When Even the Poets Were Silent

Some of the darkest episodes of twentieth-century European history come vividly to life in this fascinating memoir. George Pogany beautifully portrays a 1930s childhood in the Hungarian town of Oroshaza and the spread of anti-Semitism. He describes life in the town's Jewish ghetto, his family's journey in a sealed cattle-wagon to Vienna, and their experiences in a forced labour camp there before being liberated by Soviet troops. Returning home to Hungary on foot, Pogany soon finds himself in a country in which freedom has been savagely curtailed. He offers a stark but often humorous account of what daily life was like under Hungary's brand of Stalinism, first as a student and then as an industrial chemist. After Moscow's brutal suppression of the Hungarian Uprising in 1956, Pogany manages to escape one night to the West, right under the noses of the Red Army. "When Even The Poets Were Silent" is a wry and dispassionate account full of surprises and challenges. It is likely to become one of the last eyewitness accounts of the Holocaust.