With the exception of lyrical and dramatic works, Gábor Albert produced remarkable achievements in nearly every genre of literature. He wrote narrative short stories, symbolic novellas, “densely woven novels of consciousness,” and pioneering works of sociography. His interests encompassed the great turning points of Hungarian history – the Árpád era, the aftermath of the 1848 War of Independence, and the consequences of the Treaty of Trianon. The defining historical experience of his generation, the Revolution of 1956, was of crucial significance for him as well, although he was unable to participate personally due to a hospital stay. In his essays, following the finest traditions of Hungarian essay writing, he sought answers to the social and national dilemmas of his time. Like László Németh, he regarded writing as a form of service, a mission, an act of engagement and influence, deeply rooted in the spiritual legacy of Hungarian Protestantism. His earliest impressions and dialectal words came from the Ormánság region, his birthplace, while his classical education led him to frequent references to Latin and ancient authors. Critics emphasize the biblical tone of his language, explained by the elevated, metaphorical, and lyrically charged style of Protestant preaching. His first published work, written in 1955, dealt with László Németh’s Galilei; upon receiving a letter of praise from the master himself, he felt, as he put it in a long interview with Zsuzsa Kövesdy, “as if I had been knighted, as if I had been initiated as a writer.” As early as the late 1970s, Győző Határ placed this independent writer, who belonged to no literary school, style, or group, “among the masters of Hungarian prose.”
The Prose Writer
Albert’s literary career began with short stories and novellas. His Albérleti szobák (Rented Rooms, 1966) – “experiential stories,” as he called them – and the novellas of Az istentagadó (The God-Denier, 1969) are built from small mosaic-like fragments and vivid flashes, conveying the fear of the years following 1956 and the oppressive mood of the 1960s. The stories of Útvesztők, verőfényben (Labyrinths in Bright Sunlight, 1979) and his novel Kagylóhéjban (In a Seashell, 1985), depicting the inhabitants of an infectious liver ward – reissued in 2003 under the title A Cetgyomrában (In the Belly of the Whale) – are not easy reading; they demand intellectual effort and reflective engagement from the reader.
“These are highly distinctive and novel interplays of tradition and modernity. On the one hand, one can detect a deliberate archaism – his novels are not always ‘novel-like,’ at least not in the classical or modern sense – while on the other, they are structured according to the complex conception of time characteristic of the modern novel. Moreover, there is no single protagonist, but several: parallel, equally weighted character portraits arranged mosaic-like side by side,” observes Györgyi Pécsi. Upon its publication, Labyrinths in Bright Sunlight was considered a sensation – a collection of “lightly poetic short prose, interweaving images and impressions” (Zoltán Pósa).
His novel Királyok könyve (Book of Kings, 1980) brings to life the central figures of the thirteenth century and the Mongol invasion – Andrew II, Béla IV, Saint Margaret of the Árpád Dynasty, and Stephen IV – through sweeping interior monologues and the parallel unfolding of historical events, employing the sophisticated narrative techniques he had developed in earlier works. Albert deliberately distanced himself from the conventions of the traditional historical novel. “It may appear that I am sifting through the past, but from beneath my fingers trickle the seeds of the future. Strange as it may sound, it is true: everything exists only insofar as it exists within us,” he wrote in the book’s motto. According to Miklós Csűrös, “the text satisfies not only several criteria of prose fiction but also of drama and essay.” This fluid movement between genres remains one of the most characteristic features of his entire oeuvre.
Györgyi Pécsi considers Albert Gábor’s two novels Hol vannak azok az oszlopok? (Where Are Those Columns?, 1985) and …mi pedig itt maradtunk (…And We Remained Here, 1996) to be closely related works. In both, the destiny of an entire generation takes shape – rather than a single protagonist, it is the generation itself that becomes the hero.
“Time – the history-saturated span of the past half-century – is what structures these works. Yet the lives unfolding within this temporal flow are not revealed linearly or retrospectively, but with a seemingly erratic rhythm, partly governed by the laws of memory and partly by the narrator’s own digressions. [...] These are novels without a center: life and fate fragments of every kind unfold in polyphonic form, and the loosely connected destinies are only reassembled in the reader’s mind – into the tableau of a generation. [...] Albert Gábor belongs among the bold innovators and seekers of novelistic poetics – not merely as a theoretical or normative advocate of the unity of tradition and modernity, continuity and renewal, but as their convincing practitioner.”
