Traveler and the Moonlight - Softcover

Szerb, Antal; Hargitai, Peter

Softcover

ISBN 10: 149178928X ISBN 13: 9781491789285

Publisher: iUniverse, 2016

Synopsis

Special 70th Anniversary American Edition
A new translation by writer and poet Peter Hargitai

“Writer and poet Peter Hargitai, working on an English translation of Utas és holdvilág [Traveler and the Moonlight] in 1988, met with Szerb's widow, Klára, curious to know whether there had been real-life models for the novel's characters-particularly for Tamás and Éva, who intrigued him above all the others. In answer, Klára Szerb pointed out a framed photograph on a bookshelf: 'a youngish man with a pale, aristocratic, melancholy face.'

'This is Tamás,' Mrs. Szerb said. 'My husband's beloved schoolmate.'
'And Éva? Who is Éva?' I asked.

She held up that very picture. 'This is also Éva. Tamás and Éva are one and the same.'

Klára Szerb went on to insist that Hargitai keep the secret of Tamás and Éva's single biographical precedent until after her death. And there we have a clue, not only to the mysterious androgyny of Tamás and Éva, and to the sexually unconventional nature of Mihály's relationship with them, but also perhaps to an unresolved chapter from Szerb's past, one that held mysteries potent enough to give rise to a novel.”
Julie Orringer
Author of The Invisible Bridge

“I hope The Traveler reaches thousands and thousands of readers.”
Elie Wiesel
Distinguished Nobel Laureate

About this title

About the Author:

ANTAL SZERB (1901-1945) was a professor, a literary historian, and writer. His 1937 novel Traveler and the Moonlight has become a cult classic, due in large measure, to the tragic way in which the author and his story are intertwined. Near the end of World War II, Szerb was executed by Nazis and buried in a mass grave. At the last minute he had been given a reprieve, but rather than abandon his friend, he had chosen to die with him. In 1995, on the 50th anniversary of the author's death, his American translator, Peter Hargitai, and his students at Florida International University, had the name of Antal Szerb inscribed into the Holocaust Memorial Wall in Miami Beach. This Special 70th Anniversary Edition is to keep his memory and this remarkable novel alive for the American reader.

About this edition

• Publisher: iUniverse
• Publication date: 2016
• ISBN 10: 149178928X
• ISBN 13: 9781491789285
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 288