Oldal 134 [134]
OCR
FROM IDOL DESTRUCTION TO IDOLATRY dark blue gowns with minimal decoration, and with the addition of a white drape in the first chapter, the men in three-piece suits. “Their carefully and beautifully directed movements were ordered by the choreographic creation of group pictures", an important stylistic element of Marton’s works. IMPACT AND POSTERITY After the official opening on 21‘ April, 1970, the National played Chapters on Lenin thirty times, including morning matinees, until 5* May, then put it on repertory, and even revived it in 1980, for the 110" anniversary of Lenin’s birth. (Marton was no longer alive at that time, so the revival was directed by Marton’s then-assistant, Eszter Tatár.) While the 1970 version had overwhelmingly positive reviews, many critics of the revival noted that ten years after the premiere, the production seemed rather anachronistic. Gyorgy Kriszt commented that “it was hard to explain why they chose to revive this specific work of Gyurkó", ""? while Endre Varjas thought it was "a fundamental repertory-making error" to recreate the oratorio on the “unremarkable” 110 anniversary. "Ihe audience wont go to see it, and from their point of view, they are perfectly right.” The actors also “work half-heartedly, with no feeling”, watching the “sparsely populated and aggressively bored audience”, which “creates a performance that might reach the level of a mediocre amateur ensemble’s slightly sickly production”. Of course in 1980, it was clear that the illusion permeating Chapters on Lenin had dissipated, and it was not possible to reform the regime by returning to its origins: socialism in Hungary could not be rejuvenated.®’ (The televised recording of the performance demonstrates®* that Tamas Major could not do more either 654 Sas: Fejezetek Leninről — Döntés, 5. 55 Kriszt: Fejezetek Leninröl, 4. 66 Varjas: Alkalmatlan alkalmisäg, 13. 67 Cf. Gäbor Klaniczay’s Inventory, made in January 1980, and going beyond individual experience. “Now that it is 1980, everything under the heading of the 1970s has faded in an unattainable historical distance. And maybe that’s not so bad. We need our thinking not to be pushed back every day into the melancholic state of the loss of alternatives by the stagnation, languishing and quiet demise of the revolutionary thoughts, reforming ideas and beautiful ideals of the 1960s. It is not just a hobby of historical periodization by decades that I have been waiting for the end of ‘the Seventies’ for weeks. The differences of the past two decades sum up the development of my life to me (and perhaps to my contemporaries). The Sixties: the coordinates of my youth, my thinking, my ideals, my attitude to life. The Seventies: my growing up apathetically, my experiences of failure, my inefficiency, my loss of faith. I’m going to be 30 this year. With some relief, I’m beginning to take the disappointments of the ‘70s off. I’m going to get over the bitter taste in my mouth that’s left behind, and try to give some sense of the ‘70s at least for myself, to learn a lesson from it.” Gabor Klaniczay: 1980, Beszélő III:3:12 (1998), 65. 658 The recording was broadcast on 4" April, 1979 on Channel 2 of Hungarian Television. «132 +
