The ARM Festival is still going on this week
As one of the largest literary festivals in Central Europe, ARM now looks back on two decades of history. At the initiative of the Petőfi Literary Fund, Hungary won the title of guest of honor at the event this year. At the PesText International Literature Festival, which debuted last year as part of the Fund’s endeavors, General Manager Pál Dániel Levente announced that Hungary would send 31 contemporary Hungarian authors to participate in the popular literary event as special guests.
As Hungary was the guest of honor, the organizers promoted the event with a Hungarian slogan in the surrounding countries. They could hardly have found a more perfect motto than the longest Hungarian word, a word which illustrates the wondrous complexity of Hungarian morphology: Megszentségteleníthetetlenség, which means something like “for your undesecratablenesses.” Urban legend or not, this Hungarian term is known to almost everyone in Central Europe.
Every evening of the event, Hungarian writers offer readings from their works to audiences in Brno and Ostrava. In view of the concerns because of the coronavirus epidemic, readings at other sites can be followed online this year. Among the Hungarian performers, we come across many names that are familiar abroad, but the most talented writers and poets of the middle and younger generation have also been given an opportunity to introduce themselves. We are very pleased that the 31 famous Hungarian authors were invited to the prestigious event in part because of the committed efforts of the Fund. Short films about the authors can be viewed on the ARM website, and readings can be viewed on the festival’s Facebook page.
The following is a list of performers in the order in which they appeared:
Pál Závada, Péter Závada, Gábor Németh, György Spiró, Gábor Schein, Gábor Kálmán, Levente Csender, Dániel Varró, Lajos Parti Nagy, Gergely Péterfy, Renátó Fehér, János Lackfi, Tamás Jónás, Benedek Totth, Edina Szvoren, Viktor Horváth, Andrea Tompa, Ferenc Czinki, Zita Izsó, István Vörös, László Márton, István Kemény, Zsófi Kemény, Ildikó Noémi Nagy & László Garaczi, Krisztina Tóth, Tímea Pénzes, Endre Kukorelly, László Darvasi, Dénes Krusovszky, Gabi Csutak, Gábor Zoltán.
In addition to offering audiences and readers a chance to learn more about the most prominent contemporary Hungarian authors, the festival also presents a father-son writer couple and father-daughter writer couple. How far did the apple fall from the tree? How different is the style of Pál Závada's son, Péter Závada, from his father’s style? What did Zsófi Kemény, István Kemény’s daughter, borrow from her father’s poetry?
