Kabdebo, Thomas: Attila József. Can you take on this awesome life? (Budapest, 1997)

10. Flóra, 'Dusk'

He was reburied in Budapest in 1942. It is a persisting Hungarian mania to rebury those sons of the homeland who had been shortshrifted during their lifetime, but rose to prominence after their death. An essayist of great renown, the late Endre Illés, - a contemporary and an acquaintance of József - has written: 'Was everything denied of him? Not so. He had a worse fate ... Again, and again, I think of a line from Eliot: I have measured out my life with coffee spoons... Everything he had ever wanted was measured out this way: himself/his integrity, his kindness, his goodness and what must have been the cruellest, bitter­est thing: his poems too...'56 Illyés married Flóra in 1938. Attila József's illness has been diagnosed as: schizophrenia, depres­sion, psychosis, delusion, a psychotic condition, personality disorder, and bouts of insanity, and a condition without specification. Lately it has been surmised that given today's medications he could have survived. According to Németh, Attila's illness was genetic, had taken its course and was incurable. Attila's friends have written appreciations of his poetry, their memo­ries and memoirs, and accusations against society, blaming it for the poet's death. Some accused Judit of not loving him well enough, some accused Flóra of complicity with Illyés. Attila József committed suicide. His eldest sister Jolán later committed suicide too. In the year of his death his one-time mentor, Gyula Juhász had already committed suicide. Judit Szántó's daughter Eva committed suicide two decades later. A score of years later, another friend, Arthur Koestler committed suicide in London. In Central Europe, Hungary was and has remained the most suicide-prone nation. Melancholy is a national illness, it is in the poetry, it is in the charac­ter. Not invariably so. Paul Ignotus, Bertalan Hatvány, Edit Gyömrői, Klára Eisler have died in exile. Márta Vágó, Ferenc Hont, Lajos Hatvány, Gyula Illyés, Judit Szántó and Andor Németh have died in Budapest. Ferenc and Rose Fejtő live in Paris, Béla Szász lives in Diss, Mrs Etel Makai lives in Budapest. One of Attila's patrons Lajos Hatvány had informed Thomas Mann of the poet's death. Maim wrote to Hatvany in mid-December 1937: 'Lieber Herr Hatvany: Recht herzlichen Dank für Ihren Brief vom 6. dieses Monats, der mir die traurige und mich sehr bewegende Nachricht vom Tode des József Attila bringt. Diese Nachricht gibt mir wirklich sehr nahe und ich möchte Sie bitten, dem Kreis des Verstorbenen, den jungen Autoren vom, 'Szép Szó' meine herzliche Anteilnahme zu übermitteln an dem Verlust, den sie an die junge ungarische Literatur durch den Tod 163

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