Carrying a Secret in My Heart: Children of Political Victims of the Revolution in Post-1956 Hungary: An Oral History

Book Description
For a decade now, the authors have been conducting interviews for Hungary’s Oral History Archives, with the children of those Hungarians – national heroes, as they are generally seen today – who were imprisoned for their involvement in the 1956 revolution. The vast body of material that has been collected, and is now at the disposal of sociologists, psychologists and others in the academic community, forms the basis of this volume. This is a documentation of memories of the revolt and, more particularly, its aftermath. The virtually spontaneous ten-day uprising exerted a lasting effect on the fates of the families of the more than 20,000 who were imprisoned and 229 executed by the régime in the harsh reprisals that followed the crushing of the revolution (the last of them as late as the early 1960s), with active police surveillance extended to tens of thousands more. This intimidation, and the attendant social and economic devastation that it wrought, bore especially hard on the psyches, upbringing and education, and hence the subsequent opportunities and life courses of the children who grew up within those families. The material is grouped by theme: e.g. the effects on communication within families, changes in social status, how relatives and friends reacted, and what sorts of problems these children encountered in pursuing their studies, in trying to assimilate into society as adults, and in relating to those fathers who did return. In an appendix, the editors present detailed biographies of the people most directly affected, offering an unparalleled glimpse into the fates of those they interviewed. The documentation includes letters that the children wrote to their imprisoned fathers.

Language Notes
Text: English (translation)
Original Language: Hungarian

From the Author
We approached the subject of our research from a historio-sociological, socio-psychological and psychological perspective. The interviews focused on the fate of the individual in its social and historical framework and on the inner conflicts experienced by the individual. Thus we became acquainted not only with individual histories but with the characteristics of a unique social group. We thus obtained further information about the mechanism of the Kádár system since we were examining a unique group, the members of which were neither participants in the revolution nor directly involved in the retribution. In this respect they stood closer to the majority of society than to the participants in the revolution. At the same time, however, because they were indirectly involved they acted as indicators of the relationship of society to the political system and to the authorities, since by their mere existence they forced those around them to take sides and make statements. Their experiences also reveal how for forty years Hungarian society related to 1956 as a historical and political event, and to those who had participated in it.

About the Author
Zsuzsanna Kôrösi and Adrienne Molnár are sociologists at the Institute for the History of the 1956 Hungarian Revolution, based in Budapest.


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The effects on families of the arrest, imprisonment, and for many, execution of family members following the Hungarian Revolution of 1956 are poignantly recorded in this volume. The accounts were gathered as part of the Oral History Archive program in Budapest, Hungary, where both the authors carry out their research. The biographies of those interviewed, a detailed account of the children's drawings included in the text, and a bibliography are included; there is no index. Annotation ©2003 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR


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