Motherland means safety – says Jean Améry. Writing these words in his 1966 book At the Mind’’s Limits, in the chapter entitled How Much Motherland Does a Man Need? the Frenchman Jean Améry, born Franz Meyer in Austria in 1912, knew what he was talking about. He had lost his homeland and it took him 27 years to fully grasp what that loss – by then irreversible and irretrievable – entailed: he realized that by returning to a space one never regains the time lost. Safety means certainty; and in turn, we can feel safe wherever we do not expect […]

All the signs are that FIDESZ [Alliance of Young Democrats-Hungarian Civic Union, the largest opposition party in Hungary – tr.] will again have to fight on two fronts.  Chairman Viktor Orbán’’s much-vaunted politics of one camp under one flag, first launched over ten years ago, appears once again to be collapsing, as the spectacular advances being made by Jobbik [Movement for a Better Hungary – —tr.] are forcing the largest opposition party to devote its energies not only to challenging the liberal left but also to launch an attack on the extreme right party. Not that those who set the […]

To je už dvadsať rokov? Ale to ubehlo! Nevedno kedy. Všetko som si presťahoval do dediny v Karpatoch, neďaleko slovenskej hranice. Všetky zmeny, celú tú revolúciu som vnímal zďaleka. Trochu ako keby sa to dialo v cudzej krajine. Z perspektívy dvadsiatich rokov vidím, že som sa celým tým dianím zaoberal naozaj málo. Nepodieľal som sa na ňom. Ťažko sa mi hľadá nejaký prelomový moment, či cézura – prerývka. Možno to začalo tým, že do našej chaty prestali chodiť pohraničiari legitimovať hostí. Voľakedy to bola celkom bežná, rutinná záležitosť, ktorú muži, prichádzajúci na motocykloch a v zime na snežných skútroch, vykonávali so zhovievavou ľahostajnosťou. Zásobovali ma […]