Celestial Harmonies

Harmonia cælestis #1

by Péter Esterházy

Harmonia Caelestis is the product of a decade of labour: a monumental, part-autobiographical family history. If Helping Verbs of the Heart was an homage to his mother, then this is a memorial to his father. It is actually two works in one. Book 1, "Numbered Sentences from the Life of the Esterházy Family", comprises 371 paragraphs, some elusively succinct, others pages long, that amount to a gloriously kaleidoscopic romp through the centuries that lie behind this European dynasty. Not that the name Esterházy is ever uttered: the main protagonist of each episode is invariably identified as "my father", whether he is an anti-Habsburg Kuruc insurrectionist or a Habsburg-loyal Labanc, a hammer of the Ottomans, a dying old man, a prisoner of war, a lord charming enough to enchant Goethe himself, or a childless man, to mention but a few of "my fathers", all evoked through the language and literature proper to each persona. This strategy of anonymity allows Esterházy to extend his typically vast net of quotations to sources that originally have no family connotations whatsoever, thereby lending broader significance to the particulars of this one family, however grand, and, vice versa, appropriating the general (European) experience to the family's specific circumstances. The baroquely exuberant proliferation of anecdotal gleanings and fragments of real and fictional history, drawing on a gamut of written genres, from maxims to parables, from confessional autobiography to the account books and chronicles, is ultimately threaded together by an unobtrusive, profoundly witty and wise philosophical vein.

Book 2, subtitled "Confessions of an Esterházy family", is ostensibly a more conventional family novel. Its very subtitle alludes to an earlier Hungarian masterpiece of the genre, Confessions of a Bourgeois, 1934-35 by Sándor Márai. It consists of a series of snapshots of key events in the lives of the author's great-grandfather, grandfather, father and the young Esterházy himself. These are built up, over two hundred numbered passages, into a more or less chronological portrait of a century-and-a-half of steady decline of the family's fortunes. After 1945 the Esterházys suffered an almost catastrophic repeat of the confiscations and curtailment of liberties that befell them during the short-lived Commune of 1919 one that not only stripped them of their former rank and privileges but threatened their very subsistence. Largely anecdotal and often absurd in tone, much of this is recounted with great gusto from the author's personal perspective, not least the stories of his own childhood, such as being accidentally dropped into the baptismal font; the trek to a godforsaken village in July 1950 when an official deportation order resulted in the family being dumped in one of two rooms in a peasant couple's house; schooldays and trips to matches with his football-mad father. For all the vicissitudes and uncertainties it describes, the tone of his writing throughout is one of blithely upbeat humour and harmony, without a hint of reproach, regret or complaint.

"A captivatingly rich novel in terms of both its form and its stance. Certainly it is the most striking work of the fifty-year-old author's career to date, and I would even
venture to call it an epitome of the Esterházy oeuvre. Given its formal richness, however, it is in a way also a compendium of two to three centuries of Hungarian
prose."
-Péter Dérczy, Élet és Irodalom

"This new novel is no less constructed of fragments than his earlier novels, and those are no less whole, but this has the widest span of any Esterházy composition to date: it is a sweeping, baroque work."
-József Tamás Reményi, Népszabadság

Genres: Fiction, Historical Fiction, Hungary, Hungarian Literature, Historical, Literary Fiction, Literature

846 pages, Hardcover

First published September 1, 2003

About the author

Péter Esterházy was a Hungarian writer. He has been called a "leading figure of 20th century Hungarian literature", and his books are considered to be significant contributions to postwar literature.

Reviews

[Vit Babenco · Rating 5 out of 5]

Some periods of the last century were no less dark than the Dark Ages…

Fear and communists, everything here begins with them, and will end with them too, it seems.

Celestial Harmonies is a book of the earthly disharmonies and it consists of two parts:
The first half of a novel is a huge list of the probable author’s fathers that could exist since the medieval epoch… It is an exhaustive inventory of all possible father’s vices and sins and wrongdoings…
And Péter Esterházy, like the patent Oedipus, pitilessly kills all his hypothetical fathers all down the ages.
The second half is the family history proper…
There is the rule formulated by the author’s grandfather and the family abides by this rule…

People quickly grow tired of the good, look for something better, find something worse, then insist on it ever after for fear of something still worse to come.

Celestial Harmonies is an honest and merciless, full of dark sarcasm memorial to the odious era.
In the twentieth century, two planetary cataclysms happened: communism and fascism.

[Joselito Honestly and Brilliantly · Rating 5 out of 5]

When my brother's knee was injured while into competitive sports (naks!) he was operated on at the St. Luke's Medical Center in Quezon City. On the day of his discharge from the hospital he requested me to pick him up as he couldn't then drive by himself.

I was able to immediately free myself from my other commitments that day so I drove to the hospital about an hour early. Not wanting to wait too long, I decided to drop by the Booksale store nearby. As I entered the store the first book I saw was this. Hardbound, pages as smooth as a baby's skin, with a borrower's card from the Floral Park Public Library, but without any indication at all that somebody has borrowed, used or read it before.

At that time, I was grappling with Donald Barthelme's The Dead Father. It would turn out later that the very last footnote in this book by Peter Esterhazy is his (Esterhazy's) special thanks to the estate of Donald Barthelme for giving him permission to quote extensively from
The Dead Father and his expression of admiration for Barthelme's writing.

After reading The Dead Father I didn't get to immediately read this book, though. I think I was sort of intimidated by its length and thickness, 846 pages in fine, small print. Somebody smacks you in the head with this and you may get a brain concussion. I thought it would be a tiring read. It was not.

What is this book all about? Hungary has a thousand-year history and among the greatest and most powerful aristocrats in this country's past were those of the Esterhazy family, counting among them several princes, military commanders, diplomats, bishops, counts and patrons of the arts. By the mid-20th century, however, the power, prestige and wealth of this family were gone. There was a brief communist takeover in 1919, then the second world war and the eventual Soviet rule. The Esterhazys became enemies of the people and succumbed to dispossession, resettlement and impoverishment.

The author's father was born into great wealth and privilege in 1919. But by the time the author himself was born in 1950 the family was already forced to share a house with another family and the author's father was earning very little doing one menial work after another. One of his four children even died while still a baby for lack of good nutrition and proper medical care.

