Writing in Exile. The Value of Work of a Mid-Nineteenth Century Hungarian Novelist

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Abstract (max. 250 words):
Miklós Jósika a Transylvanian baron devoted himself to literature in his forties; foundling the historical romance in Hungarian literature with his first published novel Abafi in 1836. His merits as a novelist were instantly recognized and awarded in Hungary, the reading public and the critics too were delighted by his novels, which followed one another with rapidity. The Revolution/ War of Independence in 1848 could be seen as a line of demarcation in his literary activity. On account of his role as member of the Honvéd Government he was forced to go into exile, eventually he settled down in Brussels. His estates were confiscated and he himself was condemned to death by the vindictive Austrian Government, fact being satisfied by burning him in effigy. Brussels became his foreign but free homeland where he lived entirely by his pen.
The aim of this paper is to provide an overview of this Hungarian writer’s ways of preserving national values and identity abroad, his efforts of making a living from writing in a foreign linguistic, cultural, and political context by mapping the steps of a successful career from recommencement to gradual fade. Miklós Jósika as a functional name was a prestigious representation label in the Hungarian literary field, but after 1849 it was prohibited. The emigree writer managed to reconnect with his Hungarian readership, when his publisher Heckenast had helped him to get printed in Pest anonymously his first novel of the exilic period Eszther in 1853. Since then almost for a decade Jósika had been using a pen name to sign his novels, „by the author of Eszther”. The paper also analyses the dualistic approaches to his literary work.



Brief Professional Bio (max. 100 words):
Orsolya-Petra Pavelka is recently pursuing her PhD in Hungarian Studies at Babes-Bolyai University of Cluj-Napoca. Her research interests are Anglo-Hungarian cultural contacts, literary prose in the first half of the nineteenth century. She completed her university degree in Hungarian language and literature and English language and literature at Babes-Bolyai University of Cluj-Napoca in 2007. She received her Master degree in Literature and Society at the same university in 2009.