The Book of Fathers

This book was my first exposure to Miklos Vamos, and all I can say is that this is really a classic novel. It follows a long-lived family which is distinguished by two things--the ability of "second sight" (i.e. being able to see outside of one's self, past, present and future), as well as a multigenerational chronicle called "The Book of Fathers" that gets maintained by firstborn male children over the centuries. There is a bit of magical realism in the book, to be sure, but what surprised me about the book was that these elements were underplayed. Being able to see the future turns out rarely to be helpful to the characters--they don't get full information on what is going to happen or what they need to do--while the continuity offered by the book is extremely valuable to the characters. When that information becomes unavailable, the effects are tragic, though the book does present a rather ironic ending that suggests that having correct knowledge of our past is less important than feeling like we have one. Vamos's prose, even translated into English, is pretty potent. The novel is structured episodically, almost like a series of linked short stories that explore similar themes. Many of these stories are colorful and vividly written. I especially liked the stories about young Kornel, the progenitor of the line who has to survive Hungary's Civil War in the early 1700s; the story of Istvan, who converts to Judaism in the 18th century for love; as well as the novel's haunting coverage of World War II and the Holocaust. The protagonists of our story tend to have successes as businessmen and creators, while they tend to lack substantive relationships with their fathers and tend to suffer early deaths. In many cases, our protagonists don't know much about their fathers and their past than what they read in the titular book. Vamos's book argues that knowing our past is more important than being able to see the future, and that ultimately it is family and not circumstances that dictate most of who we are. This is a wonderful, thoughtful book, and I would readily recommend it.

The theme of the Vamos' book is of a gifted family and a gifted nation that seem to be always at the brink of destruction and doom. Again and again the Csillag family produces men of astonishing talents, gifts and abilities and, again and again, the Csillags come to abject ends. The family is torn apart by the politics, wars, rebellions and even the Holocaust. Religions are changed and the landscape that the book begins with in no way resembles that of the end of the book but the gifts that the family (or Hungarians?) carry within them are still there. The book is beautifully written in a spare but vivid prose. The characters come alive and their personalities are well drawn by the author. Each story stands almost like a short story about each of the characters who all have something magical and mysterious in common with one another. While each character (except hopefully the last) is doomed in the end, the author manages to make each story so engaging that I never lost interest in what would happen next. This is an excellent book and covers three centuries of turbulence in a country that so many of us know so little about. If you enjoy this style of Historical narration I would also recommed the book Sarum by Edward Rutherford.

This is a thoroughly Hungarian novel that has some crossover appeal, particularly if you think 19th century Russian novels are too light-hearted. Twenty pages in, an entire village is laid waste, not for any strategic military objective, but just out of wanton cruelty. And that's just the beginning. The novel traces the Csillag/Sternovzsky/Stern/Csillag over twelve generations. Each chapter tells the story of one of the sons/fathers, and along the way the reader learns a bit of Hungarian history. If you already know a great deal about that country, you'll probably understand the context of the tragic action much better, but if you don't know much, it might whet your curiosity. In a novel like this there isn't a plot, in the sense of a hero chasing a Mcguffin before a resolution a few pages before the end. Instead, it reads like a personal history of 300 years with the focus shifting from father to son through the generations. That being said, it's an intensely absorbing work, if you can handle the emotional sledgehammer that slams down at the end of just about every chapter. Just as you become engrossed with the life of one of the Csillag men, it invariably ends in tragedy--banditry, dueling, pogrom, political execution, Holocaust. There are not many happy endings in these pages. I don't think I'm overstating the violent tragedy of much of the novel. Indeed, the author addresses the issue in a delightful epilogue, noting that Hungarians have been on the losing side of every important war and revolution they've partaken in since 1490 before repeating a well-worn but nonetheless apt Hungarian joke whose punchline I won't spoil, but which perfectly reflects Hungarian history. The epilogue also puts the book into better context--it certainly makes the larger story that surrounds the Csillag clan much more lucid for non-Hungarian readers. You may want to read it first, for insights into the psyche of both the nation and the author. In some senses a meditation on nationhood, in others a study of the loss of familial memories over time, THE BOOK OF FATHERS is a thought-provoking and amazing read.

Anyone who enjoys discovering a new author will be thrilled to read this book. Miklos Vamos is a bestselling author in Hungary, and based on this one translation I can see why. The stories and characters are each in their own way compelling, and the common thread of shared memories recorded in the Book of Fathers gives continuity as the reader gets to know each successive generation. It is true that you will have to relinquish your attachment to each generation as you move through the book, but once you get the hang of it you will begin to look forward to the coming chapters, to see how each new son will change the fortunes of the family. If you turn to the postscript you will see that Mr. Vamos was quite clever, in that as the story advances through 300 years of Hungarian history, the language of the book slowly progresses alongside. He committed himself to using only those words and phrases that would have been in use at the time of his characters' lives, and thus as the novel moves forward through time his phrasing and vocabulary become increasingly modern. Granted, as this is a translation, some of this effect has been lost, but it is an interesting linguistic study nonetheless. As Americans, many of us have lost our immigrant heritage. This story brings to life the way generations of one family relate to their ancestors, the way their stories can be kept alive, and how they can be lost along the way. It is educational, entertaining, and beautifully crafted, and I cannot recommend it highly enough.

Here's the story encapsulated: The Csillag family first-born males enjoy a gift (and endure a curse) -- they respectively experience misty visions of their own (and their ancestors') pasts and occasionally of their futures. Of course this generates both a boon and a pitfall for these unusual men and their immediate families. But the focus is really not on this mystical side of the story. The Csillags were Hungarians and, as such, they endured intermittent hardship and continual repression by the Habsburg Monarchy. It was a double whammy for the Csillags: they were also Jewish and pogroms often flared up to their horrified astonishment. The reader travels along in time with the Csillags (they change their family name periodically) from the start of the 18th-Century to the present day. The story is much about the development of the Hungarian language (covertly, a national treasure), Hungarian history (their domination and the failures of their revolts), Jewish persecution, and the Hungarian plight in general. It's not all doom and gloom -- individuals of the Csillag family frequently experience bright times, both socially and economically and they travel, late in the story, to America and back. At the outset of each transitory episode is a paragraph of lyrical word-painting, originally in the evolving Hungarian language, which becomes more evocative as the tale progresses. One purpose of this exposition is that it serves to illuminate the maturation of the Hungarian language even though, in this edition, it has now all been rendered to English. The translation itself has been artfully achieved by Peter Sherwood. This is a fluid read and a page-turner. The original publication in Hungarian emerged in 2000. The story runs 466 pages and the author has included a nice background epilogue, detailing the genesis of this compelling tale, at the conclusion of the work. Milklós Vámos, who has taught at Yale on a Fulbright scholarship, has written 25 other books (eleven novels) including: Santa Kutya. This is an example of terrific contemporary European literature, the like of which we see all too little of these days. Vámos simply spins his yarn with the ease of a master and all the emphasis is on the journey, never the destination, a positive caveat of much European and Middle-eastern literature. This novel isn't another "War and Peace" but it is darn good reading. Highly recommended for fans of European and Jewish history.