Ágnes Heller
Ágnes Heller - Photos

Summary/Abstract: Journals subsequently canonized by history for their importance generally claim their privileged position on account of the labor of those prominent persons who not merely published their works in, but who wrote specifically for the journal and for the cause such publication stood for, works created within the productive dialogue characterized by the tension of the insider and the external author “for hire”. Such flagship and prominent role were those of Endre Ady and Nyugat, Avigdor Hameiri and our predecessor József Patai, editor of Múlt és Jövô. Such mutually and consciously chosen roles have been emphatically underlined by the publication of special issues during the lifetime of these authors. The legitimization of our 20 year existence is linked in such way to Ágnes Heller. All comparisons are somewhat forced and superficial, yet are suitable for highlighting characteristic features, as well as their shades. The pole bearers of Hungarian culture have been traditionally its poets — uniters of the thought (philosophy) and lyric (music)— and the discourse and value system of the genius of the nation centered around them. Ady laid the foundations of contemporary Hungarian life and culture, his good friend and follower Hameiri performed this function a continent away, in Palestine and Israel — but no such classical role would be accorded to a a Jewish poet in Hungary. This is still the case. On the other hand, the role available is one of analysis, criticism, the freedom and fate (or fatelessness) of being concurrently an insider and perennial outsider. This is the role that crystallized in the ouvre of Ágnes Heller — on occasions at a level of poesis, at a level affecting most (indeed all) continents — and more renowned and respected outside of Hungary than within. Her first manuscript reached us from New York, our first personal meetings took place in various borrowed apartments in Budapest. For us, the greatest honor was the ability to participate in the process of her homecoming, while we, as well as our readers, were able to be liberated through her to the world, of which she is a global intellectual emissary. Fully cognizant of this privileged and honored position and using her 80th birthday as a mere excuse, we dedicate this issue, in lieu of a Festschrift, to express our gratitude to her.

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