A harrowing riches-to-rags theme, supposedly. But it was no tear-jerker. This is a novel of great MELANCHOLIC GAIETY.

Divided into two parts, Book 1 has 371 paragraphs of different lengths (from the very, very short to the very, very long). These paragraphs are all about fathers (or almost all, if I missed some which have nothing to do with fathers): the author's father, his father's father, all the other Esterhazy fathers past and present, some non-Esterhazy fathers (paragraph 139 is even about fathers in Philippines--so Pinoy fathers!). And these are fathers of all kinds: good fathers, bad fathers, heroic fathers, fathers who abuse their children, intelligent fathers, stupid fathers, weird fathers, Barthelme's Dead Father, etc.).

Book 2 is also numbered (from 1 to 201) but each of the numbers often have two or more paragraphs constituting a mini story. Here we find the story of the downfall of the Esterhazy family who had lost everything (their vast tracks of land, their servants, their palaces and money) except their values, dignity, love of life and--in the case of the author at least--their sense of humor.

Why "Celestial Harmonies"? Let me hazard a guess. The term "celestial harmonies" was used tongue-in-cheek around at least 3 times in the book (as far as I remember). But the real reason could be this: there is a collage of many different "fathers" here, and a ton of literary allusions, heavy borrowings of phrases and indirect quotes from works of authors like Barthelme, Samuel Beckett, Saul Bellow, Yasunari Kawabata, John Updike, Nabokov, James Joyce, Frank McCourt (!), Henry Miller, Kenzaburo Oe, George Orwell, Franz Kafka, etc. Great works and voices towering above us all. Celestial. Esterhazy found harmonies in all of them. So, Celestial Harmonies.

But that's just my opinion.

I have several favorite "paragraphs" (Esterhazy, I dunno, call them "sentences") here. But let me quote here paragraph 189 from Book 1. Notice the biblical allusion (Moses' land flowing with milk and honey). Notice the sad theme of a father quarelling with the mother. Then notice the humor:

"My father was about to strike my mother, something that--need we add--was nothing out of the ordinary, but then he just shook her head instead (presumably like Christ the shoemaker), and stormed out to the kitchen. He paced up and down, huffing and puffing, abusing my mother under his breath, who (my mother) had just made a general comment regarding the sadness she felt with respect to her life. (Not a reproach or accusation, just the realization of complete failure, which is a reproach and accusation.) My father ripped open the refrigerator door: three milks, one in a bottle, two in plastic bags. He slammed the bottle to the floor, the milk squirting all over the place. In the meantime he was already tearing at the plastic bag with his teeth, forcing the milk out, which squirted in his face, fuck! He fucked it down and trampled it underfoot along with the third bag. The kitchen was awash in the squeaking milk. He took the honey from the cupboard, one tube and one bottle. The bottle--as a matter of custom, we might say--bang!, to the floor, and meanwhile he was forcing the liquid gold from the tube. Drip and stick everywhere. It'd have been good, had my mother sneaked quietly, cautiously out to the kitchen, and watched him rage for a while, whirling round, shirttail hanging out of his pants, everything about him tentative, his gestures, his grimaces, his sentiments, and then she, too, could have joined him, trampling into the new, sweet terrain that was the kitchen, into the guck, and she could have embraced him, whispering, you, you...you land of milk and honey! Instead, my father stormed into the living room, pulled my mother off the sofa--she was huddled there, torn between tears and dry eyes--and as he shoved her toward the kitchen, he shouted, You are going off to the land flowing with milk and honey, but I will not go up in the midst of thee, for thou art a stiff-necked people, lest I consume thee in the way!"

Peter Esterhazy wrote this book in his native language and it was translated to English by Judith Sollosy who wrote a short introduction to it in April 2003 for its publication in the United States ending with this statement:

"I can't help thinking that when the Good Lord created the world in six days and took off for the Bahamas on the seventh, he made a bad mistake. And he knows it. And once in a while, in His infinite boredom, He looks down on us, feels sorry for our plight, and He sends us a Shakespeare, or a Mozart--or a book like 'Celestial Harmonies'."

And to think I bought this treasure at the Booksale for only Php145.00!

[K.D. Absolutely · Rating 3 out of 5]

Celestial Harmonies: (1990) All the world’s a stage art and pageantry in the Renaissance and baroque.

Especially in its first part, reading Celestial Harmonies is like reading snippets from the life of demi-gods up there in Mount Olympus. The first person fragmented narrative goes anywhere you don’t know what the narrator will tell you next. It could be the chandelier, the contents of the treasure drawer, how much does the king-father loves his mother or his mistress, how the king father searches for his God, how does the father compare to God, etc. There are some bright and shining, amusing and amazing portions but there are also those that a mortal reader like me does not know anything about and just made me feel clueless or even bored. Wiki helped once in a while but there are just some parts that only maybe Hungarian readers know or can appreciate.

The book is thick, 880 pages and heavy, first class glossy paper with hardbound cover. Reading it for straight two whole days last weekend should have been an agony for my rheumatic hands but I persisted. Reason? I could not help but read because the life of this former Austro-Hungarian monarchy, the Ezterhazys was just amazingly interesting. It is like being there and watching how a royal, popular and respected European family fell down from their Mt. Olympus with even a member dying along the way because they were so poor. However, this book is not a tearjerker. The narration is strange. I think Peter Esterhazy (born 1950), a scion of the family who is now a mathematician, novelist and a freelance writer, did not write this novel to solicit sympathy. For me, this book just wants to show us how anybody who are rich and famous now could one day, find themselves as poor as rats in the gutters. But Esterhazy, did not, at least in this book, compare his father with the biblical character Job, although his father has deep faith in God and that this faith permeates as the underlying theme of this book. Esterhazy also did not put blame on anybody or anything in particular that led to his family’s downfall. He just tells the story just how it happened but he did not write it like a history book but metaphorically in a magical realism kind of way.

