If I'm right this is a Lisa Steinfeld song or something similar. I don't cite it to talk about God, more likely to talk about
whatifs.
As you might recall, I'm reading
Se dobok, se trombiták by Lajos Parti Nagy at the moment, and I must say it's absolutely amazing. It's a collection of short writings (feuilletons, I've just learned that word) he published between 1990 and 1993 in
Magyar Napló. The reason I selected this particular collection is that according to the blurb these feuilletons (bloody French vocabulary) capture the general atmosphere of Hungary at the time of the political transformation (i.e. from socialism to democracy). And you know, after reading
Fülkefor, which reflects upon the current political and social scene, I thought it would be interesting to contrast (juxtapose?) these and see what comes out of it. Of course I was only a small child in the 90s, but that makes it all the more interesting. And it's also strange and perhaps even sad to see how a lot of things haven't changed through all these years (I mean in the field of politics, of course).
The first two feuilletons (I must overuse the word to familiarize myself with it) didn't touch me much, but then from the third one on I was hooked (I've been). There are lots of thoughts about literature and writing itself, as well as thoughts on particular books and poems, and it's quite exciting to see what he read and how he liked them. So far he made me want to re-read
Iskola a határon by Géza Ottlik and read
Az elefántcsonttronyból (a collection of feuilletons by Péter Esterházy) and
Szemközt vele (a collection of poems) by Győző Csorba. Not to mention that he inspires me so much to write and think and think of writing.
So here's what I did. I just wrote down sentence after sentence, thought after thought (in the Van Gogh fashion), and tried to end up in a feuilleton. All right, the basics were formed in my mind in the early hours as I was trying to get some sleep, but I wrote it all about say half an hour ago. You can find it
here (in Hungarian), and I'm eager to hear from you regarding how you like it and if it sounds like a feuilleton at all.
I’m not very good at face recognition, but I think that in this picture he resembles Hemingway. It may be just the beard, though.
ReplyDeleteI read your feuilleton. These self-reflective pieces of writing are not always easy to interpret, but I must say it wasn’t very cheerful. Of course, life tends to present us with events that make us pessimistic, but overall, as clichéd as it may sound, we should look on the bright side. Occasionally, I also think that I miss out on all the great things, but we are way too young to say things like that. Fun (and success, pleasure, joy, etc.) can be had beyond one’s twenties.
I don't know, for me there's nothing Hemingwayish in him. Regarding the feuilleton I didn't mean and interpret it so dramatically, it's just fiction. Most of the time I'm feeling better than what I'm expressing. But thanks for worrying anyway.
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