Gyula Illyés
Encyclopedia
Gyula Illyés was a Hungarian poet
and novel
ist. He was one of the so called népi ("from the people") writers, named so because they aimed to show – propelled by strong sociological interest and left-wing convictions – the disadvantageous conditions of their native land.
, he continued his education at grammar schools there and Dombóvár
(1913 – 1914) and Bonyhád
(1914 – 1916). In 1926 his parents separated, and he moved to the capital with his mother. He continued senior high school at the Budapest
Munkácsy Mihály street gimnazium (1916 – 1917) and at the Izabella Street Kereskedelmi school (1917 – 1921). In 1921 he graduated. From 1918 to 1919 he took part in various left-wing student and youth worker's movements, being present at an attack on Romanian forces in Szolnok
during the Hungarian Republic of Councils. On December 22, 1920 his first poem was published anonymously in the Social Democrat daily Népszava
.
in December that year, moving on to Berlin
and the Rhineland
in 1922.
He arrived in Paris
in April of that year. He worked numerous jobs including as a bookbinder. For a while he studied at the Sorbonne
and published his first articles and translations in 1923. He met the French surrealists, and some of them became friends, among others Paul Éluard
, Tristan Tzara
, René Crevel
(each visited him later in Hungary).
He returned home in 1926 after an amnesty. His main forums of activity became and , periodicals edited by the avant-garde writer and poet Lajos Kassák
.
His first critical writing appeared in the review ("Occident") – the most distinguished literary magazine of the time – in November 1927. From 1928 the "Nyugat" regularly features his articles and poems.
He made friends with Attila József
, László Németh
, Lőrinc Szabó
József Erdélyi, János Kodolányi
and Péter Veres
, at the time the leading talents of his generation.
His first book was also published by Nyugat in 1928. In 1931 he married Irma Juvancz who was a physical education teacher.
Illyés was invited and travelled to the Soviet Union
in 1934 to take part in the international writers congress where he met André Malraux
and Boris Pasternak
. From that year he also participated in the editorial work of the review "Válasz" (Argument), the forum of the young "népi" writers.
He was one of the founding members of the March Front (1937 – 1939), a left-wing and anti-fascist movement. Subsequently he was invited to the editorial board of Nyugat and became a close friend of its editor, the post-symbolist poet and writer Mihály Babits
.
He divorced his first wife.
following the death of Mihály Babits, Illyés was nominated editor-in-chief of Nyugat. Having been refused by the authorities to use the same title for the magazine, he continued to publish the review under a different title: Magyar Csillag ("Hungarian Star").
In 1939 he married Flóra Kozmuta, with whom he had a daughter, Maria.
After the Nazi invasion of Hungary in March 1944, Illyés was a fugitive with László Németh
as anti-Nazi intellectuals.
in 1945, and one of the leaders of the left-wing National Peasant Party. He withdrew from public life in 1947 as the Communist takeover of government was approaching. He was a member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences
from 1945 to 1949. He directed and edited the review from 1946 to 1949.
Although he lived a reclusive life in Tihany
and Budapest until the early 1960s, his poetry, prose, theater plays and essays continued to make an important impact on Hungarian public and literary life.
On November 2, 1956 he published his famous poem of the Hungarian revolution of 1956, which was not allowed to be republished in Hungary until 1986: "One sentence on tyranny" is a long poem written in 1950.
From the early 1960s he continued to express political, social and moral issues all through his work, but the main themes of his poetry remain love, life and death. Active until his death in April 1983, he published poems, dramas, essays and parts of his diary. His work as a translator is also considerable.
He translated from many languages, French
being the most important, but - with the help of rough translations - his volume of translations from the ancient Chinese classics remains a milestone.
", , 1936. Greater universality and an appeal for national and individual liberty mark his later work.
