Stephen Borsody: The Hungarians: A Divided Nation |
The Hungarians of the Carpatho-Ukraine: From Czechoslovak to Soviet Rule
Steven Bela Vardy
The land that since World War I has been variously known as "Ruthenia," "Sub-Carpathia," "Carpatho-Ruthenia," and since World War II as the "Carpatho-Ukraine" and "Trans-Carpathia," had neither a name nor boundaries prior to Hungary's partition in 1918-19. It was part of the Hungarian state and treasured by Hungarians of modern times for romantic nationalistic reasons. The Verecke Pass in the northeastern corner of the Carpathians has been thought of as the glorious route of the Hungarian conquerors who founded the Hungarian state. The Ruthenian people living on the southern slopes of the Carpathians have been known as "gens fidelissima," because of their loyal support of Ferenc Rakoczi II, hero of a Hungarian uprising and war against the Habsburgs in the early eighteenth century. And the Polish-Hungarian frontier in the Carpathians has been traditionally regarded by both Poles and Hungarians as a source of their national strength.1
After World War I, this multiethnic land of less than five thousand square miles was given the name "Subcarpathian Rus" (Podkarpatska Rus) and incorporated as an autonomous province into the newly founded Czechoslovak state. In March 1939, following Hitler's dismemberment of Czechoslovakia, local right-wing nationalists calling
210 STEVEN BELA VARDY
themselves Carpatho-Ukrainians proclaimed their independence in the expectation of receiving the same German support toward forming a separate state as had been given to the Slovaks. However, this twoday Carpatho-Ukrainian independence was smashed by Hungarian armed intervention aimed at restoring the historic Polish-Hungarian frontier along the Carpathians. Thus, on the grounds of historic claims, Subcarpathian Ruthenia was reincorporated into the Hungarian state and remained with Hungary for the next five years.
At the end of World War II, this land of conflicting national loyalties and national interests was annexed by the victorious Soviet Union. The Soviet-Czechoslovak agreement of June 29, 1945, dictated by the Soviet Union and supported by Carpatho-Ukrainian nationalists of various political persuasions, sanctioned the annexation in the then flourishing spirit of Pan-Slav brotherhood. The annexation was hailed as a "reunion" of an "ancient Slavic homeland" with the Ukrainian "mother country," and, ever since, the former Czechoslovak Sub-Carpathia has been named Trans-Carpathia from the Kievan Ukrainian perspective.2
The fact of the matter is that, prior to 1918, Ruthenia never had any specific association with any Slavic state. The great majority of the Ruthenes, or Rusyns, migrated to Hungarian Sub-Carpathia between the fourteenth and seventeenth centuries. This influx, as well as the subsequent undisturbed population growth in the isolated valleys of the northeastern Carpathians, gradually made the Ruthenes into the majority population of this region. According to the Hungarian census of 1910, the region's population of 571,488 was composed of 319,361 Rusyns (55.8 percent), 169,434 Hungarians (29.7 percent), 62,182 Germans (10.9 percent), 15,382 Romanians (2.7 percent), 4,067 Slovaks (0.7 percent), and 1,062 others (0.2 percent).3 Following its annexation by Czechoslovakia in 1918, political and administrative power fell mostly into Czech hands. Czech modernization of this backward region introduced, among other changes, land reform. The landless Hungarian peasants, however, were denied the full benefits of this long overdue reform. They received only 27,000 acres of the 372,000 acres expropriated mostly from large Hungarian landowners.4 On the other hand, Czech, Ruthene, and Slovak colonists settled in Hungarian villages, where they were given land and funds for building homes and churches. Hungarian villages were also compelled to open schools for the children of the colonists.
The Hungarians of the Carpatho-Ukraine 211
We know little about the years immediately following the Soviet annexation of 1945. The Soviet authorities were particularly harsh with the Greek Catholic (i.e., Uniate) clergy, who supported the Ruthenian claims to nationhood and resisted being categorized as Ukrainians. But, of all the peoples of this multiethnic region, the Hungarians suffered the most. According to spotty reports that appeared in the Western press. all manifestations of Hungarian nationality were suppressed, including speaking Hungarian in public. A sizable portion of the Hungarian male population was deported to the Soviet Ukraine on the other side of the Carpathians.
