Budapest

August 1, 2023
An Economist best book of 2022, now published for the first time in the U.S., Hungarian journalist Sebestyen's history covers a span of some 1,600 years, from Budapest's beginnings as a small Celtic settlement through successive, often unspeakably violent takeovers by Romans, Magyars (so-called Hungarians), Mongols, Ottomans, Hapsburgs, and, in the twentieth century, Nazis and Soviets. Two cities, Buda and Pest, operated independently for centuries before being linked across the Danube River in 1849 by the Sz�chenyi Chain Bridge. Subject to the plunder and the whims of outsiders, Budapest, as Sebestyen copiously details here, is revealed as one of the most mercurial, resilient cities in the world, continually rising from the ashes to shine in architecture, music, literature, finance, and cuisine, among other realms, even as modern Hungarian as a language is only two centuries old. The role of Jewish residents, variously embraced and reviled through the centuries, forms an important part of the story. Curiously, the author's timeline ends with the fall of the Soviet Union. Still, an excellent primer to an extraordinary metropolis.

COPYRIGHT(2023) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

August 14, 2023
Historian Sebestyen (Lenin the Dictator) delivers a sweeping and insightful chronicle of Budapest from its origins as a first-century Roman settlement on the Danube to the present. Sebestyen highlights the arrival of the Magyars, who moved into the Carpathian Basin from the Urals in the 850s; the reign of Stephen I, who Christianized the country and named himself the first king of Hungary in 1000; the Hapsburg dynasty, which presided over a golden age in Budapest built on trading, manufacturing, and banking; WWI, which brought down the Austro-Hungarian empire and cost Hungary a third of its territory; WWII, when Hungary became an ally of Germany (the 102-day siege of Budapest at the end of the war killed thousands of civilians, including the majority of the city’s Jewish population); and the postwar occupation by the Soviets, who drove the Germans out of Hungary in 1945 and controlled the country for the next 45 years. Sebestyen vividly describes the invasions, revolutions, wars, and catastrophes (including a devastating flood in 1838) that shaped Budapest as he profiles its notable rulers and citizens, including composer and Budapest Opera director Gustave Mahler and novelist Arthur Koestler. Along the way, he captures the city’s innately pessimistic character and active café society. The result is a comprehensive account of one of Europe’s great cities.

Starred review from July 1, 2023
A satisfying history of a city that, "after London, Paris, and Rome...receives more tourists than any other capital in Europe." London-based journalist Sebestyen, author of Lenin and Revolution 1989, was an infant when his Hungarian family fled the city after the Hungarian Revolution of 1956, a cataclysmic event he chronicled in his 2006 book, Twelve Days. His evident love for the city emerges clearly in this engaging chronological account, and he provides a cleareyed sense of the "characteristic Hungarian pessimism." Over the centuries, the strategic geopolitical locations of Buda and Pest, on either of the Danube, had drawn the attention of conquering armies, from the Romans to the early marauding Magyars, the Ottomans, Austrians, Nazis, and Soviets. Throughout his sweeping history, the author emphasizes the recurrent theme that the city often had to stand alone against these onslaughts. The Ottomans ruled for 150 years and left lasting legacies, such as the coffeehouse, and they mostly tolerated a large Jewish population in Pest. As religious wars in Europe heated up, Hungarian royals "threw in their lot" with the ultra-Catholic Austrian Hapsburgs, bestowing favors and titles on a few mega-loyal families who would come to dominate in decades to come. Nationalism drove the valiant but ultimately doomed first Hungarian Revolution of 1848, yet during the Austrian backlash, Jews were awarded unprecedented liberties. "Nowhere in Middle Europe," writes the author, "did Jews play such a prominent part in modernization as in Hungary--in industry, commerce, banking, the professions." The combining of the two parts of the city and replacement of the German language with Hungarian also fueled national pride. Despite being on the wrong side of both world wars and siding closely with Hitler, the Hungarians gained the world's sympathy with what Sebestyen calls "the defining moment of the Cold War"--standing up to the Soviet army in 1956. A beautifully wrought, admiring portrait of a beloved, beleaguered city and its people.

COPYRIGHT(2023) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.