•Sarjúrendek (1931)
•Három öreg (1932)
•Hősökről beszélek (1933)
•Ifjúság (1934)
•Szálló egek alatt (1935)
•Rend a romokban (1937)
•Külön világban (1939)
•Egy év (1945)
•Szembenézve (1947)
•Két kéz (1950)
•Kézfogások (1956)
•Új versek (1961)
•Dőlt vitorla (1965)
•Fekete-fehér (1968)
•Minden lehet (1973)
•Különös testamentum (1977)
•Közügy (1981)
•Táviratok (1982)
•A Semmi közelit (1983)
•Petőfi (1936)
•Puszták népe (1936)
•Magyarok (1938)
•Ki a magyar? (1939)
•Lélek és kenyér (1939)
•Csizma az asztalon (1941)
•Kora tavasz (1941)
•Mint a darvak (1942)
•Hunok Párisban (1946)
•Franciaországi változatok (1947)
•Hetvenhét magyar népmese (1953)
•Balaton (1962)
•Ebéd a kastélyban (1962)
•Petőfi Sándor (1963)
•Ingyen lakoma (1964)
•Szives kalauz (1966)
•Kháron ladikján (1969)
•Hajszálgyökerek (1971)
•Beatrice apródjai (1979)
•Naplójegyzetek, 1-8 (1987–1995)
•Lélekbúvár (1948)
•Ozorai példa (1952)
•Fáklyaláng (1953)
•Dózsa György (1956)
•Kegyenc (1963)
•Különc (1963)
•Tiszták (1971)
•Selected Poems (Thomas Kabdebo and Paul Tabori) Chatto and Windus, London (1971)
•People of the Puszta, Translated and afterword by G.F. Cushing, Chatto and Windus, London (1967), Corvina, Budapest (1967)
•Petőfi, Translated by G.F. Cushing, Corvina, Budapest
•Once Upon a Time, Forty Hungarian Folk Tales, Corvina, Budapest (1970)
•The Tree that Reached the Sky (for children), Corvina, Budapest (1988)
•The Prince and his Magic Horse (for children), Corvina, Budapest (1987)
•29 poems, Translated by Tótfalusi István, Maecenas, Budapest (1996)
•What You Have Almost Forgotten (Trans. foreword and ed. Willam Jay Smith with Gyula Kodolányi) Kortárs, Budapest (1999)
•Charon's Ferry, Fifty Poems (Translated by Bruce Berlind) Northwestern University Press, Evanston, Illinois (2000)
•Arion, essays and poems, several issues
•The New Hungarian Quarterly and the Hungarian Quarterly, several issues
•Icarus 6 (Huns in Paris, trans. by Thomas Mark)
•Homeland in the Heights (ed. Bertha Csilla, An anthology of Post-World War II. Hungarian Poetry, Budapest (2000)
Poet
A poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...
and novel
Novel
A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....
ist. He was one of the so called népi ("from the people") writers, named so because they aimed to show – propelled by strong sociological interest and left-wing convictions – the disadvantageous conditions of their native land.
Early life
He was born the son of János Illés (1870 – 1931) and Ida Kállay (1878 – 1931) in Tolna county. His father belonged to a rich gentry family, but his mother came from the most deprived segment of society, agricultural servants. He was their third child and spent his first 9 years at his birthplace, where he finished his primary school years (1908 – 1912) and when his family moved to SimontornyaSimontornya
- External links :* *...
, he continued his education at grammar schools there and Dombóvár
Dombóvár
- External links :*...
(1913 – 1914) and Bonyhád
Bonyhád
Bonyhád is a town in Tolna County in Southwestern Hungary. It is governed by a city council and a mayor. The current mayor of Bonyhád is Arpad Potapi who has served in this capacity since 2002....
(1914 – 1916). In 1926 his parents separated, and he moved to the capital with his mother. He continued senior high school at the Budapest
Budapest
Budapest is the capital of Hungary. As the largest city of Hungary, it is the country's principal political, cultural, commercial, industrial, and transportation centre. In 2011, Budapest had 1,733,685 inhabitants, down from its 1989 peak of 2,113,645 due to suburbanization. The Budapest Commuter...
Munkácsy Mihály street gimnazium (1916 – 1917) and at the Izabella Street Kereskedelmi school (1917 – 1921). In 1921 he graduated. From 1918 to 1919 he took part in various left-wing student and youth worker's movements, being present at an attack on Romanian forces in Szolnok
Szolnok
Szolnok is the county seat of Jász-Nagykun-Szolnok county in central Hungary. Its location on the banks of the Tisza river, at the heart of the Great Hungarian Plain, has made it an important cultural and economic crossroads for centuries....
during the Hungarian Republic of Councils. On December 22, 1920 his first poem was published anonymously in the Social Democrat daily Népszava
Népszava
Népszava is a Social-democratic newspaper established in 1877 in Budapest by Viktor Külföldi. It was the official newspaper of the Hungarian Social Democratic Party until 1948....
.
University years
He began studies at the Budapest University's department of languages studying Hungarian and French. Due to illegal political activities he was forced to escape to ViennaVienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
in December that year, moving on to Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
and the Rhineland
Rhineland
Historically, the Rhinelands refers to a loosely-defined region embracing the land on either bank of the River Rhine in central Europe....
in 1922.
He arrived in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
in April of that year. He worked numerous jobs including as a bookbinder. For a while he studied at the Sorbonne
Sorbonne
The Sorbonne is an edifice of the Latin Quarter, in Paris, France, which has been the historical house of the former University of Paris...
and published his first articles and translations in 1923. He met the French surrealists, and some of them became friends, among others Paul Éluard
Paul Éluard
Paul Éluard, born Eugène Émile Paul Grindel , was a French poet who was one of the founders of the surrealist movement.-Biography:...