Events concerning the fate of the Subcarpathian Hungarians during the transitional period from Czechoslovak to Soviet rule are largely unknown. The Hungarian witnesses are passing away - among them the noted poet, Vilmos Kovacs, coauthor of an article in the Hungarian periodical Tiszataj, who recalled:
The pseudo-state Zakapartska Ukraina [Transcarpathian Ukraine] which came into being on the territory of Sub-Carpathia, existed from November 1944 to January 1946. It was sustained by the twin forces of Ukrainian nationalism and the [Stalinist] personality cult, both of them intensified by wartime conditions. The unlawful and discriminatory measures [of this period] brought irreparable damage and dealt a paralyzing blow to the Hungarians of Sub-Carpathia. At the end of 1944 the whole Hungarian adult male population was temporarily deported into the inner regions of the Ukraine, from where they were able to return only after several years. Hungarian secondary schools were abolished. This policy of discrimination [against the Hungarians] continued to a certain degree even after January 1946 when Sub-Carpathia received a new status [that of a district of the Ukraine]. Only very slowly and only in certain areas did it gradually begin to approach the norms of Leninist nationality policy. Not until 1954-55 did the initial signs of relaxation appear, when Hungarian secondary schools were gradually reopened, first in the cities and then also in the villages .6
The Hungarians under Soviet Ukrainian Rule
According to the Soviet census of 1979, there were 171,000 Hungarians in the Soviet Union, of whom 164,000 lived in the Trans-Carpathian oblast (district) of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic.7
212 STEVEN BELA VARDY
Because it is safer, most of them claim Hungarian as their "mother tongue" rather than as their "nationality."8 The actual number of Hungarians in the Carpatho-Ukraine today is probably closer to 200,000. Most of them live in the lowlands bordering on Hungary and Slovakia, on the southern and western fringes of this Carpathian region. The district of Beregszasz (Berehovo) is 95 percent Hungarian. There are also significant compact Hungarian ethnic islands in the districts of Munkacs (Mukachevo), Nagyszollos (Sevliush), and Ungvar (Uzhgorod).
The Hungarians keep close to one another and do not mix with the Slav majority. This fact is acknowledged by a Soviet ethnographic report published in a 1970 issue of the Sovetskaia etnografiia:
The largest national minonty with the longest history of settlement here are the Hungarians (ca. 160,000), who live in well-defined settlements on the southern and western lowlands. During the two months of our expedition we have visited twenty-seven Hungarian villages of between 500 and 7,000 inhabitants. The population of the great majonty of these villages is almost exclusively Hungarian. In these villages the Hungarians are strongly attached to their national traditions. Even today only a few of them speak Russian or Ukrainian, notwithstanding the fact that these languages are taught in the Hunganan schools. Hungarian-Ukrainian marriages are rare. There are also villages of mixed nationality in the region, but in those villages the nationalities are locally segregated.9
Great Russians are newcomers to the area; they were settled as part of the Soviet policy of Russification of Carpatho-Ukrainian cities. Some Ruthenes who have remained loyal to their separate nationality sympathize with the Hungarians. They do so not only because of common traditions, but also because of their mutual dislike of the intolerant Ukrainian nationalists. However, under the Soviet system, the transformation of the former Subcarpathian Ruthenes into Transcarpathian Ukrainians is progressing rapidly. And the Ukrainians are more intolerant toward the Hungarians than are the Great Russians. In fact, the newly settled Russians, reportedly, show no anti-Hungarian sentiments.10
The future of a national minority depends to a large degree on its ability to cultivate its language-hence the significance of education in the minority language. It is in this area that the Hungarians of the
The Hungarians of the Carpatho-Ukraine 213
Carpatho-Ukraine are most endangered. Today, there are about seventy Hungarian schools which are divided into three categories:
(1) Hungarian schools where the language of instruction is Hungarian, but often one day per week is a "Russian Day" when only Russian is used;
(2) bi-lingual schools that have parallel Hungarian and Russian or Hungarian and Ukrainian classes;
(3) modified Hungarian schools where Russian or Ukrainian classes have been set up for Hungarian children.11
