Hungarian literature

Hungarian literature is literature written in the Hungarian language, predominantly by Hungarians.

There is a limited amount of Old Hungarian literature dating to between the late 12th and the early 16th centuries. Middle Hungarian texts of the 16th to 18th centuries are better preserved, with poets such as Bálint Balassi (1554–1594), Tinódi Sebestyén and Miklós Zrínyi (1620–1664), and some Hungarian translations of Latin texts. The Bible was translated in 1590 by Gáspár Károli.

The language was reformed and standardized in the the 19th century, notably under the influence of Ferenc Kazinczy. Modern Hungarian literature has flourished as one of Europe's modern literatures  since the 19th century. In 2002, Imre Kertész was the first Hungarian author to receive the Nobel Prize for Literature.

While virtually unknown in the Anglosphere for centuries, Hungary's literature gained renown by the end of the 20th century thanks to a new wave of internationally accessible writers like Antal Szerb, Sándor Márai, Imre Kertész and Magda Szabó.

Old Hungarian


During the Middle Ages and well into the Renaissace, the written language in Hungary was mostly Latin. Important Latin-language documents include the Admonitions of St. Stephen, which includes the king's admonitions to his son, Prince Imre.

The oldest coherent Old Hungarian text is the Funeral Sermon and Prayer (Halotti beszéd és könyörgés) (1192–1195), a translation of a Latin sermon. (See also Funerary text and the links below.)

The oldest poem is the Old Hungarian Laments of Mary (Ómagyar Mária-siralom), also a (not very strict) translation from Latin, from the 13th century. It is also the oldest surviving Uralic poem.

Both the Funeral Sermon and the Lamentations are hard to read and not quite comprehensible for modern-day Hungarians, mostly because the 26-letter Latin alphabet was not fit to represent all the sounds in Hungarian language, as diacritic marks and double letters had not been developed yet.

Among the first chronicles about Hungarian history were Gesta Hungarorum ("Deeds of the Hungarians") by the unknown author usually called Anonymus, and Gesta Hunnorum et Hungarorum ("Deeds of the Huns and the Hungarians") by Simon Kézai. Both are in Latin. These chronicles mix history with legends, so historically they are not always authentic. Another chronicle is the Képes Krónika (Illustrated Chronicle), which was written for Louis the Great.

Further, Rogerius's 13th century work was published with Thuroczy Janos' chronicle in the late 15th century. In Split Thomas of Spalato wrote on local history with many information on Hungary in the 13th century (that time Dalmatia and the city was part of Hungary).

Middle Hungarian
Renaissance literature flourished under the reign of King Matthias (1458–1490). Janus Pannonius, although he wrote in Latin, counts as one of the most important persons in Hungarian literature, being the only significant Hungarian Humanist poet of the period. The first printing house was also founded during Matthias' reign, by András Hess, in Buda. The first book printed in Hungary was the Chronica Hungarorum.

In the 1526 most of Hungary fell under Ottoman occupation, which date is where the beginning of Middle Hungarian Period is set, in connection with various cultural changes.

The most important poets of the period was Bálint Balassi (1554–1594), Tinódi Sebestyén and Miklós Zrínyi (1620–1664). Balassi's poetry shows Medieval influences, his poems can be divided into three sections: love poems, war poems and religious poems. Zrínyi's most significant work, the epic Szigeti veszedelem ("Peril of Sziget", written in 1648/49) is written in a fashion similar to The Iliad, and recounts the heroic Battle of Szigetvár, where his great-grandfather died while defending the castle of Szigetvár.

Translation of Roman authors produced also some works: Baranyai Decsi János translated Sallustius' Catalina and Jughurta's war in the late 16th century and a decade later appeared the translation of Curtius Rufus' Aleaxander's life in Debrecen.

Historical works were even more numerous: the chronicle of Heltai Gaspar (see on the right) published by him in Kolozsvar, Zay Ferenc's unpublished work on the siege of Beograd from the 15th century, Kemény János', Transylvanian Duke's, and Bethlen Miklós' memoirs with Szalárdy János' volumeous, that time unpublished, work on contemporary Transylvanian history from the 17th century (from Bethlen' reign to 1660s), and Cserei Mihály's work from the early 18th century highlights the Hungarian-language literature.

Another category is historical verses in Hungarian, like that of Tinody Sebestyen from the 16th century, Ilosvay Selymes Peter, Szabatkai Mihaly and Gergely deak.

Latin works in the period are more numerous, Szamosközy István, Baranyai Decsi János, Istvánffy Miklós, Bethlen János, and Bethlen Farkas, Forgách Ferenc, Szerémi György, Somogyi Ambrus, Gianmichele Bruto, Oláh Miklós are the most important historical works from the 16th to 17th century.

In German Georg Kraus, Georg Zeiler wrote on Transylvanian history. In Spanish you can read Bernardo de Aldana's apologies for losing the castle of Lippa in 1552 to the Turks.

Among the religious literary works the most important is the Bible translation by Gáspár Károli, the Protestant pastor of Gönc, in 1590. The translation is called the Bible of Vizsoly, after the town where it was first published. (See Hungarian Bible translations for more details.) Another important religious work is the Legend of Saint Margaret, copied by Lea Ráskai around 1510 from an earlier work that did not survive.

Enlightenment and the language reform
The Hungarian enlightenment delayed about fifty years compared to the Western European enlightenment. The new thoughts arrived to Hungary across Vienna. The first enlightened writers were Maria Theresia's bodyguards (György Bessenyei, János Batsányi and so on). The greatest poets of the time was Mihály Csokonai Vitéz and Dániel Berzsenyi.

The greatest figure of the language reform was Ferenc Kazinczy. Hungarian linguistic purism of the time introduced calques of loanwords, such as  mozdony "locomotive", coined to replace the earlier  lokomotív.

General
summarized at the administrative website of Hungary
 * A History of Hungarian Literature (From the Earliest Times to the mid-1970s) by Lóránt Czigány
 * Albert Tezla: Hungarian authors – A bibliographical handbook
 * An overview of Hungarian literature by Daniel Abondolo
 * A brefer view, from the 'same' source
 * Hungarian literature
 * János Kőbányai,Sándor Márai: a smoldering within,"Eretz Acheret" Magazine
 * Hungarian Literature Online
 * The Hungarian Electronic Library
 * Database for translations of Hungarian literary works
 * Selected bibliographies of important Hungarian authors
 * Magyar poems
 * Magyar poetry
 * Poetry of the Magyars

Specific sources

 * Funeral Oration and Prayer
 * Sermon above the grave or the Funeral Oration
 * Hungarian poems in English

Literary chapters from the Encyclopaedia Humana Hungarica (1–5)

 * The Remains of Oral Tradition; The Beginning of Literacy (from the beginnings till 1038)
 * The External Conditions of Literature; The Characteristics of the Contents of Literature; The Authors; The Works (1038-1301)
 * The Level of Education; Authors, Genres, Works (1301-1437)
 * Hungarian Literature; Latin Literature; Humanist Literature (1437-1526)
 * Hungarian Literature; Turkish Literature (1526-1699)
 * (The English translation of volumes 6 to 9 are in preparation.)