Németh's Revulsion: An Exploration Of Fate And Human Nature?

Anna Poszmik
Naked Reality: Hungarian Prose in Translation

Revulsion: An Exploration of Fate and Human Nature

Lászlo Németh’s Revulsion is characterized in Hungarian literature as a “tudatregény”, a name that doesn’t lend itself easily to English translation. This genre refers to the archetypal nature of its characters, in the consistency and homogeneity of their minds. Revulsion is narrated by Nelli Kárász, a woman forced into an unwanted marriage by the father she idolizes and a sense of obligation to her ailing mother. Nelli embodies a few basic traits such as sensitivity, dignity and seriousness that govern most of her actions. This one-sidedness, however, is juxtaposed with and explored in such meticulous detail that she is in no way
In addition to Nelli and Sányi, all of the characters in Revulsion share a monochromatic quality and are easily divided into archetypal groups. Nelli, her father, her Aunt Szeréna, and Sányi’s mother, the characters with whom Nelli feels a kinship, are all portrayed as silent, dignified and solitary. Sányi, Nelli’s mother, and the townsfolk are depicted as superficial, empty, and morally bankrupt. This structuring of the characters lends itself to a sense of inevitability, thus giving the novel a gravity that transcends time and circumstance, akin to mythological stories. Through Nelli and her relationships, Németh depicts solitude as essential for integrity and self-awareness. Despite the tension that is often caused by the alienation of the more thoughtful characters, they reveal a profound capacity for empathy and morality that the other characters seem to lack. This can be seen in the silent bond between Nelli and her father (Németh 61), the understanding between Nelli and Aunt Szeréna (Németh 408), the reverence of Aunt Szeréna by her sisters (Németh 412), and Mrs. Takaró’s unquestioning love for her sons (Németh 312). On the other hand, Németh portrays the social relationships and “worldliness” of the remaining characters as a façade for their lack of depth. Sányi, his friends, and the townspeople embody these qualities. Their social gatherings are vain, ostentatious, and
In the myth, Actaeon stumbles upon Artemis bathing on Mount Cithaeron and inadvertently beholds her physical form, becoming awestruck by her beauty. As the protector of virginity, it is impermissible for any man to possess her image. For this transgression, she punishes him mercilessly: he is turned into a stag to be hunted and killed by his own hunting dogs. Sányi similarly strives to possess Nelli, which is seen when he tells her that the more withdrawn she is, “the sweeter it will be when I finally take her in my arms and press her to me,” (Németh 333). Nelli’s aversion to him and need for freedom make her repulsed by even the most innocent of his affections, and she is paranoid about his intentions from the beginning of their relationship. She reflects that she often felt, “from the back of his adoring eyes a cunning fox was leering at [her],” (Németh 158), and describes her experience with love as “the vulgar man’s desire to slobber all over his wife, to soften her up and make her more docile,” (Németh 410). A healthy relationship between them becomes obviously impossible when Nelli explains that, even when she was happy, simply that Sányi was “laying claim to [her]” felt like something “dark and heavy” bearing down upon her (Németh 157). Both Sányi and Actaeon become unwitting victims of the