Oldal 474 [474]
OCR
Visual Representations of “Self” and “Others”: Images of the Traitor and the Enemy in Slovak their names but also by depicting them in the guise of typical Slovak stereotypes such as the poor wire tinker, the raftsman, the peddler, or the vagabond, even while at the same time they were shown working to support their Hungarian cultural associations. These caricatures contain none of the stereotypical Magyar attributes (like fine Magyar dress or even spurred boots, as were seen in other caricatures of the madarön). This type of cartoon included caricatures of Baron Béla Radvanszky, director of FMKE, as a raftsman transporting the property of Matica slovenskd to “Pestbudin”? (ill. 214); Istvan Rakovszky, co-founder of FMKE, as a wire tinker (ill. 215), Mihaly Zsilinszky, secretary of MTKE, as a wandering musician; and Gabor Baross, co-founder of MTKE and minister of transport and public works, as a wandering monger of “Slovak-Hungarian axle grease” (ill. 217). In this series of cartoons there also appeared Bela Grünwald (ill. 216), the aforementioned podzupan of Zvolen County, who was considered by Slovak patriots as one of the worst “Magyarizers” and an enemy of the Slovak national movement, but whose mother was known to be of Slovak origin.” It is, at the same time, interesting that several identical motifs, albeit with an altered ideological message, can be found later in the Hungarian humor magazine Borsszem Jankó, as Slovak historian Roman Holec has shown (2009: 52). Specifically, the character of Gabor Baross was always depicted in Magyar magazines wearing traditional Slovak dress and bearing other stereotypical markers of Slovakness (depiction as a wire tinker, a raftsman, or a wandering salesman).”* While in Cernoknaénik this image conveys the taste of betrayal to Slovaks, in the Magyar magazines Slovaks are shown obeying Baross’s every word. More typical representatives of the madarén, however, were small landlords, numerous members of the lower nobility who, living in small Slovak towns and villages, emphasized their Hungarian patriotism by consistently declaring their allegiance to Magyar culture. As with Jewish madaréni, Slovak madaröni were targets of condemnation and ridicule for having betrayed their origins to gain social position and material wealth. In Cernokñaënik we found numerous feuilletons and comical vignettes mimicking these characters’ broken Magyar speech or attempts 26 Pestbudin—a colloquial Slovakization of “Budapest” (translator’s note). 7 Bela Grünwald’s parents were, from an ethnic perspective, German and Slovak. His father, Augustin Griinwald, was caretaker of the Coburg family estate in Antol (in present-day Slovakia [translator’s note]); his mother, neé Majovska, was Slovak. It is for this reason noteworthy that in his work A Felvidek (On Upper Hungary) he took his anti-Slovak reflections so far as to conclude that Slovaks represented an inferior race (Slovensky biograficky slountk 1987: 238). 28 Another type of visual parallel with opposite ideological orientation can be found in the abovementioned cartoon of István Rakovszky as a wire tinker mending a shattered jug bearing the name tt egyesület (Slovak association, i.e., FMKE), while above the entryway of the room in front of which the character is working, there is written Magyar dllam (Hungarian state)—it is interesting that in 1898 Borsszem Jankó published a caricature of a “Slovak wire tinker,” depicted in imagery that in Hungarian magazines commonly signified idiocy. The wire tinker was trying to put back together a shattered vessel labeled szddv egység (Slavic unity), while on the door to the room behind him we see the inscription Praga (Prague) (Ibidem). 471