If a book has a gender, this is definitely a very manly book. It centers on fathers. Esterhazy used the word father not only in reference to God (the father) and his biological king-father but also his grandfather, or the father’s grandfather, uncles, older brothers, or any father for that matter. Particularly in the first part of the book, readers must decipher whose the father being referred to in some of the portions. It did not put me off, because of Esterhazy’s brilliant play of words; you just interpret his words for yourself. Suit it in any way you want, the outcome is still fascinating if not outright amazing especially when in the end the fragmented narrations fall into their right pieces of the Esterhazy’s long and arduous history as a family.

The second part provides a more focused approach as it details the occupation of Hungary by communist, followed by World War II and the eventual takeover of the Soviet Union. So, when you finally close the book, the anchored and definitive second half seems to be enhanced by the fragments of the first part. It like when you clean your leather shoes. If you just brush it without applying shoe polish, it feels like that when you are reading the second part. But as afterthought, if you apply some shoe polish, the shoes shine brighter. But Esterhazy’s style makes it unbelievably interesting because of the sequence: the shine comes first before the shoes. For me, this speaks well of how bright a novelist Esterhazy is.

[Alana · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hungarians are sexy motherfuckers. I have never read more heartbreak and hilarity in a single work.

[Jonfaith · Rating 4 out of 5]

An astonishing torque of history, memory and language.

[Julia Boechat Machado · Rating 5 out of 5]

Esse livro foi o que escolhi para representar a Hungria na Volta ao Mundo em Livros.

Os Esterházys foram nobres húngaros importantes, condes, diplomatas, guerreiros, políticos. O seu palácio era conhecido como a Versalhes húngara. Eles são para os húngaros algo como os Kennedys, os Rotschilds e os Rockefellers, tudo em uma só família, segundo o próprio autor. Fora do país, são muito conhecidos como os patronos de Haydn. Durante o comunismo, perderam tudo. Péter Esterházy se voltou então à história de sua família para escrever o seu último romance, Celestial Harmonies.

Mas, como ele é o Esterházy, ele não tem interesse em fazer um história linear. Ele começa o livro com as “Numbered Sentences from the Lives of the Esterházy Family”, centenas de anedotas numeradas, todas sobre o mesmo personagem, “meu pai”. Usando apenas esse nome, ele conta histórias de família, sobre os Esterházy heróicos e os traidores, sobre suas relações com príncipes e imperadores, turcos, prisioneiros de guerra, aquele que matou a mulher para herdar sua fortuna, o que teve um ataque de gases em frente a tsarina Catarina (ela teria respondido “enfim um som sincero”), o que recebeu os russos, que ele chamava de bárbaros, no seu palácio. Outros “meus pais” são tirados de romances famosos, são figuras míticas, são paródias de Nabokov, Gombrowicz, Joyce, Musil, Sófocles, Calvino e dezenas de outros. Um é um dublê de corpo da Lady Di, um é o gato de Schröndiger.



“11 – I once had a distant, fascinating and intriguing father – let’s call my father by this name around whose crib there danced the last moon rays of the old century and the first shimmering light of a new dawn – the Evening Star, the Morning Star, the Star of the Even-Morn. That’s where our name comes from.“



“15 For fifty fillérs my father would eat a fly, for one florint you could take a picture of the cadaver in his tongue, for five florints and an apple (Starking), he’d bite a mouse in two. He never worked with outsourced mice, he liked to catch his own.”



“31 My father was a great warrior, an enemy commander, who had no peer in duel or warfare. (No peer in warfare, et cetera, I know! My mother.) Prince Rákóczi had great affection for him, as once he had slaughtered forty-two of the enemy in front of his very eyes. When the Prince was told that my father was planning to betray him, he refused to believe it.But he had to, because it was my mother who had denounced him, after he’d told her about his plan. My father ended up in front of a military tribunal, and the tribunal sentenced him to death for high treason. My mother didn’t shed a tear (…).”



“132 In the Eighteenth Century my father did away with religion, in the nineteenth century he did away with god, in the twentieth century, he did away with man.“



“152 My father, the man without qualities, slept with his older sister. Fuck it / him / her.”



“210 My father: a horse has four legs, and it still trips up. In the same way, the Danube has two banks, but they shot the Jews into it just the same.“



“237 Is my father capable of creating a boulder so large that he himself could not raise it?”



“266 (They found a clearing and, gun in hand, the two parties positioned themselves about thirty paces’ distance from each other in keeping with the custom of fighting a duel that many Hungarian writers, and pratically every Hungarian writer of aristocratic origin, have described in detail). I had an argument with a Stranger, father. It was nothing, really. I slapped him, and then he killed me in a duel near Kalugano. Please forgive me, my father wrote my grandfather in his last letter.”



“274 My father is just like Piero della Francesca’s father: metaphorical.”



A segunda parte se chama “Confessions of an Esterházy family”, em alusão às Confissões de um Burguês de Sándor Márai. Essa parte é mais linear, e foca em eventos importantes da vida do autor, seu pai, avô e bisavô, principalmente durante o comunismo. Essa parte pode ser descrita como o declínio de uma família – afinal, o autor disse uma vez que toda história de família depois de Thomas Mann é influenciada pelos Buddenbrook.

Esse romance foi publicado em 2001, mas não era cedo demais para dizer que é um dos maiores do século XXI.

[Dani Dányi · Rating 5 out of 5]

(újraolvasás)

Egy Esterházy-olvasó utánaemlékezett egykori (azóta kiköltözött szoba, azóta nem frekventált ellenőrizetlen villamoson, azóta kijárt tantermek farvizén) olvasottaknak, most hogy nincs épp aktualitása (csak amennyi konstans aktualitása egy klasszikussá azonnaliasodó időtlen szövegnek) az újraviszketést tenyérileg már éreztem - de hol a könyv? Nem egy apró könyv, mégis elkerült. Úgyhogy kipecáztam gyorsan egy újat (használtat! újszerűt).
A többi már közvetlenebb olvasmányélmény, annak mindenki más is utána tud lapozni, nagyon érdemes, nem is csak mert móka és kacc, hanem az eközé módszeresen odaaprított világ, az a mikor milyen, komoly stb. az feltétlen látogatnivaló, újra is járható. Nagy, és nagyon jó könyv.

