July 2008 issue

From the End till a New Beginning
Jewish identity in Hungary stands as the focal point of works by 24 of the country’s best authors in Contemporary Jewish Writing in Hungary: An Anthology.

Heureka!
I must begin with a confession, a strange confession perhaps, but a candid one. From the moment I stepped on the airplane to make the journey here and accept this year’s Nobel Prize in Literature, I have been feeling the steady, searching gaze of a dispassionate observer on my back. Even at this special moment, when I find myself being the center of attention, I feel I am closer to this cool and detached observer than to the writer whose work, of a sudden, is read around the world. I can only hope that the speech I have the honor to deliver on this occasion will help me dissolve the duality and fuse the two selves within me.

The lost contract
The relationship between Europe and her Jews has deteriorated. Complaints of a new European anti-Semitism are voiced increasingly more loudly and ever more often on various Jewish forums – which then re-surface in European public discourse with the mediation of Israeli and North American media, often even more vociferously. European reactions tend to be a mixture of surprise and barely concealed offendedness.

“I’m beginning to understand the system’s logic”
András Heisler, 49 years old, engineer-economist, businessman. Married, with two children. Vice-president of the Alliance of the Jewish Congregations of Hungary (MAZSIHISZ) from the early 1990s. In April, 2003, he was elected president of the Alliance.

Historical Commissions and Reconciliation
This paper was delivered at The International Conference on Confronting History: The Historical Commissions of Inquiry that discussed the various historical commissions appointed by different governments to deal with the role of their country during the Second World War. Although Hungary failed to establish such a commission thus far, this does not mean that there were not debates about historical research; or that no studies were completed related to the issues of expropriation, looted property, refugees, war crimes and other relevant aspects of the Holocaust.

The Crunch of Empty Boots
Snow.
Flakes of snow.
Falling, falling, flakes of snow.

Szarvas The Magical Place
The Lauder-Joint International Jewish Youth Camp was established in 1990 by the Lauder Foundation and by the American Joint in order to give a great Jewish summer experience and a long-lasting impact on the Jewish identity of the youngsters who had just started to discover their roots in the Eastern-Central – European Jewish communities.