Of these three types, the third type is the most dangerous. The parents are usually pressured into enrolling their children in such classes so that the few newly-settled Russians and Ukrainians should have eventually legal title to a school of their own language. In Nagydobrony, for example, of the 6,550 inhabitants only 270 are either Ukrainians or Russians (4 percent of the population), yet the Hungarian school now has parallel Russian classes. Actually, 99 percent of the students in these Russian classes are Hungarians.12 On the other hand, Hungarians in mixed villages are given few chances to study in their own language, in violation of Soviet law. There are many towns and villages where half of the population is Hungarian, yet they either have no Hungarian schools, or Hungarian children can study in their mother tongue only in the first three grades.13
The number of the Hungarian schools has been on the decline, particularly since the late 1960s. In 1968-69, there were 93 purely Hungarian schools and only 6 mixed schools. By 1969-70, the forrner had declined to 68, while the latter increased to 29. This drastic oneyear change resulted in an almost 10 percent decline in the number of students enrolled in Hungarian schools, from 22,800 to 20,873.14 Today, only 31 of the Hungarian schools are ten-year schools, a combination of primary and secondary schools typical of the Soviet educational system.15 There are, however, no Hungarian kindergartens, the foundation of education in the mother tongue. Hungarian children are unable to familiarize themselves with the basic concepts of education in their own language. Many parents give in to pressure from kindergarten teachers or local administrators and enroll their children in Ukrainian- or Russian-language schools. Such pressures are often successful because parents are given to understand that enrolling their children in Hungarian schools puts the children at a disadvantage compared to those who study in the Ukrainian or Russian languages. 16
214 STEVEN BELA VARDY
Furthermore, as there are no Hungarian technical high schools in the whole province, all children who wish to study technical fields have to enroll in a Russian or Ukrainian school. Entrance examinations at the Uzhgorod State University are given only in Russian and Ukrainian.l7 The result is that Hungarians enter the province's only university in far fewer numbers than do the Ukrainians and the Russians. In 1970, only 9.4 percent of the students at Uzhgorod State University were Hungarian, which is barely half their share in the region's population.18 Of the nearly 1,000 Hungarians studying at the university only a small fraction can study a few subjects in their native tongue by taking courses in the Department of Hungarian Studies, established in 1963 for the purpose of training Hungarian teachers. After an initial annual enrollment of twenty, today the department admits only ten students per year. But, since even this number have difficulty finding appropriate positions upon graduation, in 1979 the department actually enrolled only two students.l9 Today, the faculty of the Department of Hungarian Studies consists of three linguists and three literary scholars. It is chaired, however, by the Rusyn-Ukrainian linguist Petro Lizanec, who is also the Dean of the Faculty of Arts. Characteristic of the Department's ideological orientation, the bulk of its literary offerings consists of such courses as "Lenin's Image in Hungarian Literature," "Shevchenko and Hungary," "The Problem of Internationalism and the Critique of Hungarian Bourgeois Nationalism in Hungarian Literature," and "Anti-Religious Motifs in Hungarian Literature."20
Other topics are limited to Hungarian folklore, ethnography, and linguistics of the Carpatho-Ukraine. The study of history is conducted in the spirit of the "prize winning" history text under the title suggestive of its contents: "Toward Happiness: The Outline History of Trans-Carpathia."21 It is made up of half truths and conscious misinterpretation of facts, and it is passed off as the first scientific history of the Carpatho-Ukraine which is to replace all earlier works produced by "bourgeois falsificators of history." (See excerpts from this "scientific history" in Annex II, below.)
The Hungarians of the Carpatho-Ukraine have several Hungarian newspapers. These include the four-page daily Karpati Igaz Szo (Carpathian Word of Truth), as well as several other periodical publications, such as Karpatontuli Ifjusag, (Trans-Carpathian Youth) which
The Hungarians of the Carpatho-Ukraine 215
is the Hungarian translation of the province's official Komsomol paper, Voros Zaszlo (Red Flag) of Beregszasz, Kommunizmus Fenyei (Lights of Communism) of Ungvar, and Kommunizmus Zaszlaja (The Communist Flag) of Nagyszollos. The very titles of these papers indicate their contents.