, Tristan Tzara
Tristan Tzara
Tristan Tzara was a Romanian and French avant-garde poet, essayist and performance artist. Also active as a journalist, playwright, literary and art critic, composer and film director, he was known best for being one of the founders and central figures of the anti-establishment Dada movement...
, René Crevel
René Crevel
René Crevel was a French writer involved with the surrealist movement.-Life:Crevel was born in Paris to a family of Parisian bourgeoisie. He had a traumatic religious upbringing. At the age of fourteen, during a difficult stage of his life, his father committed suicide by hanging himself. Crevel...
(each visited him later in Hungary).
He returned home in 1926 after an amnesty. His main forums of activity became and , periodicals edited by the avant-garde writer and poet Lajos Kassák
Lajos Kassák
Lajos Kassák was a Hungarian poet, novelist, painter, essayist, editor, theoretician of the avant-garde and occasional translator, was the father of many modernisms....
.
Early career
Illyés worked for the Phoenix Insurance company from 1927 to 1936, and after its bankruptcy he became press referent to the Hungarian National Bank on French agricultural matters (1937 – 1944).His first critical writing appeared in the review ("Occident") – the most distinguished literary magazine of the time – in November 1927. From 1928 the "Nyugat" regularly features his articles and poems.
He made friends with Attila József
Attila József
Attila József was one of the most important and well-known Hungarian poets of the 20th century.-Biography:The son of Áron József, a soap factory worker of Romanian origin from Bánát, and Hungarian peasant girl Borbála Pőcze, he was born in Ferencváros, a poor district of Budapest. He had two elder...
, László Németh
László Németh
László Németh was a Hungarian dentist, writer, dramatist and essayist. He was born in Nagybánya the son of József Németh and Vilma Gaál . Over the Christmas of 1925, he married Ella Démusz , the daughter of János Démusz, a keeper of a public house. Between 1926 and 1944 they had six daughters, but...
, Lőrinc Szabó
Lorinc Szabó
Lőrinc Szabó de Gáborján was a Hungarian poet and literary translator.-Biography:He was born in Miskolc as the son of an engine driver, Lőrinc Szabó sr., and Ilona Panyiczky. The family moved to Balassagyarmat when he was 3 years old. He attended school in Balassagyarmat and Debrecen. He studied...
József Erdélyi, János Kodolányi
János Kodolányi
János Kodolányi Hungarian writer of short stories, dramas, novels and sociographies.-Prose and politics:...
and Péter Veres
Péter Veres
Péter Veres was a Hungarian politician and writer, who served as Minister of Defence from 1947 to 1948.-References:*...
, at the time the leading talents of his generation.
His first book was also published by Nyugat in 1928. In 1931 he married Irma Juvancz who was a physical education teacher.
Illyés was invited and travelled to the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
in 1934 to take part in the international writers congress where he met André Malraux
André Malraux
André Malraux DSO was a French adventurer, award-winning author, and statesman. Having traveled extensively in Indochina and China, Malraux was noted especially for his novel entitled La Condition Humaine , which won the Prix Goncourt...
and Boris Pasternak
Boris Pasternak
Boris Leonidovich Pasternak was a Russian language poet, novelist, and literary translator. In his native Russia, Pasternak's anthology My Sister Life, is one of the most influential collections ever published in the Russian language...
. From that year he also participated in the editorial work of the review "Válasz" (Argument), the forum of the young "népi" writers.
He was one of the founding members of the March Front (1937 – 1939), a left-wing and anti-fascist movement. Subsequently he was invited to the editorial board of Nyugat and became a close friend of its editor, the post-symbolist poet and writer Mihály Babits
Mihály Babits
Mihály Babits was a Hungarian poet, writer and translator.- Biography :...
.
He divorced his first wife.
War years
During World War IIWorld War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
following the death of Mihály Babits, Illyés was nominated editor-in-chief of Nyugat. Having been refused by the authorities to use the same title for the magazine, he continued to publish the review under a different title: Magyar Csillag ("Hungarian Star").
In 1939 he married Flóra Kozmuta, with whom he had a daughter, Maria.
After the Nazi invasion of Hungary in March 1944, Illyés was a fugitive with László Németh
László Németh
László Németh was a Hungarian dentist, writer, dramatist and essayist. He was born in Nagybánya the son of József Németh and Vilma Gaál . Over the Christmas of 1925, he married Ella Démusz , the daughter of János Démusz, a keeper of a public house. Between 1926 and 1944 they had six daughters, but...
as anti-Nazi intellectuals.
After World War II
He became a member of the democratically elected parliament of HungaryHungary
Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...
in 1945, and one of the leaders of the left-wing National Peasant Party. He withdrew from public life in 1947 as the Communist takeover of government was approaching. He was a member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences
Hungarian Academy of Sciences
The Hungarian Academy of Sciences is the most important and prestigious learned society of Hungary. Its seat is at the bank of the Danube in Budapest.-History:...
from 1945 to 1949. He directed and edited the review from 1946 to 1949.
