Counterpart Diaries
Counterpart Diaries

Summary/Abstract: [János Kovács]: Magyar Forradalom 1956. Napló (Hungarian Revolution 1956. Diary). Facsimile edition in numbered copies. Budapest, Tamás Kieselbach, 200 pp. • Gyula Csics: Magyar Forradalom 1956. Napló (Hungarian Revolution 1956. Diary), Budapest, 1956-os Intézet, 222 pp. In 2006 Hungary is remembering one of the decisive events in its history, the October of fifty years ago: the 1956 Revolution. Hope lasted just two weeks, though years, decades, of events and experiences were compressed into those 13 days, kneading Hungarians—at least temporarily—into a genuine unity. Some still chose to place their trust in a truer form of communism, others hoped for civil, democratic institutions that had never existed in the country, while others nurtured a fierce anti-communism—nearly everyone lived in some sort of euphoria, nurturing the hope that starting tomorrow things would be different. The days of oppression would be over. During Kádár’s long rule there were two absolute taboos: to question the “temporary stationing” of Soviet troops in Hungary or the official designation of 1956 as a counter-revolution. It was the overturning of those two taboos that prepared the way for the 1989–90 transition to democracy. With that turning-point, the dam burst on three and a half decades of pent-up silence. Survivors trying to come to terms with this legacy create myths and demolish them—including distinguished academic works, memoirs and albums of photographs—but the biggest sensation has been the publication, by separate publishing houses, of reproductions of parallel diaries kept at the time by two boys who were close friends.[...]

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