The The Sad Critique, the Lawyer, and the Teacher(ess) Histories of Nineteenth-Century Hungarian Literature

Abstract

There is a tendency in Hungarian literary reception that locates the emergence of Hungarian Women’s literature at the turn of the last century only. Is that late perception a matter of literary history or that of contemporary cultural memory? In my paper I will point out that there is a continuous presence of women authors throughout the 19th century by exploring three nineteenth-century works that represent and reflect on contemporary female authors: Pál Gyulai, Írónőink (1858), Károly Zilahy, Hölgyek Lantja (1865), Mariska Fayl-Hentaller, A magyar írónőkről (1889). At the same time, the works of these women authors are rendered into a „ second(ary) literary history”. It is this 19th century devaluation that has continued to shape our current reception, producing the telling gaps in our cultural memory.