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each element received a special meaning from the wider context in which it was embedded".
(István Nánay: Profán szentély. Színpad a kápolnában, Pécs, Alexandra, 2007, 29.) In the
performance of György Somlyö’s Why does a man die?, directed by Vilmos Dobai in 1962,
for example, “the actors brought situations to life with the script in their hands, reading and
playing alike” (Ibid., 44). The Last Warlord, edited by Peter Vägö in the 1966-1967 season,
also “tried to give an idea of the quarter-century called the Horthy Era and, of course, of
Miklös Horthy himself, with the help of documents, film excerpts, sound recordings, literary
works, diaries and newspaper articles”. (Ibid., 86.)
Belädi-Rönay: A magyar irodalom törtenete 1945-1975, 1126. — The articles on the National
Theatre’s production pointed out that it did not show “the desk-weight-Lenin, the bronze¬
Lenin or the marble-Lenin, themandatory-ceremony-Lenin” (Molnär Gäl: Rendelkezöproba,
214.), but “the man breathing behind the sculptures” (Anna Földes: Szivügyünk: a magyar
dráma, Színház 3:7 [1970], 6.) who "was almost greeting us". (Zoltán Lőkös: Fejezetek Leninről.
Gyurkó László dokumentumoratóriuma a Nemzeti Színházban, Magyar Hírlap, Vol. 3, No.
112, 23" April, 1970, 7.) In the decade of the ideal of "Shakespeare, our contemporary",
Gyurkó, as Tamás Tarján noted, created the idea of "Lenin, our contemporary", while
examining the possibility of “revolution after the revolution” (cf. Béladi-Rénay: A magyar
irodalom története 1945-1975, 1127.).
Functioning according to the mechanism of Stephen Greenblatts "subversion" and
"containment", the 1970 premiere made all that was potentially subversive in the play
already contained in official propaganda, so that it would become practically ineffective.
Gyurkó was sentenced to six months in prison for his participation in the 1956 revolution.
However, it is part of the inescapable (and probably irresolvable) contradiction of his
biography and his oeuvre that he had gone from “counter-revolutionary” not only to
theatre manager - first at the Twenty-Fifth Theatre, which assumed a legitimate socialist
avant-garde theatre culture, and then at the Népszinhaz (1970-1979) — but also member
of Parliament (1971-1985), member of Gyérgy Aczél’s circle of advisers and friends, and
writer of Janos Kadar’s monograph, Portrait with Historical Background, published in 1982.
But he also wrote an essay on “Ihe Crisis of Hungarian Socialism” in 1987, and a book on
1956, which was later revised and published several times as Revolution in Hiking Boots.
This ambivalence was expressed by Peter Agärdi in his study published after Gyurkö’s
death: “Having read Revolution in Hiking Boots, now we see, although it is paradoxical, that
Gyurkö’s image of 1956 is determined by the inspiration of Lenin’s revolution, and he also
incorporated his experience of 1956 (a taboo then, of, course) in the description of 1917.”
Péter Agárdi: Gyurkó László 77 éve és a baloldal, Egyenlítő 5:10 (2007), 4.
The reviewer of the monthly Hid (Imre Bori) made it clear that Gyurkö’s book Lenin, October
got rid of “countless legends of Lenin in which the man who ‘made’ the revolution remained
in the background or got lost, not independently of the view of the 1930s and 1940s, as
the period of the cult of personality had obviously also affected the image of Lenin”. (BI):
Leninről - eredeti módon, Híd 31:12 (1967), 1405.
The beginning of Chapters on Lenin already defies the cult of personality as it guotes the
words of Lenin’s widow: “I ask you a lot: do not let your pain at the death of Ilyich manifest
itself in external respect for the person. Do not erect monuments to him, name palaces
after him, or organize large-scale celebrations in honor of his memory. He attached so
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