„Beszéljünk mi is oroszul, cselekedjünk mi is oroszul!” Az 1917-es oroszországi forradalmak hatása a Galilei Körre
“Now Let Us Speak in Russian as Well, Let Us Act in Russian!” The Impact of the 1917 Russian Revolutions on the Galilei Circle

Summary/Abstract: The members of the liberal student association called Galilei Circle, which had been utterly apolitical at the time of its foundation in 1908, had become increasingly radical under the influence of World War I and the Russian revolutions, to the extent that some at least among them came to accept the dictatorship of the proletariat. In a highly symbolic way, in the autumn of 1917 a Russian language course was launched alongside the French and English courses in the club of the Circle in the Anker Köz. From 1917 the Galilei Circle was a regular participant to the anti-war demonstrations organised by the trade unions, and in the second half of the year the first Hungarian Bolshevik group was established within the Circle, called the Duczynska–Sugár-group, whose activity led to the prohibition of the Galilei Circle in January 1918. While the scale and importance of the activity of the group members in the “small period” paled in comparison to the “great period” of the Circle before 1914, under the Horthy regime, and in the Socialist era for that matter, it was the post-1917 period that dominated the memory of the Galilei Circle. It is therefore important to emphasise that, alongside the members of the Duczynska–Sugár-group, there were several members of the Circle who rejected the authoritarian means, and remained attached to the idea of democracy even after the penetration of Bolshevism into their ranks. The problem is introduced here through an analysis of the publications in the 1918 December special issue of the Circle’s periodical called Szabadgondolat, dedicated to Bolshevism.

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