The novel Hol vannak azok az oszlopok? (Where Are Those Columns?) was one of the writer’s more adventurous publications – and as an author never belonging to the category “supported” by the regime, his situation was difficult enough. In its first edition, censors required that the margins be marked with dates indicating which temporal plane the reader was currently following. The version without those “crutches,” omitting the forced dates, was finally published in 1999 by Felsőmagyarország Kiadó. Freed from these constraints, the text allows the reader’s imagination to wander freely, adding an inner, psychological movement that provides an additional aesthetic experience.
His selected stories were published under the title Sárkány és oktaéder (Dragon and Octahedron, 1991). “The realities of history and the present offered the mosaics – the often intolerable facts just as much as the realities of the irrational beyond reality,” the author wrote in the book’s blurb. The structure and style of his short stories, with their interplay between external and internal times, mirror those of his novels. “He is not drawn by plot, adventure, story, or action – the ancient elements of epic narrative; above all, he has ‘learned’ from his masters a new way of handling temporal relations and of expanding the role of memory. Without these, he could be called a traditional writer, even one buried in microrealism. (…) But his detailed depictions and abundance of data always serve a higher purpose, a larger unity, a hidden authorial intention (for instance, irony),” observed Tibor Tüskés.
On the occasion of Albert’s eightieth birthday, Anikó Fázsy conducted a valuable workshop conversation with the writer, touching on the virtuosity of his narrative technique: “the way he plays the past into the present, how he slides times into one another, how lifetimes pile up into a kind of perpetual present. Out of these multiple simultaneities, the chain – the story – unfolds.” According to Albert, “In consciousness, the past and the present are not separated by an impenetrable wall; the present is always constructed from the images of the past, and vice versa… the temporal planes constantly slip into one another, and it becomes almost impossible to untangle which moment plays the decisive role in this game of time. [...] This ‘game,’ of course, can only become an aesthetic experience if it overcomes the reader’s resistance, if it can lure them into this world that seems to operate by other laws.” (A földieper levelei alatt, pp. 115–116)
A large part of Albert Gábor’s literary work was first published by Szépirodalmi Könyvkiadó, and after 2000 by PONT Kiadó, which has since managed his complete oeuvre: A Cet gyomrában (In the Belly of the Whale, 2003), Keskeny résen át (Through a Narrow Gap, 2003), Hullámok és a part (The Waves and the Shore, 2004), Függőfolyosók (Hanging Corridors, 2006), Hűvös hajnalok (Cool Dawns, 2008), Ezüst óriás (Silver Giant, 2008), A nymphenburgi herceg (The Duke of Nymphenburg, 2009), Előtted majdnem végtelen a víz (Before You the Water Is Almost Endless, 2009), and Nekünk senki sem mondott jövendőt (No One Told Us the Future, 2009).
In the Captivity of Sociography
At the end of the 1970s, he signed a contract to write a sociography for the Discovering Hungary series. “While gathering material for Emelt fővel (With Heads Held High) –” he said in the career interview published in 2002 under the title Boltívek, vízköpők, rózsaablakok (Arches, Gargoyles, Rose Windows) – “I grew increasingly convinced that until this book brings justice to the victims of politics – to the Bukovina Székelys who found their way home, to the peasants deprived of their land, to the displaced Swabians, to the Hungarians relocated from Upper Hungary to Baranya, and indeed to all those who became victims of internal deportations and dictatorial communist policies – my hands are tied.” Following the best traditions of the 1930s sociographers (Lajos Fülep, Gyula Illyés, Zsigmond Móricz, Zoltán Szabó), Albert Gábor recorded life stories with scholarly precision and literary sensitivity. He gave voice to Hungarians from the northern and southern regions, to ethnic Germans and South Slavs living in Hungary, and to Bukovina and Moldavian Csángós. “He steps beyond the sociographer’s detachment when he describes the exodus of the Bukovina people,” noted Anikó Fázsy. With Heads Held High is not simply a sociography: it is a Central European diagnosis, written with philological accuracy, historical authenticity, journalistic empathy, political clarity, and uncompromising moral integrity. Though it was published almost secretly, the book had a profound impact and played a significant role in preparing the democratic transition. Its second, revised edition appeared in 2010, also from PONT Kiadó, together with the booklet Őslakosok és telepesek (Natives and Settlers), which includes the author’s reflections, analyses, and selected reviews of the sociography.