Originally, the daily Karpati Igaz Szo was sirnply a verbatim translation of the Ukrainian Zakarpatska pravda. Only in 1965 did it become an independent paper under the editorship of Laszlo Balla, who is one of two Hungarian members of the Soviet Writers' Union (the other one is Borbala Szalai). However, Karpati Igaz Szo and its sister papers have no real independence. They are Soviet Ukrainian papers in the Hungarian language, with only a small percentage of their space devoted to Hungarian matters. They do not serve the interests of the Hungarian minority against the Soviet and Ukrainian nationalism that dominates all aspects of social and intellectual life in the province. It is hard for a Hungarian, even one reared in the atmosphere of this Soviet-dominated province, to endure these papers.22 Of greatest interest to Hungarians are the daily programs of Hungarian radio and television printed in the Karpati Igaz Szo. These programs are the only regular link between the Hungarians of the Carpatho-Ukraine and Hungary.
Not unlike the state of Hungarian journalism, bleak, too, is the situation in Hungarian book publishing. The Carpathian Publishing House of the Carpatho-Ukraine, founded in 1945 and reorganized in 1964, now publishes close to a hundred titles per year. In 1981, 36 of these were in the Hungarian language: 12 were indigenous works, while the others were joint publications with various publishing houses in Hungary. The number of books sounds rather impressive until we examine their contents. The director of the publishing house, Boris Gvaradinov, summed up their character in a recent interview:
Our main goal is to make available in sufficient number of copies the necessary political, ideological, and sociological works . . . such as those of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin and Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev, the constitutions of our republic and of the Soviet Union, their election laws, the documents of the five-year plans and of the party congresses, atheist brochures, as well as other works needed for the ideological struggle. In addition, we also publish works in three broad areas: specialized works on industry and agriculture . , touristic works . . . , and works of belles lettres.23
216 STEVEN BELA VARDY
Even in the category of belles lettres, it should be noted, a goodly number are works translated from the Russian or Ukrainian.
The first Hungarian work published by the Carpathian Publishing House (called Karpati Konyvkiado in Hungarian) was in 1951. Today, there are about a dozen writers publishing works on the life and problems of that most forgotten Hungarian minority in the Danube region. Most of their works consist of poetry or short stories. Books in Hungarian are usually published in 1,000 to 2,000 copies. The bulk of the printer's sheets alloted to Hungarian works per year is reserved for the Karpati kalendarium (Carpathian Almanac), published annually since 1957 in about 15,000 to 19,000 copies. It is filled with the usual political and ideological propaganda, yet it is called a "kind of anthology."24 Another "kind of anthology" is the slender volume published every five years by the Jozsef Attila Irodalmi Studio (on the origins of this organization, see Annex I, below). The most recent volume, entitled Lendulet, appeared in 1982 on the occasion of the sixtieth anniversary of the foundation of the Soviet Union.25 The goal of this politically streamlined literary circle and its publications is to advance the cause of a "subjectively partisan socialist-realist literature that is imbued with revolutionary romanticism."26 Although Lendulet contains some valuable poetical contributions, it also indulges in political sloganism, such as an ode to Lenin and a crude anti-American description of an American arms manufacturer's "visit" to his workers.27
Occasionally, Karpati Konyvkiado publishes Hungarian works in the so-called "scholarly" category. The most recent work in this category was Szazadok oroksege, published in 1981 jointly with a publishing house in Budapest (Gondolat). It deals with various aspects of Russian-Hungarian and Ukrainian-Hungarian historical relations, demonstrating the beneficial influence of those "great Slavic neighbors" on Hungary and the Hungarians. All historical works follow the official line to such a degree that they have little credibility with the professional historian - either in Hungary or in the West. This is even more true of the textbooks, most of which are translations of Ukrainian originals published in Kiev. A few exceptions are those that deal with Hungarian literature, which are usually prepared by local Hungarian authors, with due attention of course to official guidelines.28
The Hungarians of the Carpatho-Ukraine 217
The Resources of Resistance to Denationalization
Although the Hungarians of the Carpatho-Ukraine are constantly subjected to a demeaning interpretation of their national history and traditions, so far their attachment to their Hungarian nationality appears to be unbroken. They can manifest their national attachment only in limited ways, mainly by stressing the role of Hungarian historical personalities who qualify as "forerunners of socialism." These include some of the heroes of Hungary's struggles against the Habsburgs, such as Ferenc Rakoczi II and Lajos Kossuth, as well as such local heroes as Rakoczi's peasant-general, Tamas Esze. To make them "acceptable" these Hungarian heroes are placed next to the heroes of Soviet communism. The Hungarian spirit of resistance is also evident in the lively interest in Hungarian folk traditions of the region.29 However, the Institute of Ethnography of the Soviet Academy of Sciences, which also deals with the folklore and folk habits of the Carpatho-Ukraine, employs no Hungarian ethnographer.
