Words to Remember Ádám Nádasdy – Farewell to Ádám Nádasdy

The immediate outpouring of admiration and affection for Ádám from every corner of today’s sometimes fractured and fractious cultural scene in Hungary shows what a unique role he filled in it, as poet, linguist, astonishingly versatile translator, elegant essayist on a wide range of topics, often linguistic but – as his marvellously entertaining Londoni levelek (Letters from London) showed – of wider cultural significance, too. – Peter Sherwood, András Gerevich, Owen Good, and George Szirtes bid farewell to Ádám Nádasdy.

Ádám Bodor, the Transylvanian-born author of The Sinistra Zone and The Birds of Verhovina, celebrates his ninetieth birthday.

“With stories like these it is perhaps unsurprising that one begins to write.” – Géza Bereményi, a remarkable writer, screenwriter, director, and songwriter turns 80.

'A multifunctional style dictator, a hedonistic register hunter, and if you're not careful, fainter-hearted readers, he'll play you like a fiddle.' – An introduction to our latest author in focus, the Hungarian poet, novelist and playwright Péter Bognár.

Literature comes home. At Litera, this is the title we give our portrait films in which we visit the hometown of a writer who is important to us. This time, our author was born in Hungary but raised in England. So we travelled all the way to Norwich to find out who the poet is who was honoured by the King, who translated The Tragedy of Man and who has been the English voice of, among others, Krisztina Tóth and László Krasznahorkai. To find out: Who really is George Szirtes?

The curators of the Hungarian pavilion at the 1900 Paris World Exhibition determined that nothing would better represent Hungary in the art and cultural capital of the world than to release Jókai’s works in a deluxe hundred-volume jubilee edition (...) – Noémi Szécsi's portrait on one of Hungary's best known and most prolific writers Mór Jókai who was born 200 years ago today.

Tibor Déry was a leading writer and satirist of the 20th century, a political headache (for many a Hungarian government), and a political icon (for everyone else). We present a portrait of this essential voice of Hungarian literature, in honor of Déry's 130th birthday.

"There is a deeper reason as to why György Petri—if not eternally, then at least enduringly—muddied up Hungarian poetry. And that reason is the poetics of the “unturned gaze.” A gaze which does not turn languidly toward the empty sky," — in this essay for HLO, Dávid Locker looks at the enduring presence in Hungarian poetry of György Petri.

"Vámos’s oeuvre is saturated with honesty and forthrightness, with knowledge and curiosity, with sadness and humor. He lays bare his soul in front of his readers, and lets them ride shotgun as they travel with him" - a portrait of Miklós Vámos by Ági Bori.

"A radical creator of the Yugoslav and Hungarian neo-avant-garde," — Gabriella Nagy introduces the poet and performance artist Katalin Ladik.

Literary Translator Miriam Grunwald introduces the universe of Hungarian avant-garde poet Ottó Tolnai, of former Yugoslavia, through her first experiences of reading his poetic cycle: Wilhelm's Song AKA Orpheus of the Countryside.

A translator, poet, prose writer, essayist, and educator. And the word 'legendary' could be happily prefixed onto any of them – a portrait of Ádám Nádasdy.

A sprawling diversity of ideas, a subversion of expectations, and regular revisititation and reimagination of not only accepted literary convention, but his own previous works – a portrait of Hungarian writer Imre Bartók.

"A story turns on a dime from a jovial satire to a poignant coming-of-age tale, from autofiction to metanovel to crime, leaving the reader forever playing catchup. Worlds blur and fantasy simmers to the surface," – a portrait of Hungarian writer Zsolt Láng.

Words like surreal, absurd, tragic, and Kafka tend to pop up in conversation about her writing – a portrait of Hungarian author Edina Szvoren, HLO's author of the month in March.

Reading Anna T. Szabó’s deeply intimate poems and stories brings us closer not only to her, but more importantly to ourselves - Dóra Vincze's portrait of Anna T. Szabó.

Szilárd Borbély's untimely death was a huge loss to the world of poetry, and to Hungarian contemporary culture in particular – for Borbély's is a powerful voice of conscience in the post-1989 era. Dóra Vincze's portrait of the Hungarian writer.

Someone who effortlessly layered realism, symbolism, folklore, and anecdotes to create irresistible stories filled with rich, lifelike characters and universal truths. – a portrait of Nándor Gion, by his translator Zsuzsa Koltay.

Translator and literary historian Zsuzsa Hetényi commends Yuri Pavlovich Gusev, upon receiving the 2020 Balassi Prize for Literary Translation.