(Első HC-olvasóknak szintén föltétlen-kötelező-ajánlott föladvány utána a Javított kiadás, az egy olyan utózmány ami teljesen szinguláris a világirodalomban, de nem késztetődtem újraolvasására, mert egyszer már megvolt)

[Οδυσσέας Μουζίλης · Rating 5 out of 5]

Θεϊκό βιβλίο!

https://pepperlines.blogspot.gr/2017/...

[Shoti · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Esterházy family is one of the most ancient noble dynasties of Hungary. Their origins date back almost to the foundation of Hungary as an independent state in A.D. 1000. The family’s history is inextricably intertwined with the history of both Hungary and the Austro-Hungarian Empire. This more than 800-page tome consists of two books, simply called the 1st and the 2nd book, and provides the reader with insights into a deep reservoir of family tradition and memories.

In Book 1 Péter Esterházy shares anecdotes about the rich and often piquant history of his predecessors. The author zigzags in time without respecting any chronological order. In one chapter the Esterházys fight against the Habsburg during one of the Hungarian independence wars just so that the following chapter can find them as close and loyal allies to the Kaiser. Any chapter may depict the Esterházys fighting against the invading Turks with the same probability as describe how they had fun by composing music or flirting within their aristocratic circles. Some of the 371 chapters are limited to a few sentences while others amount to short novellas. I could identify only two common orientation points through this labyrinth of anecdotes. First, each chapter is written from the perspective of the author's daddy (’My daddy’). Great-great grandfathers or other ancient relatives of the author can equally manifest as 'my daddy'. 'My daddy' can also take the persona of a character from a given era, including modern times, who is unlikely to ever had connection with the Esterházys. Second, and this is a most remarkable thing about this book, the mood constantly swings between hilarity and complete heartbreak. Or it does not even swing but conjures both sentiments simultaneously. While reading the sometimes bizarre chapters I often had to smile, just to become morose a very few sentences later. And then repeated the same again and again.

Book 2 is a family history about the more recent but certainly not less turbulent events of the 20th century. The 20th century, in Hungary, meant the loss of WW1 along with the collapse and disintegration of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, a quick period of red terror in 1919 followed by a revisionist government, the loss a WW2 as a satellite state to Nazi Germany, and then communism-socialism as a satellite state to the Soviet Union. From the dynastical perspectives of the aristocratic Esterházys it would be difficult to envision a more disruptive century. The author writes about his childhood memories, living through atrocities and enmities orchestrated against his blue-blooded parents. The Esterházys were the ideal targets and scapegoats to communist propaganda. Or perhaps not that perfect. They were aristocratic enough to be punished admirably but also too much ingrained in the country’s history, like living memorials, for the communist party to dare to exterminate them.

This book is about many things. First and foremost, it’s about family and it's a hymn to a delicate and sensitive father-son relationship. It's about religion and the individual’s identity vis-à-vis God. It shows history through the eyes of high aristocracy, their fight against losing anchors of identity, and their slide into depression and self-destruction. Love and intimacy are recurring topics just as the enormous suffering brought forward by Nazism, communism, anti-Semitism. It's beautifully written and Esterházy not only writes but plays and jokes with the words (caveat: I read it in Hungarian, my mother tongue, no idea how his playful use of words translates into other languages). The bittersweet, satirical tone is masterful. And this is one of those books where, despite my 5-star rating, I can readily understand 1-star, 2-star ratings by fellow readers. It’s certainly not everybody’s cup of tea.

[Víctor Sampayo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ni siquiera logro pensar en una posible clasificación para este libro monumental. ¿Autobiografía? ¿Novela? ¿Libro familiar? Podría ser todo eso pero también todo lo contrario, porque si algo resulta notable en la prosa de Esterházy es la capacidad de convertirlo todo en literatura mediante los senderos torcidos no sólo del lenguaje, sino de las referencias históricas, familiares, bíblicas, míticas, e incluso psicológicas. Así, en la primera parte (el libro, con sus más de 800 páginas, consta de dos), el «padre» es una suerte de protagonista de todas las historias del mundo, al grado de que puede surgir la sospecha de que la intención del escritor es hacer de la figura paterna un arquetipo primordial, un Adam Cadmon articulado por todas las acciones del ser humano, desde las más bajas, hasta las más sublimes, pasando por las tiernas, las violentas, las grotescas, las naïf, las graciosas y las indignantes.
En la segunda parte, el libro se acerca más a lo biográfico —si bien nunca podremos saber con certeza qué tan cerca llega realmente—, lo cual, en una familia como la Esterházy en Hungría, equivale a lo histórico. Es decir, el paso de un mundo aristocrático y decimonónico hacia su propia decadencia, las dos guerras mundiales y sus efectos en la familia, y las persecuciones comunistas, que tendrían su punto más álgido en un turbio episodio con el padre de protagonista precisamente, lo cual podría resumirse como el paso de la opulencia feudal a la miseria más abyecta, el paso de las actividades intelectuales y oligárquicas a labores que sólo podían hacer los peones menos espabilados. Pero en cualquier caso, un proceso narrado con las mismas armas que ya se vislumbraban desde la primera página del libro: la ironía, el humor cáustico, los extraños e hipnóticos caminos que un lenguaje lleno de malabares y guiños poéticos son capaces de abrir, y que, gracias a las musas, no se empantanan en la autocompasión o en jeremiadas y azotes en la espalda por el mundo perdido. Y al final, lo que queda claro es que esa evocación se asemeja más a un canto homérico que a una reivindicación o a un estéril intento de lavar un nombre de todos conocido en Hungría. Un intento, vamos, de convertir la historia de toda una estirpe en un mundo mítico en el que pueden caber sí, todas las tragedias y nefastos destinos, pero también todas las alegrías.