Despite widespread anti-religious propaganda, religion remains a significant force of resistance against the official Soviet-Ukrainian cultural policy. Ever since the Union of Ungvar of 1646, the dominant religion of the region has been Greek Catholicism. There is also a Roman Catholic minority, as well as a small Calvinist (Reformed) religious community, both of which are almost exclusively Hungarian. Since the early nineteenth century, the immigrant Jews became Magyarized and when Carpatho-Ruthenia was part of Czechoslovakia they were among the most nationally conscious Hungarians of the region.30 During World War II, however, when the province became again part of Hungary, the Nazi holocaust, engulfing German-occupied Hungary in 1944, wiped out this Magyarized Jewish population along with much of the rest of the Jewish community.
Following the Soviet takeover, the Greek Catholic majority (most of whom were Rusyns) was forced into union with the Ukrainian-Russian Orthodox Church. This compelled the Greek Catholic Hungarians, and even many Rusyns, to make a choice between Orthodoxy and Roman Catholicism. Virtually all of the Hungarians chose the latter, and so did a number of Rusyns. Thus the Rusyns who opted for Roman Catholicism actually joined Hungarian Catholic parishes and are attending Catholic mass in Hungarian.31 However, the number of these Rusyns is very small.
218 STEVEN BELA VARDY
Little is known about the fate of the Calvinists, although a recent report in the official bulletin of the Hungarian Reformed Church, Reformatusok Lapja, speaks of about 80 congregations.32 In 1979, their bishop, Pal Forgon, was awarded an honorary doctorate by the Reformed Theological Seminary of Budapest - significantly though, Forgon received this degree in the company of the Ukrainian Patriarch of Kiev.
The life of the churches, whether Catholic or Calvinist, is difficult. Religious life is frowned upon and both churches suffer from a shortage of clergymen. According to a 1976 report, a single Catholic priest or Reformed minister is often obliged to take care of as many as five congregations. But at least they are tolerated, which is not true on the other side of the Carpathians in Soviet Ukraine proper.
Life for the Hungarians in the Carpatho-Ukraine is grim - to the Hungarian intellectuals, it is virtually hopeless. Resettling in Hungary is their ultimate, but mostly unattainable, goal. To them, Hungary represents the envied world of Western civilization. An almost impenetrable wall-according to one of the resettled Hungarian intellectuals, "locks them into a culturally and psychologically alien world that gradually suffocates them."33 This wall is penetrated regularly only by the Hungarian radio and television and by some Hungarian books and newspapers. Occasionally Hungarian intellectuals give vent to their resentments. Such was the case in the early 1970s when a group of young writers, members of Forras Studio, drew up a protest against the official Ukrainianization of the Hungarian schools in violation of the terms and spirit of the Soviet Constitution. They were silenced. Some of them were able to resettle in Hungary. Forras Studio itself was banned and was replaced by the officially sponsored Jozsef Attila Irodalmi Studio.34
How do Hungarians in Hungary view the plight of the Hungarians in the Carpatho-Ukraine? The average Hungarian knows little about the minority problems in general. The nationally conscious Hungarian intellectuals, however, are ever more aware of the plight of the Hungarian minorities in the neighboring states. But while it is now permissible to talk, and occasionally even to write, about the problems of the Hungarians in Transylvania and Slovakia, no one dares to raise openly the problems of the Hungarians in the Carpatho-Ukraine. The weight of the powerful Soviet neighbor is too great; all attempts at demanding intercession are silenced.