Although he lived a reclusive life in Tihany
Tihany
Tihany is a village on the northern shore of Lake Balaton on the Tihany Peninsula . The whole peninsula is a historical district....
and Budapest until the early 1960s, his poetry, prose, theater plays and essays continued to make an important impact on Hungarian public and literary life.
On November 2, 1956 he published his famous poem of the Hungarian revolution of 1956, which was not allowed to be republished in Hungary until 1986: "One sentence on tyranny" is a long poem written in 1950.
From the early 1960s he continued to express political, social and moral issues all through his work, but the main themes of his poetry remain love, life and death. Active until his death in April 1983, he published poems, dramas, essays and parts of his diary. His work as a translator is also considerable.
He translated from many languages, French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
being the most important, but - with the help of rough translations - his volume of translations from the ancient Chinese classics remains a milestone.
Works
In his poetry Illyés was a spokesman for the oppressed peasant class. Typical is "People of the pusztaPuszta
Puszta is a steppe biome on the Great Hungarian Plain around the River Tisza in the eastern part of Hungary as well as on the western part of Hungary and in the Austrian Burgenland. The Hungarian puszta is an enclave of the Eurasian Steppe....
", , 1936. Greater universality and an appeal for national and individual liberty mark his later work.
Poetry
•Nehéz föld (1928)•Sarjúrendek (1931)
•Három öreg (1932)
•Hősökről beszélek (1933)
•Ifjúság (1934)
•Szálló egek alatt (1935)
•Rend a romokban (1937)
•Külön világban (1939)
•Egy év (1945)
•Szembenézve (1947)
•Két kéz (1950)
•Kézfogások (1956)
•Új versek (1961)
•Dőlt vitorla (1965)
•Fekete-fehér (1968)
•Minden lehet (1973)
•Különös testamentum (1977)
•Közügy (1981)
•Táviratok (1982)
•A Semmi közelit (1983)
Prose
•Oroszország (1934)•Petőfi (1936)
•Puszták népe (1936)
•Magyarok (1938)
•Ki a magyar? (1939)
•Lélek és kenyér (1939)
•Csizma az asztalon (1941)
•Kora tavasz (1941)
•Mint a darvak (1942)
•Hunok Párisban (1946)
•Franciaországi változatok (1947)
•Hetvenhét magyar népmese (1953)
•Balaton (1962)
•Ebéd a kastélyban (1962)
•Petőfi Sándor (1963)
•Ingyen lakoma (1964)
•Szives kalauz (1966)
•Kháron ladikján (1969)
•Hajszálgyökerek (1971)
•Beatrice apródjai (1979)
•Naplójegyzetek, 1-8 (1987–1995)
Theater
•A tü foka (1944)•Lélekbúvár (1948)
•Ozorai példa (1952)
•Fáklyaláng (1953)
•Dózsa György (1956)
•Kegyenc (1963)
•Különc (1963)
•Tiszták (1971)
His work in English translation
•A Tribute to Gyula Illyés, Occidental Press, Washington (1968)•Selected Poems (Thomas Kabdebo and Paul Tabori) Chatto and Windus, London (1971)
•People of the Puszta, Translated and afterword by G.F. Cushing, Chatto and Windus, London (1967), Corvina, Budapest (1967)
•Petőfi, Translated by G.F. Cushing, Corvina, Budapest
•Once Upon a Time, Forty Hungarian Folk Tales, Corvina, Budapest (1970)
•The Tree that Reached the Sky (for children), Corvina, Budapest (1988)
•The Prince and his Magic Horse (for children), Corvina, Budapest (1987)
•29 poems, Translated by Tótfalusi István, Maecenas, Budapest (1996)
•What You Have Almost Forgotten (Trans. foreword and ed. Willam Jay Smith with Gyula Kodolányi) Kortárs, Budapest (1999)
•Charon's Ferry, Fifty Poems (Translated by Bruce Berlind) Northwestern University Press, Evanston, Illinois (2000)
In anthologies and periodicals
•Poems for the Millennium, (ed. Jerome Rothenberg) 2000•Arion, essays and poems, several issues
•The New Hungarian Quarterly and the Hungarian Quarterly, several issues
•Icarus 6 (Huns in Paris, trans. by Thomas Mark)
•Homeland in the Heights (ed. Bertha Csilla, An anthology of Post-World War II. Hungarian Poetry, Budapest (2000)
External links
- Illyés in Hunlit, the on-line multilingual database of Hungarian Book Foundation on Hungarian literature
- Bibliographical Handbook of Hungarian Authors by Albert Tezla; online var. Orig. vers. published at The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS, 1970
- CityPoem 'A Sentence about Tyranny' by Gyula Illyés at Erasmuspc, network for cities and culture