Imre Kertész (; 9 November 192931 March 2016) was a Hungarian author and recipient of the 2002 Nobel Prize in Literature, "for writing that upholds the fragile experience of the individual against the barbaric arbitrariness of history". He was the first Hungarian to win the Nobel in Literature. His works deal with themes of the Holocaust (he was a survivor of German concentration and death camps), dictatorship, and personal freedom. a middle-class Jewish couple. After the separation of his parents when he was around the age of five, Kertész attended boarding school, and, in 1940, he started secondary school, where he was put into a special class for Jewish students. During World War II, in 1944 at the age of 14, Kertész was deported with other Hungarian Jews to the Auschwitz concentration camp, and was later sent to Buchenwald. After the camp was liberated in 1945, Kertész returned to Budapest. and then went on to find work as a journalist and translator. In 1951, he lost his job at the journal Világosság (Clarity), when the publication adopted the Communist Party line. From 1953, he started freelance journalism and translated various works into Hungarian, including those of Friedrich Nietzsche, Sigmund Freud, Ludwig Wittgenstein, and Elias Canetti. Although sharing the same title, some reviews noted that the film was more overtly autobiographical than the novel. It was released internationally at various dates in 2005 and 2006.

Following on from Fatelessness, Kertész's Fiasco (1988) and Kaddish for an Unborn Child (1990) are, respectively, the second and third parts of his Holocaust trilogy. His writings translated into English include Kaddish for an Unborn Child (Kaddis a meg nem született gyermekért) and Liquidation (Felszámolás), the latter set during the period of Hungary's evolution into a democracy from communist rule. notably The Birth of Tragedy, the plays of Dürrenmatt, Schnitzler, and Tankred Dorst, and various thoughts and aphorisms of Wittgenstein. Kertész also continued working at his craft, writing his fiction in Hungarian, but did not publish another novel until the late 1980s. Many Hungarian newspapers reacted negatively to what they called a hypocritical statement. Other critics viewed the Budapest comment ironically, saying it represented "a grudge policy that is painfully and unmistakably, characteristically Hungarian". In a Duna TV interview Kertész later clarified that he had intended his comment to be "constructive": Hungary was still "his homeland".

In November 2014, Kertész was the subject of an interview with The New York Times. Kertész claimed the reporter was expecting him to question Hungary's democratic values and was shocked to hear Kertész say that "the situation in Hungary is nice, I'm having a great time". According to Kertész, "he didn't like my answer. His purpose must have been to make me call Hungary a dictatorship which it isn't. In the end, the interview was never published."

Health issues and death

In November 2013, after a fall in his home, Kertész underwent successful surgery on his right hip, but continued having to deal with various health problems during the last years of his life. Diagnosed with Parkinson's disease, he was again suffering from depression, a recurring battle in his life that he managed to transform into literature: The main character of his 2003 book Felszámolás (Liquidation) commits suicide after a struggle with depression.

  • Fateless, translated by Christopher C. Wilson and Katharina M. Wilson (1992). Evanston, Illinois: Northwestern University Press. and
  • Fatelessness, translated by Tim Wilkinson (2004). New York: Vintage International.
  • A nyomkereső (1977)
  • Mentés másként (2011)
  • A végső kocsma, The Final Tavern, also published as The Last Refuge (2014)
  • 1997: Friedrich-Gundolf-Preis
  • 1997: Jeanette Schocken Preis
  • 2000: Herder Prize
  • 2001: Pour le Mérite (Germany)
  • 2004: Corine Literature Prize
  • 2004: Goethe Medal
  • 2011: Grande Médaille de Vermeil de la ville de Paris

Hungarian prizes

  • 1983: Milán Füst Prize
  • 1986: Hieronymus Prize
  • 1988: Artisjus Literature Prize

See also

  • Hungarian literature
  • List of Jewish Nobel laureates

References

Further reading

  • Molnár, Sára. "Nobel in Literature 2002 Imre Kertész's Aesthetics of the Holocaust" CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture 5.1 (2003)
  • Tötösy de Zepetnek, Steven. "And the 2002 Nobel Prize for Literature Goes to Imre Kertész, Jew and Hungarian" CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture 5.1 (2003)
  • Tötösy de Zepetnek, Steven. "Imre Kertész's Nobel Prize, Public Discourse, and the Media" CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture 7.4 (2005)
  • Vasvári, Louise O., and Tötösy de Zepetnek, Steven, eds. Imre Kertész and Holocaust Literature. West Lafayette: Purdue UP, 2005.
  • Vasvári, Louise O., and Tötösy de Zepetnek, Steven, eds. Comparative Central European Holocaust Studies. West Lafayette: Purdue UP, 2009.
  • Imre Kertész, Nobel Luminaries – Jewish Nobel Prize Winners, on the Beit Hatfutsot-The Museum of the Jewish People Website.
  • The Last Word – an interview with Kertész from Holocaust Survivors and Remembrance Project: "Forget You Not"
  • Imre Kertész—Nobel Lecture
  • List of Works
  • B.-ing There, a review of the novel Liquidation by Ben Ehrenreich, Village Voice, 20 December 2004
  • Haaretz article on Kertész
  • 2011 Interview on "Self-imposed exile and writing" with Swedish publisher Svante Weyler.
  • including the Nobel Lecture 7 December 2002