[M · Rating 2 out of 5]

This review needs some context. Péter Esterházy was born in 1950 in Budapest to one of the most notable noble families of former Austro-Hungarian monarchy. This novel is divided in two parts: the first one is a collection of sentences about Esterházy men since the formal foundation of the family around the end of the 16th century, while the second part has a structure more similar to that of a novel and tells the story of Péter himself, his father and his grandfather. I chose this book because I love reading about large families, but I was somewhat disappointed with Celestial Harmonies. If you are like me and don't know a thing about Hungarian history, Wikipedia'll come in handy. It has also an article about the Esterházy family that'll prove useful to have a clear family tree. This didn't make it an easy read. The writing didn't help either. While the style is flowing, precise, intelligent and a little demanding of the reader, it is too experimental for my taste. Sorry, but I can't bear reading page after page of descriptions of family heirlooms. I thought it would pay back somehow, but it didn't. The author talks about some of them all around the book, but that infamous list doesn't enhance the reader's experience in any way. This book was way too long, so long that I was weary before I had finished it.
However, I liked some things about the book. I liked the rythm created by the repetition of 'my father' or 'my dear father' in the first part and reading about how the most recent Hungarian history affected the Esterházys, especially about Hungary supporting nazis and then the Soviet republic. I would recommend to anyone who wants to read this book to think of it as a colossal monument to the Esterházy family, instead of a novel. I don't mean this is necessarily a bad book, I would say it is beautiful as a sculpture is. I guess this wasn't the right book for me, since this isn't what I expect of novels.

[Bence Labancz · Rating 5 out of 5]

A könyv látszólag két jól elkülöníthető részből áll. Az első rész egy arcképcsarnok név nélkül, az Esterházy ősapákról, a nagyokról akik hercegek, nádorok bárók grófok voltak, akik részt vettek az ország irányításában, hadat viseltek, meghatározó alakjai voltak az európai politikának.

A másik része pedig 20. századról szólt, amit nem lehetet a régi értékekkel túl élni.

A könyv elsőre vaskosnak tűnik így nehéz olvasmánynak is. Viszont annak köszönhetően, hogy nem egy folyamatos történetet mesél el, hanem mikro történeteket könnyen olvashatóvá teszi. Ezek a történetek időrendileg nem követik egymást, inkább harmonizálnak egymással. Hol kontrasztok hol kiegészítik egymást. A végére viszont összeáll egy képpé, amin vidám és élénk színek mellett markánsan ott van a többi is. A történetek között vannak tréfásak és olyik igazán szívbe markolóak.



Nem teljesen tartozik szorosan a könyvhöz, de ha Esterházyt olvasok mindig eszembe jut, hogy mennyire fontos hogy magyar írókat is olvassunk ne csak az éppen aktuális angolszász bestsellert. Annyira más a gondolat vezetése a magyar nyelvnek, az üteme a lüktetése, ha nem fordításról van szó hanem irodalmi alkotásról (igei formában).

Idézetek:

Az emberek hamar megelégelik a jót, keresik a jobbat, meglelik a rosszat, és ehhez ez után ragaszkodnak tartva a rosszabtól.

Nem, a jelen mindig agresszív és csak azért merül alá az ősidők zavarosába, hogy csak azt hozza fel, amire szüksége van ahhoz hogy megjobba egészítse ki mostani formáját.

A szolgalonak reumaja az úrnak köszvénye van.

Tudniillik a az úti költséget nem apám állta. Nehéz volna megmondani, miért. Tan mert hogy nem érdekelte a pénz.

Édesapámnak hirtelen, akár egy villámcsapás, eszébe jutott, mi van, ha a mamsellnek épp napjai vannak, ha a napjai épp akkor vannak. Mert mindenestül, persze, és beszélgetni is, hogyne, de azért mégiscsak.

Történelmi felelősségről itt nem lehetett szó, csupán az egyéni siker múló tömjénfustje csapta meg apámat. Őrült neki.

[Bettie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Bettie's Books

[Agnes]

Mille anni fa.. Prima edizione.

[Becky · Rating 1 out of 5]

My word, that was a chore. 841 pages of literary fanciness, jumpy storytelling, and unsympathetic family issues. I have no idea why this book was written the way it was. I'm not a fan of innovative methods and zany structures. I like a good story I can get my teeth into, and that never happens throughout the length of this book. The first section consists of numbered paragraphs, mostly short but sometimes 3-4 pages in length, all about "my father." But "My Father" may be an Esterhazy of any generation from the dark ages to the modern day, he's probably being messed around by some wanton woman, and he may or may not be a nobleman, depending on the era. Just occasionally I hit a hypnotic kind of rhythm with this section, but generally it was arduous and unforgiving. I almost gave up multiple times.

The second half follows a more linear story, focussing in on the more modern day history of the family, their fall from grace as communism takes over, and their potential hand in it's downfall. Thankfully this half is a lot more accessible, but the Esterhazy's are never particularly likeable. I'm not sure how much of the story is true and how much is literary invention, I know very little about the nobility of Hungary but man...surely there is an amazing story to be told about a family with such endurance. But this book felt like the band, The Dirty Projectors. If you consider yourself a fan of a certain kind of music, you're supposed to love them. But really, the music is disjointed, spiky, cold and while technically proficient, could really do with just finding a good tune. I feel exactly the same way about this book as I do about them. Eurgh.

[Zorro · Rating 5 out of 5]

Εκπληκτικό βιβλίο. Μπορεί εύκολα να συνεπάρει.

[Nibi · Rating 5 out of 5]

4 i 3/4.
Przedziwna. Fascynująca. Podobne wrażenie miałam podczas czytania "Lodu", choć tu nie trzeba tak bardzo skupiać się na śledzeniu nitek fabuły (jakiej fabuły?).

[Dorina · Rating 5 out of 5]

Miről szól ez a könyv? Az apai szerepről. Az apa minden szempontból. Benne van az, aki apa lesz; a másfél éves csecsemő, aki meghal, így nem lesz belőle semmi; az, akinek gyereke nem lett, csak abortusza. A világirodalomban és a világban elképzelhető összes lehetséges és lehetetlen apa. Erről szól a könyv első fele. A rendszertelenül összeillesztett szövegek valójában leírnak egy emberi életet, de minden eseményt sokszorozva, kifacsarva, átértelmezve. A könyv elején eredettörténetek sorakoznak, majd a férfi és nő találkozása (így ismerkedett meg édesapám édesanyámmal). A végén pedig a szülők betegségei, öregedése és halála kap fontos szerepet. Miután az író szétcincálta az édesapját-mármint az ÉDESAPÁT, mint általános létezőt, és talán fel is dolgozta, akkor jut el ahhoz, hogy önmagáról is meséljen.