The Hungarians of the Carpatho-Ukraine 219
The rare reports that do appear in the Hungarian press about life in the Carpatho-Ukraine paint a rosy picture.35 But few Hungarians believe in these reports. Some intellectuals occasionally protest these unrealistic portrayals.36 However, the Hungarian Communist party leadership does not dare to challenge the great Soviet neighbor.
The future of the Hungarians in the Carpatho-Ukraine appears to be no less difficult than their present condition. Though slowly rising, their number is small. They are cut off from the motherland, and they are subjected to a relentless pressure of denationalization. The resources that have saved their self-identity so far stem mainly from their rural existence, their lack of mobility, and their resistance to intermarriage. The process of industrialization and urbanization, however desirable in itself, would only further imperil their survival as a distinct nationality. Yet the situation is not hopeless, for there are inscrutable factors at work, not the least of which is the resistance of the human spirit to the forced transformation of one's identity.
Notes
1. Stephen Borsody, The Tragedy of Central Europe, rev. ed. (New Haven, 1980), 79.
2. Quoted from Vyacheslav Molotov's speech at the signing of the Czechoslovak-Soviet Treaty of June 29, 1945, as cited by Frantisek Nemec and Vladimir Moudry, The Soviet Seizure of Subcarpathian Ruthenia (Toronto, 1955; reprint, Westport, 1981), 170. Cf. Eduard Taborsky, "Benes and Stalin--Moscow, 1943-1945," Journal of Central European Affairs 13/2 (1953): 167-75.
3. Statistics quoted from Oscar Jaszi, "The Problem of Sub-Carpathian Ruthenia," in Robert J. Kerner, ed., Czechoslovakia (Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1949), 193-215.
4. Statistics quoted from Janos Olvedi, "A magyarsag helyzete Karpataljan," Katolikus Szemle 30/2-3 (1978): 159.
5. While some reports on the Nagydobrony (Velikaia Dobron) massacre appear to be exaggerated, there is no doubt that atrocities did take place. On the extreme claims see Laszlo Arkay, "Helye a terkepen ures: Rekviem Nagydobronyert," in Janos Nadas and Ferenc Somogyi, eds., A XVI. magyar taldlkozo kronikaja (Cleveland, 1978): 67-70; and Gyorgy Stirling, "Nagydobrony, a magyar szuper-Lidice," in Katolikus Magyarok Vasarnapja (Youngstown), October 1, 1978.
6. Vilmos Kovacs and Andras Benedek, "Magyar irodalom
220 STEVEN BELA VARDY
Karpat-Ukrajnaban," Tiszataj 24/10 and 12 (October and December 1970): 961-66, 1144 50. See also, Miklos Beladi, ed., A hataron tuli magyar irodalom (Budapest, 1982), 162.
7. These statistics are cited by Csaba Skultety, "A karpataljai magyarsag szellemi elete," in Eva Saary, ed. Magyar merleg 3 (1980): 123-24.
8. United Nations Demographic Handbook (New York, 1964), 319. On the question of "mother tongue" versus "nationality," see Alfred Bohmann, "Russians and Russification in the Soviet Union," Aussenpolitik (English edition) 32/3 (1981): 252-62.
9. Sovetskaia etnografiia (1970), as quoted by Olvedi, "A magyarsag helyzete," 162.
10. Skultety, "A karpataljai magyarsag szellemi elete," 126-27.
11. Miklos Zelei, "Magyar muvelodesi elet Karpat-Ukrajnaban. Interju Fodo Sandorral, az Ungvari Allami Egyetem tanaraval," Magyar Hirlap, September 29, 1979.
12. Information taken from the 1971 appeal of Forras Studio, as published in the emigre monthly Nemzetor (Munich), September-November 1983. Henceforth cited as Forras Studio appeal. See also Annex I, below.
13. Ibid.
14. Ibid.
15. A recent official source refers to the unrealistically high figure of 100 Hungarian schools, among them 20 high schools: Peter Lizanec, "A magyar nyelv es irodalom oktatasa az Uzsgorodi Allami Egyetemen," in Judit M. Rona, ed., Hungarologiai oktatas regen es ma (Budapest, 1983), 36-40. One of my informers, most knowledgeable in Carpatho-Ruthenian affairs, claims that today there is only one Hungarian high school in the whole province, at Peterfalva.