While working on Emelt fővel, he also wrote Egy lakodalom végelszámolása (The Final Reckoning of a Wedding), a collection of short stories published in 1983. The first cycle “mostly presents the neo-surrealist Albert Gábor, whose interior monologues in In a Shell and the urban meditations of Mazes in Bright Light are distant kin” (Győző Határ), while the second cycle, Nyersanyag (Raw Material), with seven stories, most of them about rural life, draws on the experiences from his sociographic interviews. The “jewel” of the volume is the long monologue Így fullad meg egy ember (Thus a Man Drowns), described by Győző Határ as a short novel, in which an aging, ill, once world-famous pianist speaks from the safety of his oxygen tank.
Politics and History
On 29 November 1986, at the general assembly of the Writers’ Union, Albert shocked both the audience and the Communist Party representatives with his courageous political speech at what was meant to be a closed meeting, with journalists excluded. He openly denounced the country’s and society’s dire condition, declaring that after 1948 “the people were deceived a hundred times, humiliated in their self-respect, robbed of their past, paralyzed by false guilt… and when they raised their heads in protest, they were trampled down.” János Berecz, one of the most influential Communist leaders of the 1980s, dismissed Albert’s accusations as an ultimatum and a demagogic provocation, threatening to suspend the Writers’ Union altogether.
His impassioned critique of the Kádár dictatorship, his moral indictment of the regime’s decay and national disintegration, had serious consequences: for a time, his books were banned from publication. The speech – politically bold and literarily refined – was first published in Szétszóratás után (After the Dispersion, 1989), a collection of essays. By then, the regime change was already underway. “History – both past and present – does not allow literature as a whole to renounce its obligations beyond literature in the strict sense. Here, in Central Europe, and now, in the 1980s, for the sake of clear articulation, literature, despite itself, through its very existence, must take on this makeshift role, even if it convinces itself that it has escaped the unwanted or detested ‘prophethood.’”
After the Dispersion received the Book of the Year Award in the essay category in 1989.
“I stood outside and lived outside the ruling system at home, and essentially I felt and regarded myself as an emigrant, a dissident who had remained in his homeland – in the original sense of the word.” (Arches, Gargoyles, Rose Windows)
It is no coincidence, therefore, that in the 1980s his attention increasingly turned toward the emigration of 1849. Through intensive research, he first studied the letters written in exile by Bertalan Szemere, the Minister of the Interior and later Prime Minister of Hungary’s first responsible government, intending to publish them. From this work emerged a hybrid genre – part essay-novel, part historical pamphlet. He called Zsákutcák hősei (Heroes of Dead Ends, 1989) a “by-product” of his research on the Szemere correspondence. “It is far from a calm, academic style of writing; rather, it bears the mark of discovery and excitement. The surge of overlapping ideas, the alternation of mutually illuminating historical scenes, and the flashes of centuries joined by question marks make it an engaging read,” he explained.
In Heroes of Dead Ends, he draws a triple portrait of Bertalan Szemere, Lajos Kossuth, and László Teleki. Szemere Bertalan leveleskönyve (The Letter Book of Bertalan Szemere, 1999) was published as a scholarly source edition, while Lidérc minden, mi homályba vezet (Every Phantom That Leads into Darkness, 1999) took the form of a “historical epistolary novel.” Later, Szemere Bertalan Napló (1849–1861) (The Diary of Bertalan Szemere, 1849–1861) and the study Szemere Bertalan hazatérései (The Homecomings of Bertalan Szemere) appeared in 2005.
What fascinated Albert Gábor was the timeless fate of the emigrant: “only the external circumstances, the scenery, and the figures change – the essence remains the same: from infighting to informers and everything in between.”