A könyv második fele az író gyerekkoráról szól. Ezt a rész sokkal könnyebben olvastam, és miközben ezzel haladtam, erőnek erejével vettem rá magam, hogy az első felével is haladjak. Utólag mégis azt mondom, hogy az első fele érdekesebb volt. Ez olyan könyv, amivel meg kell küzdeni, de megéri.

"Az ember fiatal férfiként úgy érzi, az ember túl van édesapámon, nem írta le, de beletörődött, vagy azt reméli, sikerül majd tiszta vizet önteni a pohárba, vagy nem remél semmit, látja, milyen: olyan, amilyen (édesapám). Ám az ember a negyvenes éveiben egyszer csak újra tudni szeretné, ki is ez a férfi. Apaéhség. Apafogalmazásigény. Édesapámnak nevet adni. Az ember szemét el-elfutja a könny. Apafiútánc-életfogytiglan. Mielőtt meghalt volna (édesapám), édesapám fia az éjszakai konyhában a közös érzületek közös talaját kereste, lehajolt édesapámhoz, aki ott ült, akár egy király (s képtelen volt szembenézni élete csődjével), nyújtotta segítőkészen a kezét s ölelte volna át, édesapám azonban nem viszonozta. Nem mozdult sértettségében. Édesapámat Timár József játszta."

[Shelby · Rating 2 out of 5]

When I read a fiction book, I don't expect too much from it. A decent plot and halfway developed characters are really all I need. Hand me an 800 pages plus fiction book, an, by golly, both plot and characters have better be spectacular. Sadly, this book gave a semi-autobiographical, semi-fictional bunch of unconnected thoughts with characters that weren't developed any farther than "This was my aunt. She like coffee" or some such factoid that had nothing to do with the story itself. Not a very winning combination. I'm sure some people would read this book and love it, for some of the writing itself is quite beautiful, and sometimes thought provoking. Sadly, I am not one of those people, and wish I had been reading something else for the past month.

[Aron Kerpel-Fronius · Rating 5 out of 5]

An incredibly moving, cleverly constructed, witty and absolutely heartbreaking work of genius. Rightly considered as one of the great contemporary Hungarian novels. What a way to tick off this year's reading challenge.

Esterházy's mastery of Hungarian and his linguistic playfulness is unparalleled (to me at least), I always wonder how it is possible to translate his works - but ultimately I would consider this novel is exceptional even without his sentence-crafting genius and playfulness replicated in other languages.

I look forward to reading his follow-up novel, Corrected Version.

[Joey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Someone has daddy issues

[Alexandru Madian · Rating 5 out of 5]

