Page 27 [27]
OCR
“THE ‘ETERNAL CANDIDATE’ — THAT WAS ME”: INTERVIEW WITH KAROLY BARD friends the language, otherwise she only taught people involved in foreign trade at her home. When I started teaching at the university, I took on every conceivable translation gig because the salary was so meagre. If I got stuck with the translation, I just hopped over to my grandmother and got all the translation done in two or three hours that I had been struggling over the past week. Later on, I also worked as a conference interpreter with awesome, accomplished colleagues. I had learnt German as a child in Frankfurt, but it was my knowledge of English that gave me an edge. Consequently, I had an exceptional position at the university. On my first study trip abroad in 1976, I went to Finland for two months. There was a scholarship for this study trip that was quite easy to get. Finland was an “almost Western country”. Also, the location was especially attractive for me, since there was an excellent institute of criminology in Helsinki. Yet I didn’t go to the institute but the university instead, where I worked with a very kind, elderly professor of procedural law, from whom, alas, I didn’t get to learn too much. However, I somehow got involved with the Legal Policy Institute, which was headed by one of the most renowned criminologists of the time: Inkeri Anttila. She organized a lecture for me in Turku. Actually, this was my first step to join the international academic world. I got on really well with the Finns. It was at this time that the HEUNI, the European Institute for Crime Prevention and Control was established, where Inkeri became director. I was invited to multiple conferences, I worked there as an advisor for three months, preparing conferences and seminars. This was particularly attractive, since the Helsinki institute was a sort of bridge between the East and the West. Here, I got into contact with Western professionals, offering me various opportunities. Like I said, it was one of my Helsinki presentations that got me my job at the UN Headquarters in Vienna. I also had the chance to attend the American Studies Salzburg Seminar where the most notable researchers of the field lectured. I chose the course given by Mirjan Damaska, a star lecturer of Yale University. Then there was the HungarianBritish Round Table exchange program, launched by the British Council. The Hungarian team was put together by Katalin Gönczöl. I also gave a lecture there, upon which the Brits invited me to London the next year for a short study trip. I even went to Vancouver one time. Tibor Király was invited to a conference on victimology. However, he kindly offered that I go in his stead, saying his English was not good enough. V. Z. K.: Reading the articles you had written in the eighties, what strikes me is that you often refer to constitutional principles. What’s more, Istvan Kukorelli claims that itis your articles that laid the foundations of constitutional criminal law. I must admit, it seems strange for members of my generation that any requirement should flow from the constitution under an authoritarian regime. Were constitutional and +925 +