A new collection of his essays and public writings, István király fanyar bora (The Tart Wine of King Stephen, 1993), also included some of his journalistic articles. Alongside his previously mentioned Writers’ Union speech, the volume features a case study titled A bizalom pajzsa megreped (The Shield of Trust Cracks), which recounts his resignation from the newspaper Új Magyarország (New Hungary). This was, as he put it, his “second adventure with politics” – referring to the nine months after the regime change when he served as editor-in-chief of the new government party’s daily newspaper.
According to Tibor Tüskés, “the book remains a document of a writer deeply engaged in public life, testifying to his moral integrity and intellectual steadfastness.”
His later collection, Nem fáj az a kőnek… (That Stone Does Not Feel Pain, 1998), is a “millennial chronicle,” comprising essays, micro-philological analyses, reading notes, literary interpretations, and meditative commentaries. Their common thread is the struggle with issues that shaped the present and future of the Hungarian nation at the turn of the century.
The Essayist
As mentioned earlier, Albert Gábor’s works are characterized by a constant fluidity between genres. His novels contain embedded essays, his sociographies evolve into short stories, and his studies display the stylistic virtues of fiction. The same vibrant intensity, restless curiosity, and creative tension that define his prose also permeate his essays. “He is driven by the synthesis of continuity and renewal: a perpetual state of readiness, inner restlessness, an urge for action, and a fundamental need for creative rebirth,” wrote Györgyi Pécsi. According to Mátyás Domokos, “his essays are more exciting – and, in a sense, more readable – than much of today’s dull, monotonous writing.”
Öreg Kutya vedleni készül (An Old Dog About to Shed Its Coat, 2001) is a collection of Albert Gábor’s “ideas and awakenings,” mainly from the 1990s. The title essay, alongside his beloved 19th-century themes, focuses on László Mednyánszky, while other pieces address thought-provoking issues related to Gyula Illyés, István Bibó, and László Ravasz. The closing essay, Ceterum censeo…, explores the distortions in Hungarian historical consciousness. According to critic Bálint Török, Albert’s “views are those of a free man – devoid of prejudice, rigidity, or dogma. Yet he has firm principles, and he holds fast to them.” This intellectual independence characterizes his entire oeuvre. Tibor Tüskés observed that “Albert Gábor is the kind of writer who has always remained outside literary factions, generational camps, and defensive alliances.” The consequence of this independence is clear from his critical reception: he never enjoyed the backing of any particular group or political side. He has followed his own path with steadfast solitude and remarkable consistency.
From the mid-2010s, PONT Publishing has been issuing a series of his essays. A lineáris ember (The Linear Man, 2006) opens with a response to Francis Fukuyama’s famous The End of History. Albert, however, believes in the continuation of history, in the vitality of national cultures, and in the meaningfulness of human life. The second essay in the volume addresses the dilemmas surrounding the European Union and two thousand years of Christian Europe, while the third reflects on where Hungary went astray after the regime change.
Védekező halálraítéltek – Szókratész és Bakunyin (Defensive Condemned Men – Socrates and Bakunin, 2007) draws a parallel between two archetypes of the intellectual, prompting readers to consider contemporary analogies. Albert aptly described himself as having a “future-oriented view of the past”: “When I read Greek history, I am reading about ourselves; when I write about the Greeks, I am writing about us.”
His later essay volumes – A szellem napvilága (The Daylight of the Spirit, 2009), Csakazértis! (In Spite of It All!, 2009), A földieper levelei alatt (Beneath the Strawberry Leaves, 2010), Kiért szól a hidasi harang (For Whom the Bell of Hidas Tolls, 2011), and Sok itt a baj, Uram, mindenben nagyon is sok… (There Is Much Trouble Here, Lord, Far Too Much in Everything…, 2012) – all express firm convictions and urgent appeals. They are the writings of a thinker who refuses to yield to fashion, expectation, or convention. In every essay – sometimes directly, sometimes through subtle allusion – he engages with the wounds of Trianon and with the existential questions of Hungarian identity and destiny, issues that remained central to his thinking throughout his life. These same concerns motivated his speech at the 1986 Writers’ Union congress and shaped his influential sociography With Heads Held High.
[2012]