„Aici urmează numele tatei! — Numele acesta a simbolizat un vis; un vis unguresc despre risipitorul bogat, despre domnul care azvârle cu ambele mâini banii pe fereastră, care vântură bancnotele de parcă ar vântura grâul, cântăreşte aurul şi argintul cu baniţa, o figură numai bună pentru basmele populare. L-a simbolizat pe ungurul bogat… În imaginaţia maghiară, numele tatei a însemnat posibilitatea raiului pe pământ… Un mic regat veritabil, dar nu ca micul regat din anecdote, care se termină la marginea satului, ci domnia aia adevărată, care-l succede nemijlocit pe regele ăl bătrân. A însemnat domenii atât de vaste că nici măcar gâştele sălbatice nu-l pot survola într-o noapte, darămite omul visător care aude doar ţipătul iluzoriu al acestor păsări nocturne! A însemnat castele cu turnuri şi creneluri ca-n poveşti, care, în marea lor plictiseală, se privesc melancolic în oglinda lacului pentru că stăpânii n-au timp să le viziteze. Străzi întregi cu palate în care cel mult portarul e cel care se scarpină-n barbă, în ale căror săli închise portretele care s-au iubit îşi pot trăi în voie viaţa intimă sau îşi pot întoarce spatele unii altora cei care s-au duşmănit: servitorii beau la cârciuma Ivkoff de pe strada József, acolo unde, de când e lumea şi pământul, intră domnii cei mari fără ocupaţie… Numele acesta, aici urmează numele tatei, e o legendă; la sfârşitul secolului al XIX-lea, când realmente au început să se ruineze conacele ungureşti, în orele când ungurul priveşte visător după rotocoalele de fum ale pipei, sunt rostite, la drept vorbind, două nume. Unul este al tatei, celălalt al lui Rothschild. Cu toate că-n Ungaria mai erau şi alte nume, pe care le ştia orice copil; de exemplu: Franz Joseph sau bătrânul Tisza — în timp ce persoanele de sex feminin rosteau oftând, dacă altădată nu, cel puţin în somn, şi numele lui Mihály Tímár, vaporeanul cu mustăţi lungi, finul scriitorului Jókai —, dar populaţia de bază, serioasă, chibzuită a ţării se gândea numai la numele tatei şi la cel al lui Rothschild, din moment ce tot s-a dedat la visare. Doamne, de câte ori a visat tânărul drumeţ, în timp ce rezema trunchiul bătrânelor sălcii povestitoare, că pe lungul, foarte lungul drum din faţa lui, tatăl meu de odinioară a presărat atâta sare, până când acesta s-a făcut alb ca zăpada, ca pe Maria Tereza s-o poată aduce şi-n toiul verii de la Viena la Kismarton cu sania moscovită trasă de reni! Doamne, de câte ori şi-a întors capul şi s-a holbat călătorul de dincolo de Dunăre, de altfel predispus spre meditare, când vizitiul îi arăta cu biciul spre câte un castel mai ceva ca-n poveste, spre parcuri uriaşe care moţăiau sub mângâierile soarelui, spre lacurile care se legănau în argint până la orizont şi din care îşi scotea capul, din când în când, peştişorul de aur, spre rezervaţiile de vânătoare din care căprioarele priveau la fel de blajin ca-n cărţile de poveşti… când căruţaşul bombănea sub mustaţa-i roşcată: Şi ăsta-i a lui, aici urma numele tatei. La fel şi fierăria, unde potcovim caii, este a lui, aici urma numele tatei. Rezumând: cine ar putea înşira toate acordurile dulci care rezonau în sufletul ungurului de odinioară la auzul numelui tatei, cine… rezumând” (pp. 11-12)
„Numele familiei noastre vine de la Luceafăr. La început n-am avut nume, în documentele şi clauzele acestora, provenind din primele secole ale mileniului, funcţionarii amintiţi apar numai cu numele de botez şi, mai rar, cu numele naţionalităţii lor, iar dacă nu există nume, nu există nici familie. (Familia reprezintă totalitatea persoanelor care au legătură unele cu altele pe calea relaţiilor de filiaţie, unite prin acelaşi sânge şi care au acelaşi trecut istoric. Respectarea strămoşilor şi memoriei acestora e fundamentul sentimentului de dragoste resimţit faţă de familie şi totodată al patriotismului. Iată de ce familia care-şi neglijează trecutul şi nu respectă memoria strămoşilor taie, de fapt, una din rădăcinile pomului vieţii, al naţiunii şi aşa mai departe.) Ce anume conferă unei familii calitatea de familie? («Eu sunt cel care spun cine mi-e cuzin.») Pe scurt, faptul că sunt în stare şi au curajul să spună: noi. La fel, că vor acest lucru. Că nu le este greu să spună asta. Iar în cazul ăsta trebuie şi un nume. Dacă nu există un nume, îşi cască numai gura, la fel ca un crăpcean. Noi… pauză. Cască gura, fiule, cască gura, pentru că aerul e elementul vital… Trebuie un nume. Noi, cei din familia Baradlay. Prin împrejurimi, în băltoacele din zona Csallóköz, pentru că acolo era pentru noi Donaueschingen, li (ni) se spunea: prinţii cu barbă albastră. Blaubart nu-i un nume bun, şi altora le creştea barbă albastră, iar câte unuia dintre prinţii barbă albastră nu le creştea, fie nu le creştea, fie nu era albastră. Bref, nici prinţi, nici barbă albastră. Aşa nu se poate încropi o familie cu ambiţii măreţe. În sinea sa, de-a barba albastră s-a manifestat mult prea concret şi nu prea explicit, sau vag, parcă toate rubedeniile ar fi fost nişte crai supuşi măriei sale pizduca, deşi, în mod logic, asta s-a întâmplat pe baza a cine faţă de cine; dacă; deşi, în lipsa documentelor, trebuie să spunem şi despre acest aspect c-a rămas în ceaţă. Numele se furişase de mult timp în jurul nostru, venea din cer, venea din pământ, venea din noi înşine, din barbă. Ce altă stea ar fi putut să fie cea a bărbilor albastre dacă nu Venus?, cea de-a cincea planetă, steaua iubirii, bardul veseliei lumeşti, al cântecului, al sunetelor de vioară, trompetă, fluier, al scumpelor podoabe şi zorzoane de tot felul. De altfel, a ei este culoarea verde şi parfumul de salvie, ea este cea mai aproape de Soare, într-un an, când se află în faţa acestuia se numeşte Lucifer, adică steaua dimineţii, în celălalt an e în urma lui, iar atunci se numeşte Hesperus, adică, steaua serii, Luceafărul, Esthajnalcsillag, steaua dimineţii-serii. Dacă omul se îmbolnăveşte în ceasul Luceafărului, e clar că-i din cauza omului-femeie. Băiatul sau fata care se naşte în ceasul Luceafărului în nerodnicie va trăi, teamă mi-e că-n preacurvie. Omul Luceafărului e un om foarte moale, se îndoieşte de lucruri esenţiale, se-ndoieşte de ce nu trebuie, îşi taie creanga de sub picioare. Taie şi plantează, taie şi plantează. Tata: cel care stă în steaua dimineţii-serii probabil că ameţeşte îngrozitor, pentru că stă în vid, nici aici, nici acolo, nu e nici ziuă, nu e nici noapte, cerul e gol, se vede doar o singură stea, numai şi numai crepusculul care freamătă, acest mic nimic care vibrează, dar care, la un moment dat, este mai mult şi mai bogat decât orice, dens şi vaporos, la fel ca o cremă de somon, colorat şi sever, mobil şi etern, e ceasul melancoliei; cel care stă în steaua dimineţii-serii poate străluci triumfător pentru că stă în «acum», în etern — oh, clipă faustiană, oricât ar fi de jenant! —; nu-l trage înapoi mătasea-broaştei băloasă a trecutului şi nu-l deprimă viitorul iresponsabil, nu există unde şi încotro, există acum, prezentul de aur, clipa de argint, existenţa de fier, iar apoi nu mai rămâne nimic altceva decât acest fier, rugina, frumuseţea ruginii, duritatea, această fărâmiţare grea, autentică, materie în imaterialitate: tata” (pp. 13-14)
„Viața tatălui meu a reintrat într-un făgaș ceva mai normal. Într-unul ceva mai normal, nu în normal, nu în cel normal, fapt în urma căruia tocmai această distincție a devenit întrebare: la urma urmei, ce-i cu făgașul ăsta? Poate totuşi e mai greu de suportat ce suportăm decât ceea ce nu, pentru că-n primul caz trebuie pusă întrebarea ce este acel ceva de suportat, în comparaţie cu faptul că suportăm ce nu poate fi suportat, şi atunci nu apare această întrebare, acest lux, atunci există doar suportarea.
În perioada asta, tata a devenit cu adevărat însingurat. De acum înainte așa îl văd în veci: stă îndărătul mesei de birou și dactilografiază. Țăcănitul mașinii de scris vuiește prin univers, umple toate cotloanele acestuia, ajunge în cele mai îndepărtate golfuri, în toate curburile tainice, acest bocănit mârșav, necruțător, care-i mai degrabă o gâfâială, un horcăit decât zgomotul obiectiv al unei mașini, e recunoaștere eșecului, e plâns înfundat și implorare, cu asta se îmbibă întreaga lume creată, acesta este ultimul, zăngănitorul cuvânt din viața tatălui meu, acest sunet groaznic, îngrozitor de denaturat, ordinar, înfricoșător, feroce, împăciuitor, această neputință, unicitate, plenitudine.
Adevărata clipă a însingurării n-a fost când stătea în pepenărie, ţăran între ţărani, privind înspăimântat în camera aparatului de fotografiat, ci clipa de acum. Ca şi ţării, nici lui nu i-a mai rămas nimic altceva decât prezentul, iar el în niciun caz nu fusese obişnuit cu o astfel de solitudine, cu o solitudine istorică, dar care într-un mod perfid se referea la persoana lui, Dumnezeu a croit-o pe măsura lui, și dacă arunca o privire în această solitudine, în oglinda prezentului devorator a tot și a toate, atunci această oglindă reflecta un bărbat în jur de patruzeci, născut cineva, care-i pe nicăieri, n-a ajuns niciunde, nu există, sau există, dar la ce bun.
Noi nu puteam schimba această solitudine. Niciunul dintre noi. Nici cât negru sub unghie. (Eu, de exemplu, cât îl mai plictiseam…!) Și nu-i făcea bine să privească în această oglindă, îi era mai bine să piardă vremea în cârciumi obscure, asta era bine pentru el.
O masă de birou, permanentul țăcănit al mașinii de scris și obscuritatea asta acră: asta-i tot.” (pp. 788-790)

