Magyar Hang published Nóra Szendi's article, which gives you a precise view of the pharisee nature of those who arbitrarily appropriate moral superiority.

I received a letter in my mailbox from the journalist of the ("curious, fair, critical") Telex portal.

I regularly published short stories in their magazine column, my text was published in two Telex magazine volumes, I was there at the dedication of the volumes, I was considered a respected author. After some embroidering and peeling excuses in the letter, the following followed: As for the text:

we would very much like to bring it down in a few months, but there is one thing here (and if I dig really deep, maybe this subconsciously contributed to the fact that I delayed the answer for so long). So we saw that your texts were published at our previous workplace, Index.

It's very difficult to formulate this normally, I'm really looking for the words, but around November of last year it became clear to us that we want to avoid these parallels in the future. Of course, we don't think anything bad about the mostly excellent authors who also publish there (it is their sovereign decision where to publish their text, the main thing is that the readers have access to great texts anyway), but e.g. after this, after our analytical material published last year [link follows], we still want to draw some kind of symbolic border from 2024.

I write these lines with a bit of worry and uncertainty, and I completely understand if you feel that such a sign is a violation of your author's autonomy - believe me, we have no such intention, in fact we made this decision keeping in mind the goals and mission of the column, really struggling with the situation. If, after this, we can publish the attached short story in late spring, we would be very happy, you would honor us with it.

I stare at the letter. Sooner or later something similar had to happen, if not with them, then with others. After all, I have already been part of this, when WMN magazine ("a place where you don't have to conform to anyone. And we're not driven to conform to anyone either") rejected my text on showing the perspective of the abusers by saying that

"since we write a lot about this topic from the point of view of the victims, unfortunately we cannot use this article of yours now".

The same sensitivity. Censorship of those with different opinions disguised as moral supremacy. The words of the woke trombones, which of course - at least in opposition circles - are rumored to be exclusively the paranoia-inducing products of Fidesz propaganda, all this is not heard from the happier West until our poor country.

What does it mean to be a writer?

I still have symbolic boundaries. I don't like it when someone tries to manipulate me with hand-wringing, downright guilt-inducing - subtly hinting at his own sleepless nights - good-naturedness, when he doesn't speak straight and honestly, when he gives ultimatums disguised as free choice, while pushing the responsibility on me.

I think about what I'm going to answer, and at the same time, what it means to be a writer. I'm just trying to cover up an artistic low point in myself by saying that it will pass, because this is my profession, basically since my childhood, but after the telex letter, the question arises even more urgently, whether it is still worth writing in a world where you don't dare to publish an excerpt of your novel , in which you parody the speech of a gypsy character, where the professionals (who simply apply for an NKA) shout competition when a company close to NER buys itself into the multimonster that dominates the book market, as if it had been the last of free and democratic culture until now , a bastion untouched by any business aspect, and where your colleagues are put to shame on Facebook because they dared to go and report on their writers' camp, from which we of course do not read a single line; and where perhaps it could provide compensation for the increasingly oppressive atmosphere that, according to them, we are after all - some kind of community in a broader sense.

I go back to the times when, as an ex-sadeszes, socialized at Európa Kiadón, with first-generation intellectual parents, and as an enthusiastic university student majoring in Hungarian in the capital, it was only an assumption on my part where I belonged. I was a beginner freelance editor, I didn't publish fiction, I didn't even think that I could earn any amount of money with this (or just complain about why it couldn't be). I had plans, dreams, a sense of vocation and even mission, but most of all: writing and me.

Vertigo intoxication, the most unrestrained desire to experiment, linguistic orgies that last through the night.

How did all of this become a compulsion to publish, a desperate desire to conform to a narrow and intimate circle, and then a noisy confirmation that I am not dependent on them? How did all of this turn into the waving of awards, and then the feeling of emptiness after the news value of each award ran out in a flash, and resentment for not winning other awards? How did all of this turn into do-it-yourself marketing activity, self-promotional self-promotion, shooting selfies just because your cheeky pout gets more likes than an excerpt from a novel shared without visual stimuli - how could more time be spent on producing posts than creating?

Man is a social asset, this is an evolutionary fact. Undoubtedly, it was wonderful to break into the community of writers my age (at least that's how I experienced it) with my first novel. Pub crawls, camping trips, big conversations, participation in each other's presentations and dedications, writing reviews of each other's books. I believed in some kind of common ethos.

I understand injuries and disappointments, I have experienced that certain animals are more equal than others, and certain glass ceilings, even if they are not visible, can cause pain when you hit your head into them. During this time, I became a writer in my thirties, married, about to have a child, who no longer drinks and has grown out of drinking. I sobered up. I stopped writing reviews, which involved a lot of background work, because no paper was willing to pay more than HUF 15,000. I took my third book to a smaller publisher from the highly prestigious Kalligram, because I was fed up with the lack of weight loss reports, with the fact that they rush the signing of the contract, and then postpone the publication of my book indefinitely at the last moment (in fact, they suddenly pretend that the editor who has been with them for six months they wouldn't even know about the existence of my manuscript already seen by them), and I can't count on any help in self-management - at Christmas together, of course, I should feel honored as a young member of the pantheon.

Before the publication of my third book, I also put an end to humiliating free work, when the trendy (and, in my opinion, not struggling with financial problems) Könyves magazine, when I submitted an excerpt from a novel, they replied that they don't usually bring details, how about a portfolio series of my own instead, and then my three texts are naively enthusiastic after attaching it, it was announced that "since you are not writing this series for us, not at our request, we cannot pay for it". This is how I started exploring popular portals such as Index and Telex: I wanted a change of scenery, to address a wider audience and to have understandable honors.

