and 86: Such were her words. No more would
Page 87 and 88: As if a nest of hornets rose to sti
Page 89 and 90: Upon an isle, by a Czech's hand the
Page 95 and 96: REVIEW ARTICLEQuo Vadis Transylvani
Page 97 and 98: Hungarians in Rumania in terms of t
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down by serious shortcomings in bot
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alanced presentation of the Vienna
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talent enables Wass to depict the s
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Carpathian Federation, and printed
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Now and then, however, this rule de
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temper such an indictment by recogn
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OUR CONTRIBUTORS (continued from pa
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TO THOSE WISHING TO SUBMIT MANUSCRI
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