Antal Szerb (1901-1945) was a writer, scholar, critic and
translator born to Jewish parents but baptized Catholic. Multilingual, he lived
in Hungary, France, Italy and England, and after graduating in German and
English he rapidly established himself as a prolific scholar, publishing books
on drama and poetry, studies of Ibsen and Blake, and histories of English and
Hungarian literature.
At the age of 39, Szerb wrote an authoritative History
of World Literature. He wrote his first novel, The Pendragon Legend, in
1934, followed by Journey by Moonlight in 1937 and The Queen's
Necklace in 1943. These, and a collection of his short stories, Love
in a Bottle, are also published in English by Pushkin Press. Szerb was killed
in a concentration camp in January 1945.
“Journey by Moonlight”
1.
Did
you like this book?
2.
What
do you think about Mihaily and Erzsi as
a newly-weds and their honeymoon in
Venice?
3.
Did
it surprise you when Mihaily suddenly left his new wife in the hotel room and
was wandering the back streets until dawn?
4.
Why
Erzsi’s ex-husband Zoltan, writes to Mihaily, giving him instructions on how to
care for Erzsi?
5.
How
important for Mihaily is his past circle of friends he was part of? (Tamas and
his sister Eva, Ervin, and Janos)
6.
Why
all of them were obsessed with drama and death?
7.
Hwo
would you describe Mihaly’s relationship with Tamas and Eva? Was this a
true friendship?
8.
Did
it surprise you when Mihaily left his
wife at a railway station (although we all know the possibilities for getting
on the wrong train at a busy station) and
when he realizes that he has done
the wrong thing he run away?
9.
When
Erzsi realizes that her marriage is based on fiction?
11. While wondering through Italy, Mihaily meets with two people
from the past, János Szepetneki, an arch-manipulator and now a
motorcycle-riding criminal, and the Catholic convert Ervin, who appears as
Father Severinus. What do we learn from
these meetings?
12. After the “incidental” separation with Mihaily, Erszi goes to Paris and
lives with her girlfriend. How do you
describe her life in Paris?
113. Is
nostalgia what eats at Mihály? Mihály told his doctor “I know what’s wrong with
me… Acute nostalgia. I want to be young again. Is there a cure for that?”
14. Why Mihaily is obsessed with Eva?
What happen after they finally meets?
15. Do you agree with
this opinion that “Szerb’s narrative is a remarkable, painstaking study of a
man’s fascination with his own mortality.”?
116. Later
we learn that Mihaily is Journeying from Venice to Ravenna, Florence and Rome,
loses himself in in the Tuscan and Umbrian countryside. What is he searching for? Is he trying to
resurrect his lost youth? Is this the
last change to have scandalous adventures before he returns to the dull adult life?
17. Do you agree with
this opinion that “Szerb’s narrative is a remarkable, painstaking study of a
man’s fascination with his own mortality”?
18. Did the
ending of this book surprise you? Why?
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