[Danny · Rating 4 out of 5]

episch, ambitieus, een stilistisch speciale stream of historical consciousness: een aanrader maar eveneens een harde kluif (;))

[Herman · Rating 3 out of 5]

***1/2

[Steve · Rating 4 out of 5]

Whew! This was a fascinating book about Hungary, fathers, history, and everything else, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't relieved when Count Esterhazy ran out of pages.

I'd read a couple of other Esterházy works, and it's clear he's a much better aphorist than a novelist. His way with words is incredible; there's no writer I can think of apart from Nietzsche who has a better ear for irony and paradox. He's often laugh out loud funny. However, his skill works much better in the context of the brief passages like the ones that make up She Loves Me. Even in his anarchic travelogue The Gaze of Countess Hahn-Hahn (Down the Danube), he struggled to make the work anything more than a collection of hilarious observations and philosophical wordplay.

This book is divided evenly into two parts. Book One is a bunch of routines that involve folkloric anecdotes, and it indicates the limitations of Esterházy's style in a novel format. Though thought-provoking and frequently hilarious, it rarely rises above farce. Book Two is the much more personal and linear chronicle of the Esterházy family's diminishing fortunes during the 20th century, and the stories Esterházy tells about his grandfather and parents are brilliantly conceived. While many of the set-pieces (particularly the final episode, a chaotic family outing to a restaurant in Budapest) are wonderful, this time Esterházy manages to weave them into a strange and wonderful whole.

Considering how much he included in this gargantuan book, Esterházy unfortunately seems to have left out a lot of relevant material. Conspicuous in its absence is the upheaval of '56 revolution, which one would think would feature prominently in any 20th century Hungarian's family history. And the book only deals with Esterházy himself up to his youth; shouldn't there be more about his later family life that involves his changing relationship with his parents?

All in all, a roaring, maddening, delirious success.

[Ian · Rating 1 out of 5]

I don't like giving a respected work only one star. It leaves me feelings of guilt and inadequacy: if this book is so well liked, it must be that I am an intellectual pygmy for not appreciating it. It can't be the author's fault - it must be me. But shelving my inferiority complex and my damaging ignorance of Hungarian history, I'm really not convinced this is any good. The first section, 371 numbered sentences, jump-cutting random moments from the history of the author's own illustrious noble family is really heavy going. As he refers to each of the male ancestors as simply "my father", it is a real struggle to recognise which century the narrative is centring on. Because it is so fragmented, each time you pick up the book it is as if it is for the very first time: there is no building on the past, which in the tale of a dynastic family, is exactly the opposite effect to what you would have expected. The second half follows a more orthodox narrative, with Esterhazy's own childhood, the Communists having dispossessed the family. But there is a light, whimsical touch to the description of their privations. It does not ring true or strike home. Writing about your own family is a temptation to self-indulgence. Like one of his dissipated ancestors, Esterhazy gives in to this temptation at great length.

[Riet · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ik lees dit boek nu voor de 2de keer. Het is in het Duits en was jaren geleden, toen ik weinig Duits las, best moeilijk. Nu heb ik er erg van genoten en kan het aanbevelen (Het is in ieder geval in het Engels vetaald). Het is wel een hele pil, maar opgedeeld in veel kleine stukjes; dat leest makkelijk. De schrijver is een telg uit het beroemde Esterhazy geslacht, die onder de communisten uiteraard alles kwijt geraakt zijn. In de eerste elft van het boek beschtijft hij zijn voorvaderen en noemt daarbij iedere man, van welke generatie dan ook, "mijn vader". Het tweede deel gaat echt over zijn ouders en de grote veranderingen voor de hele familie onder het communisme. Hij is zelf uit 1950, dus beschrijft het vanuit het gezichtspunt van een jongen van zo'n jaar of 6.
Het is een z.g. postmoderne roman, dus het gaat nogal van de hak op de tak, maar zeer boeiend!

[Tarah Luke · Rating 3 out of 5]

#1001books #696left

This had so much more potential, but ended up being incredibly confusing. The problem here is not the length, but the lack of general knowledge about Hungarian history and the style the book is written in. I am not a fan of pomo, random, stream of conscious form of writing, which is what this was. I found the second book much more readable (and intelligible) than the first, but my mind is more attuned to facts and concrete details than poetry and random jumps. The writing is good, and it makes me want to learn more about Hungarian history and the Esterhazy family.

[Liam Ostermann]

One of those books I was so happy to buy, and desire to read, but have yet to find the time to read. Perhaps if I hadn't found a beautiful copy for literally £1 (which these days is probably less than $1) I would have made more effort to find the time, if only to justify the money spent. It remains one of my urgent TBR books.

[Beth (bibliobeth) · Rating 2 out of 5]

I have to admit, I struggled with this book and did not finish it. I gave it two stars for the writing style but realised that it wasn't for me. It felt rather disjointed in a way I did not like.