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West European Absurd (see Brecht, Beckett &
Ionesco): Though the absurd drama of the 20th century - anti
drama as Martin Esslin named it - sprang of existentialism, the
tensions are not the heroic pessimism of Camus's vision, the
existence of humans menaced by the unavoidability of death is not
tragically hopeless, but comic, building a counterpoint in a
theater of derision consisting of grotesque relationships that
are not connected with any particular place or time.
East European Absurd (see Orkeny, Mrozek & Hrabal)
differs from the Western one: it doesn't lose social interest, it
focuses on the relationship between power and individual, on the
aggression and the servitude of people living in a historic and
social context.
Istvan Orkeny (1912-1979) is one of the most popular
Hungarian writers of 20th century. His grotesque never builds up
in cosmic situations ignoring space and time. The place is always
Hungary, the characters are individualized Hungarian typologies,
the situations condense grotesque conflicts of the Hungarian
society before, during and after second World War.
His first volume of short stories, "Ocean Dance",
appeared in 1941. During the war while serving on the Russian
Front Orkeny was taken prisoner and sent to a camp near Moscow.
Here he wrote the play "Voronej", the sociography of
"People of the Camps" and a series of biographical
pieces, "Those Who Remember". After the war, Orkeny s
writing appeared in quick succession. His use of the absurd &
grotesque tools brought him fame especially with his plays
"Cat's Play", "Pisti In the Blood Bath",
"The Toth Family" and the collection of miniatures One
Minute Short Short Stories that capture the denial of the
didactic, overwritten, over explanatory tradition. They simply
raise questions to which the response is let to the reader s
imagination. A unique, bizarre, clear-cut picture comes to life
in a second of a lightning flash. Man, even if steady on his
feet, risks to fall on his belly in the moment he steps once
more, says Orkeny. The grotesque becomes the realization of the
unreal. In front of us stands an imaginary hypothesis governed by
laws equally harsh with those of the real world, but maybe
manifested in a reversed way.
According to Andrew Reiner "Orkeny's little stories laugh
at the absurdities (and also at the horrors) of the world in a
genial and oblique way. There is a wry elusiveness, a cunning
capacity to say shocking things with disarming innocence, which
is one of the hallmarks of a master of the art of survival.
Here is a world of gossip and innuendo, a city where petty
bureaucrats have always strutted in the confidence of their
power, yet each had, their particular price. A depressing world
certainly, but also one with a curious exhilaration thanks to its
inhabitants that had to survive as best they could: by evolving a
tongue-in-cheek cynical skepticism and an ability to find a way
around "Keep Out!" signs, by learning constant
vigilance, trusting few and confiding in none.
Though they contain nothing of the heroic or the grandiose,
these stories are nevertheless a testimony to resilience, to an
ability to laugh even at those times when it would be expected/
easier/ safer to cry.
Supremely deft, witty and poignant, they sparkle with the
absurd and the inexplicable which Orkeny discovered gliding
beneath the surface of everyday.
Orkeny's ars poetica is: the last and only human hope is
action that is to say in his work even in impossible and hopeless
situations transpires the belief in human action.
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