False community experiences

In the meantime, I somehow ran out of literary friendships around me. The others also became writers in their thirties, about to start a family, married or with small children. I missed out on the evenings, after which the common denominator mostly turned out to be nagging about the NER's cultural policy, angering colleagues who were considered more successful, and self-pity due to the lack of money. A colleague of mine tried to recruit a community of writers born in the 80s, organized programs and invited me as well. I went a few times, then the group disbanded due to lack of interest. They camped together once (I couldn't go because of a pre-fixed program), and it is said that it was cathartic to work through literary traumas and grievances together.

The grateful editorial pats on the back after the Telex dedications also provided a similar false sense of community, with the unspoken premise: we are rowing in the same boat, we all know what needs to be nodded with a sigh, and what needs to be nodded intellectually. A colleague of mine who is the same age as me once said with a twinkling-eyed enthusiasm that puts instant flyers to shame (what the hell is he doing at one of the last pub crawls of people born in the 80s) that he believes in the diversity of opinions, and those who think differently should be shut out.

No, this is not a parody concocted by alt-rightists, this boat is like that. It's like that. I'm afraid it's getting more like this.

I sobered up. I got tired. Just over a year ago, my husband and I got married and moved to the countryside to farm, for now on a small scale. I don't miss the capital. I quit social media a few months ago. I don't miss that either. I don't miss my so-called followers and the dopamine produced by hearts thrown without reading my texts, I don't miss the glorious week when Facebook graciously gifted me with the label "Emerging content creator", obviously as an encouragement that I could slowly run some paid ads.

We began to develop real relationships with the villagers and members of the local farm community. There is no messaging in a Facebook group and then sitting back to say that I am already part of the community. Instead, I go down to the convenience store to ask from whom it is worth buying a hardy, good egg-laying hen, who exchanges gas bottles, who has straw at a good price, I collect phone numbers, we go to meet people.

The hysterias of the last decade have sharpened my ears, while the other person is talking, a back program is involuntarily running, which undermines the chances of the person who is drawn to political power. Our ducks, if my internal barometer is correct, come from pro-government voters (we received homemade sausage as a gift in addition to the below-priced feed), several members of the farm community seem to be Mi Hazánk sympathizers (I see that for now there are more common points, from support for home birth to anti-capitalism , like not with an acquaintance from the city, even if you can't discuss literary theory with the farmers), and our Transylvanian neighbors claim that they lived better in Ceaușescu's time, and I don't think they would vote for the opposition for all the wealth in the world (they jump in to help at any time, whether it's carrying plasterboard, improvised mowing training or connecting a boiler, in addition, they provide us with complete lunches at the most unexpected moments).

Hope for recovery

I don't care who reads which portals, who votes where, or even what they think about the rights of gypsy transgender people. The first time I received help, a tasting of my own produce, it was obvious that I would give it back. The head of the farm community said that they are not impressed by how well people talk about food self-sufficiency, which is becoming more and more fashionable these days. All you have to do is click on YouTube.

If you are willing to move when you need to help, if there is pig slaughtering, pen building, cabbage pickling, and you take your part in the joint work, then you can be a member of the team, and you will not be left alone either.

I know it all works, I have experience with it. I am also part of a completely different self-help therapy community that is also based on mutual support. You don't even think to complain if you do free work, because it's not work: it's service. You are truly grateful for everything you have received, so you give it back without hesitation.

I think that all of these are missing both from the literary and from the wider humanities intellectual milieu.

Art has now lost its community-forming power, and it seems that written culture is also on the decline. Lonely humanities people desperately try to produce, because there is no time to create mature works in addition to subletting, family and grief beer. Of course, the book as a beautiful object is different, it looks good on the shelf, but we know: it is not the author who produces the GDP, but the large book publishing groups, their small-scale, mall-like stores, where the book of the person who does not end up in the warehouse is willing to pay for a shelf marked "the company's offer".

It is in the interests of neoliberal capitalism to break up communities and direct the individual to consumer groups instead. You can't buy values, principles, a complex outlook on life, but you can buy a feeling instead, you can spend as a cure for the lack for a sense of belonging to your pseudo-communities, your fan team, the other Starbucks hipsters, the armchair vegans who spend on greenwashing products.

You can switch to a burning rainforest, Ukrainian sympathizer, Great Hungarian, stay beautiful home, vanmásek profile picture frame and experience that you belong to the good side. The system isolates, quarantines and unsettles. You can't move on your own, you spend on exercise programs, you can't give your child what he needs, you spend on jingling plastic crap, you can't do any manual work, call an expert, call an expert for everything, sit back at the conveyor belt of your laptop, and as a substitute sometimes gossip about those who you think you belong to the same platform, but you haven't had time to meet for years.

So I ask myself anxiously and uncertainly, is it still worth writing in a world in which the Telex letter is only a symptom (in any case, what does the Telex matter if one creates for so-called eternity in principle)? Or do I benefit my mental health (and thus indirectly my environment) more if I sit next to our poultry yard and watch the endless, peaceful chirping, chirping, and clucking of the birds?

I give myself time to find my answers. In the meantime, I also answer to the telex editor, succinctly, restrainedly, calmly.

Of course, I accept and fully respect your decision; I'm obviously very sorry - he writes, as if it was all over me, or if I even had the opportunity to choose between real options. – In this case, however, the cleanest thing is to refrain from communicating Szélcsend as well (I am very sorry for this).

I won't give him the "I'm sorry too" solution. It wouldn't even be true. On the other hand, I give myself something, not a little: hope to find my authentic self again. For the young woman who doesn't even care if a world may eventually come where there is no expert camp left that is willing to accept her texts. Who finally writes for himself again for the sake of writing.

Featured image: szifonline.hu