So I've been trying everyone's patience in the Discord server for the past several days, because I've just (re)discovered my love for Romanian and Hungarian literary fiction. For such small countries we have amazingly creative and interesting literature, and I really, really want to share the ones I love with the folks I'm friends with. Some of these books are classics, some are contemporary and some have achieved cult status - the one thing they have in common is that they have all been translated into English, so you can actually look them up if you're interested. (Warning: extremely long post incoming. Reach out to me on Discord if you're interested in a book but need a trigger warning, because listing them here would mean huge spoilers.)

The Paul Street Boys by Ferenc Móra: This is one of the most beloved Hungarian books of all time, a very bittersweet exploration of childhood games in an adult world, about two friend groups starting a playful street war over the area they both want to use as a playground until the game turns a little serious. Not "Lord of the Flies" serious, but suffice to say, there are consequences. The novel appeared in 1907, so unfortunately it has a few cringeworthy moments (such as the boys making themselves toy tomahawks), but it's charmed generations of children and adults all the same, including yours truly.

The Tragedy of Man by Imre Madách: Okay, there's no getting around it, this is a Hungarian Paradise Lost ripoff, but it's a very good Paradise Lost ripoff. It is an epic dramatic poem about Lucifer taking Adam and Eve on a journey through human history, to show them the fate of mankind after they leave the Garden of Eden. The imagery is wonderful, the characters are all rich and complex, and the journey is truly fantastic, full of magic and philosophy. As a bonus, you can find the entire translation for free on the internet on Hungarian archival sites (try the ones on mek.oszk.hu, it's a fully legal online library of classic Hungarian texts).

Anna Édes by Dezső Kosztolányi: One of the earliest Hungarian psychological stories as well as a very harsh class critique, this is also a classic literary novel. It's the portrait of a young, hardworking maid in the 1920s being exploited in various ways by her employers, who fail to see her as a human being with her own needs and desires. It's not exactly a cheerful read, but a very insightful and sensitive portrait of a young woman, considering that it was written by a man.

Embers by Sándor Márai: This one is also a beloved classic and one of the better-known Hungarian novels out there. It is a bittersweet, deeply philosophical conversation between two old men meeting for one last time in their lives, recounting their youth, their intensely complex and complicated friendship, and their shared secrets. (Also, the original Hungarian title is The candles burn to a stub, which is one of my favorite book titles - so atmospheric.)

The Fawn, Night of the Pig-Killing, Abigél and Iza's Ballad by Magda Szabó: Magda Szabó was one of the most popular and talented Hungarian literary fiction writers out there, and I thoroughly recommend each book of hers that is available in English, even the ones I haven't read yet. Abigél (Abigail in English) is a novel written for and about young women - specifically, a book about a smart and strong-willed teenage girl trying to navigate a deeply conservative Catholic girls' school in a changing pre-WW2 political regime. Night of the Pig-Killing is a tragic and unsettling family portrait, while The Fawn (my favorite of hers) and Iza's Ballad are female-driven psychological narratives about deeply unsympathetic, selfish women and their ties to the people around them. Please read Magda Szabó, I really love her books.

Tranquility by Attila Bartis: Don't read this book. I'm serious. It's one of the cruelest, most visceral, most messed-up character studies ever put to paper, and it has every kind of psychological grossness you can think of - but it is so, so human and so beautifully written. It's the portrait of a writer whose life is dominated by his mother, a disgraced actress who hasn't left the apartment in fifteen years and has pretty much collapsed mentally. Then he meets a woman and falls in love, but it doesn't bring happiness. Quite the contrary. I can't give individual trigger warnings because it would exhaust every Blacklist item and then some, so just imagine a giant STOP HERE sign instead - but all I will say is that this book has cult status in Hungary, has been translated into Romanian (!) as well as English, has a movie version, and is one of my favorite books ever written.

Pixel by Krisztina Tóth: This is a very smart book. It could be called a short story collection, except the characters' lives are all interconnected without them ever knowing, and they keep turning up in each other's stories, guided by a self-aware omniscient narrator; so it's closer to a finely woven metafictional cloth or a mosaic. From gay French artists to angry Roma youth there are all sorts of lives and fates here, united by the common theme of alienation and the million ways human relationships could fail. Again, not a cheerful read - but a beautiful one.

The End of a Family Story by Péter Nádas: One of my favorite family novels, about a young Jewish boy and his kin living in socialist Hungary, this is a fairytale, a family chronicle, a political societal portrait, a play on time and perspective, all told through a child's voice. It's a very challenging read even in Hungarian, because it's very tight and caleidoscopic prose, but please give it a try.

The White King by György Dragomán: This is basically the Hungarian contemporary novel - everyone knows it, it was translated and adapted a million times, we studied it at school; but it is also really, really good. It's basically another "childhood in Communist Romania" book, which is a dead horse of a topic by now, but told in very sharp and fresh prose, with vibrant characters, rich symbolism, a well-plotted episodic structure and a touch of magical realism. The writer, György Dragomán, also writes brilliant sci-fi stories and is very passionate about cooking. No reason to tell y'all that, I just like him a lot. :)

The Trans Space Octopus Congregation by Bogi Takács: I confess I haven't read this one yet, but come on - it's a sci-fi collection by an agender trans Hungarian Jewish writer and poet, who publishes regularly in English-language sci-fi magazines and has won awards for eir transgender fiction. Of course I'm going to recommend eir latest book to everyone I open my mouth around.

If you've lasted this long, first of all congratulations, and second, thank you for reading my ridiculously long tangent on books that mean a lot to me. Let me know if you find anything you like here - nothing would make me happier than knowing that I've managed to capture your interest with the literature of my home.

~Oculus