"I do not want to be successful at such a price." Interview with Ferenc Barnás

In mental defeat, doctors do not really have the means to help you, but if you try to spring upwards rather than simply go down, then this dynamics may produce a very special personality.

Hard-boiled thrillers from Hungary: Vilmos Kondor

The novels of Vilmos Kondor, the first Hungarian author of hard-boiled thrillers, became instant bestsellers in Hungary, and made the previously despised genre of thriller a subject of interest for mainstream literary critics.

"Kafka cured me of my American optimism at an early age". Interview with Jonathan Franzen

"Comedy can certainly be bitter, but it’s also a way of forgiving people, including yourself." - We talked to Jonathan Franzen about anxiety, American families and humour.

Hungarian presence at the 2013 Leipzig Book Fair

The next event in the Publishing Hungary programme, sponsored by the National Cultural Fund of Hungary, will be the Hungarian presence at the Leipzig Book Fair, one of the greatest literary events in Europe. The book fair will be held between 14 and 17 March, 2013.

Poem of the Month - István Ágh: The Night Dog

This poem by István Ágh (1938) draws us into a world of darkness, anxiety and fear, where you don't know any more who fears whom, where landscape, animal and human are all imbued with a nameless rage.

The silence of a lost generation. Interview with Judit Kováts

Judit Kováts’s novel is written from the viewpoint of a 19-year-old girl during the Soviet occupation as she is trying to escape Russian soldiers, bombs and forced labour. How is oral history transformed into literature? – An interview with the author.

A relentless march towards tragedy

Judit Kováts: Denied

Anna was a carefree teenager in 1944. Then World War II broke out. She is now 85 years old, and narrates her life, broken forever by her war experiences. Judit Kováts's "Denied" shows history as we have never seen it in books and sources.

Hungarian writers at the Jerusalem Book Festival

Four Hungarian writers – György Spiró, György Dragomán, Gábor Schein and Géza Röhrig – were guests at the Jerusalem Book Festival, held between 10-15 February 2013.

Summer brunch (intermezzo)

Péter Gerőcs

"For the truth is, my boy," he always told me, "is only the pawns matter, the major pieces are always the first to be exchanged." So that was my father's lesson to me. I of course disregarded his advice, and thereby demolished his reality, the imaginary one based on unwritten codes; usually using two knights, the occasional rook helping out from the background.

A guide to Hungarians

János Lackfi: What are Hungarians like?

The last few years have been abundant in books specializing in understanding and interpreting the attributes and the behaviour of Hungarians. János Lackfi experiments with well-known elements that have been on the periodic table of Hungarians for decades, and tries to create a new and interesting compound.

Surviving Voronezh: in the footsteps of Örkény

"I don't get to the Opera as often as I'd like. I'm too busy crawling on my belly, wiping out my fellow men", István Örkény wrote from the Russian front in World War II. His play "Voronezh" commemorates the fatal offensive against the Hungarian Army, launched seventy years ago.

Literary lovers: Béla Balázs and Leni Riefenstahl

It was by mere chance that the Führer's favourite film director made "Triumph of the Will" for the Nazis rather than the Bolsheviks.

Bans and taboos: censorship in the Kádár era

According to Communist ideology, literature shapes consciousness. This explains why the regime was so much interested in literature. – A discussion on censorship in Communist Hungary.

I want to suck your blood. Noémi Szécsi: The Finno-Ugrian Vampire

Blood-sucker and tale-teller: Noémi Szécsi’s latter-day vampire girl is a combination of the eastern European and the Indian vampire. - Ottilie Mulzet's review on The Finno-Ugrian Vampire, recently published in English.