János Arany was born 206 years ago, on March 2, 1817, in Nagyszalontán, the central figure of 19th century Hungarian poetry, the unsurpassed master of the Hungarian language.
He came from an impoverished hajdú family. He studied in Debrecen, then became a teacher, painted, and became an actor in 1836. From 1840 he was a sub-registrar in Szalonta, then from 1842 he was the rector of the local high school. During the 65 years of his life, the poet lived through the ups and downs of the times, and gave voice to everything that happened to Hungarians in his lyrics.
Arany considered himself primarily an epic poet, but the lyrical side of his poetry - apart from the deservedly popular and immortal Toldi - carries a message for posterity as well.
The period of his poetic consciousness was the period of the reform, his development and the formation of his individual voice fell during the war of independence of 1848-49.
His depression and the waning of his poetic power fell on the period of autocracy, his second creative period began at the turn of the 1850s and 1860s with the revival of national hopes, while his resignation in old age can be linked to the period after the compromise of 1867. The parallels of the age and individual life can be precisely followed in his lyre and small epics - his ballads.
His first great success was the Elveszett aktotmány , with which he won the competition of the Kisfaludy Society in 1846. The poet himself referred to the "iron age of our literature" in relation to the work, which can hardly be read today.
He achieved even greater success Toldi in 1847, which marked the high point of his career both in terms of language and editing, as well as the political impact of popular literature, and also earned him the friendship of Petőfi. This relationship was a life-long journey for Arany, who was six years older, but more reserved and introverted: spiritual and intellectual development, literary and political guidance, to which he remained loyal even decades later.
The fall of the freedom struggle and the death of Petőfi plunged Arany, who was already prone to depression, into a deep mental crisis. After several years of silence, he expressed his own and the mood of the oppression of the 1850s in such bitter poems as A lute , Letészem a lute , Fiamnak , A honvéd vevygye .
At the end of the autocracy, the nation and its poet slowly recovered. Arany's first great ballads were created in the second half of the 1850s, they are mainly national in nature: pieces from Hunyadi Klára Zách , two small pieces from Szondi , and the most famous, The Welsh Bards , which became a symbol of resistance.
Between 1851 and 1860 he was a teacher in Nagykőrös, where he also stood out among his peers as a teacher. In 1860, he moved to Pest, where he became more and more active together with other public figures of the time. During this time, he wrote many literary studies and edited magazines.
His poetry flourished as well, he wrote Széchenyi's memoir , then his huge odes Unsettled and Alone In these years, 1862 and 1863, he wrote The Death of Buda , which his famous monographer, Dezső Keresztury, called the last great upsurge of Hungarian nationalism.
Arany was elected secretary of the Academy in 1865, this position provided him with some financial security, but he had little time for literature. His big plans, the other parts of the Hun trilogy and the Toldi remained in fragments, and he only finished his love for Toldi The early death of his beloved daughter contributed to his temporary silence, and between 1865 and 1876 he produced only a few poems.
He was not enthusiastic about the compromise, he accepted the royal award given to him only at the special request of József Eötvös, and in this connection he wrote many mocking poems about himself.
In the last decade of his life, he became more and more resigned, and after leaving his offices, he wrote his last major cycle, Őszikék et, on Margitsziget. His ballads of that time project the dramas of conscience before us, the poems Red Reds , The Call to the Corpse , The Midnight Duel , Hídavatás , Tengeri-hántás , The Holiday Destroyers are all "tragedies told in song" - according to the definition of the esthete Ágost Greguss. The poet died on October 22, 1882 in Budapest.
His poetry of the old age is at least as significant, the Epilogue , the Fair , Under the Oaks , the Song of the Pest Grove reveal to the reader the joys and worries of an old man, the memories of a calmed soul.
In 1995, the Hungarian Writers' Association established the János Arany Foundation, which was awarded for the first time in 1996. In 2016, on the occasion of the 200th anniversary of the poet's birth, the Parliament declared 2017 the year of commemoration of János Arany, and the Magyar Nemzeti Bank issued a commemorative medal for the anniversary.
Source: mult-kor.hu
Opening image: mta.hu
