[biography] - [quotes] - [publications]
"With a final rush they arrive and plunge for cover
into a hollow in the riverbank where they can spend the night in safety.
The male grabs some thorny branches to block the opening, and then in
the safety of the shelter he starts to pant and grunt, excited, as he
tells the story of how they got here. He specifies his topic:
- Lalalla, lala. - He refers to the manner of his narrative: - Drrr-brrr
-, then: Shhh - he starts, in the middle of things. He points, gesticulates,
makes magic. First the red volcano: - Hoo-hoo! - The grasses swaying
in the wind: - Shhhh. - Now they have reached the middle of the savanna,
and found food under the stone: - Mmmmmmm. - The female slips: - Oooooh
-, and she regains her balance: - Lalall. - The horrible great cat beyond
the horizon: - Drrr, mrrr. - The dumb beast is snoring: - Khrrr-sss,
Khrrr-sss. - And there is sweet water at the river: -TchTchTch -, shelter:
- Bababbabb. - Satisfied, he tells the tale to the end, amidst much
excitement. The common ancestors of all of us, I can identify with him,
he is an earlier version of me - and it is I grunting behind the thorn
barrier - and of you. His motivation is the same as any popular novelist's:
to hold the audience's attention by means of his narrative, to arrest
the unstoppable flow of time, to recall a piece of it, to tear it out
and store it away for all of us, so that we may refer to it at any time,
while it remains in its original place, a crystal with its thousands
of sparkling facets: take it or leave it, now you see it, now you don't."
(from: Cobblestone, tr. by J. Bátki)
"Peter Lengyel offers not only an intrigue of a
detective story, but also a universal learning experience. The reader,
immersed in time and space spanning a whole century, learns about its
turbulent history."
(Maria Green, World Literature Today, vol. 68)
[biography] - [quotes] - [publications]
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