16. Forras Studio appeal.
17. Ibid.
18. Ibid.
19. On the Department of Hungarian Studies, see Lizanec, "A magyar nyelv," 36-40. Concerning the lack of applicants, see Zelei, "Magyar muvelodesi elet."
20. Lizanec, "A magyar nyelv," 37.
21. A boldogsag fele. Karpatontul vazlatos tortenete (Uzhgorod, 1975), 296. For excerpts, see Annex II, below.
22. Concerning Hungarian journals, book publishing, and literary activities in the Carpatho-Ukraine, see Kovacs and Benedek, "Magyar irodalom," 961-66, 1144 50; Olvedi, "A magyarsag helyzete," 344 47; Skultety, "A karpataljai magyarsag szellemi elete," 128, 130, 133-36; Jozsef Marias, "Sorok Karpatontul magyar irodalmaro1," Korunk 39/4 (April 1980): 312-14; Andras Gorombei, "Karpat-ukrajnai magyar irok," Alfold 32/11 (November
The Hungarians of the Carpatho-Ukraine 221
1981): 18-26; and the recent summary in Beladi, ed., A hataron tuli magyar irodalom, 159-74, which is based to a large extent on the above-cited article by Kovacs and Benedek.
23. "Testverkiadok: Pozsony, Ungvar, Ujvidek, Bukarest," Kritika S (May 1981): 4-5.
24. Ibid., 5.
25. Lendulet: Ifjusagi almanach (Uzhgorod, 1982). The earlier volumes include: A varakozas legszebb reggelen (Uzhgorod, 1972), and Szivarvanyszinben (Uzhgorod, 1977).
26. Lendulet, 3.
27. Ibid., 5-6.
28. See, for example, the following textbooks: Gizella Dravai, Magyar irodalom az Ukran SZSZK magyar tanitasi nyelvu kozepiskolainak 9. osztalya szamara, 4th rev. ed. (Kiev-Uzhgorod, 1971); Laszlo Balla, Irodalom az Ukran SZSZK magyar tanitasi nyelvu kozepiskolainak 10. osztalya szamara (Kiev-Uzhgorod, 1975). Almost one-third of these texts is devoted to Ukrainian literature. All selections and interpretations are geared to class struggle.
29. Skultety, "A karpataljai magyarsag szellemi elete," 137-38. See also "Magyar neprajzi kutatas a szomszedos orszagokban," ValosAg 18/6 (June 1975): 29-44, especially 39-40. 30. Concerning religious life in Carpatho-Ruthenia, see Walter C. Warzeski, Byzantine Rite Rusins in Carpatho-Ruthenia and America (Pittsburgh, 1971); Paul Robert Magocsi, The Shaping of a National Identity: Subcarpathian Rus', 184S1948 (Cambridge, Mass., 1978); and some of the studies in Basil Shereghy, ed., The United Societies of the U.S.A.: A Historical Album (McKeesport, Penn., 1978).
31. Skultety, "A karpataljai magyarsag szellemi elete," 138-39.
32. "A Karpatontuli Reformatus Egyhaz eletebol," Reformatusok Lapja 24/50 (December 14, 1980).
33. In the 1970s and early 1980s, I spoke with several Hungarian intellectuals from the Carpatho-Ukraine. The view presented here is based on these conversations.
34. For excerpts from Forras Studio appeal, see Annex I, below. On Jozsef Attila Irodalmi Studio (JAIS), see Gyorgy Dupka, "Visszatekintes alkoto kozossegunk tiz esztendejere," in Lendulet, 60-62.
35. See, for example, articles by Janos Siklos: "Barangolas a Karpatok alatt," Nepszava, February 6, 1972; "Nezelodes a vilagban," Delmagyarorszag, July 4, 1972.
36. In Budapest, I had the opportunity to examine several of these protests (including a 160 page memorandum) submitted in the late 1970s by prominent Hungarian intellectuals to the leadership of the Hungarian Communist Party. Glowing reports about the life of the Hungarian minority in
222 STEVEN BELA VARDY
Carpatho-Ukraine, such as those of Janos Siklos (see note 35 above), was singled out for cnticism.
Stephen Borsody: The Hungarians: A Divided Nation |