Slave of the Huns

by Géza Gárdonyi

Gárdonyi egyik legnépszerűbb történelmi regénye, színes, ősi világot elevenít a népvándorlás korának izgalmas, sorsdöntő fejezetét, Attila - hun királynak - mindent elsöprő uralmát és hirtelen halálát. Egy fiatal görög rabszolga, Zéta, Attila közelébe sodródik és krónikási hűséggel meséli el élményeit, tapasztalatait a hunok táborában. Ő maga művelt, nagytudású ifjú, íródeákja Priszkosz rétornak aki a császár követeként indul Konstantinápolyból a Tisza partjára, Attila udvarába. Zéta szerint rettenthetetlen, vad harcosok élnek a hunok földjén, de asszonyaik sem akármilyenek. Van köztük egy, aki különösen kedves neki. Tőle tanulja meg, hogy az embereknek csak az arca ismerhető meg, igazi lényük rejtett, láthatatlan. Zéta nevet, rangot, vagyont remélve indul még a katalaunumi ütközetbe is, hogy méltó lehessen a hun főúr lányához. De Emőke számára csak egy csillag Attila - akit halálakor önként követ a sírba.Gárdonyi hiteles történeti forrásokra támaszkodva, s széles körű történelmi tájékozottsággal írta meg regényét. A mű Függelékében közli az író a tárgykörre vonatkozó jegyzeteit is (Igazítások Attila történetén). Tóth Lászlónak a regény keletkezési körülményeit taglaló utószava egészíti ki a tizenkét éven felülieknek szánt nagy regényt.

Genres: Historical Fiction, Hungarian Literature, Classics, Fiction, Adventure, Historical, Novels

Hardcover

First published January 1, 1902

About the author

Géza Gárdonyi, born Géza Ziegler (August 3, 1863 – October 30, 1922) was a Hungarian writer and journalist. Although he wrote a range of works, he had his greatest success as a historical novelist, particularly with Eclipse of the Crescent Moon and Slave of the Huns.

Gárdonyi was born in Agárdpuszta, Kingdom of Hungary, the son of a machinist on the estate of an aristocrat in Western Hungary. He graduated at a college for teachers and worked for some years as a teacher and Catholic cantor. He married Mária Molnár in 1885, but their marriage was unhappy and they separated in 1892.
Gárdonyi's career as a writer started off when he began writing for magazines and newspapers in the mid-1880s. His first successes were the satirical "Göre Gábor" letters on rural life, works which he later repudiated. Around the turn of the century, he started to tackle historical themes in writing, which resulted in a series of fine novels.
He moved to Eger (today's northern Hungary) in 1897 with his mother and lived there until his death. He is also buried there, with his tomb bearing the inscription Csak a teste ("Only his body"). The house where he lived and did most of his writing is now preserved as a museum.

Reviews

[Virág · Rating 5 out of 5]

Slave of the Huns was one of the first historical fiction/adventure novels I read. Maybe that is why I love historical fiction now - this was a very good book to start with, and it got me hooked on the genre.

Slave of the Huns is about Zeta, a Greek slave during the time of Theodosis, who travels to the land of Attila and falls in love with a Hunnish noble. The plot really drew me in, and I thought the translation from the original version was done quite well. I remember reading this over and over and over... I must have finsihed it at least five or six times.

Oh, and I should mention that this is considered a Hungarian classic (all-round classic really, if it was more known).

[Sean N Noonan · Rating 5 out of 5]

The first book to truly inspire me. I read it many times over the years and it can still work its magic, though as a teenaqer it meant the most. Full of history, this is essentially a love story replete with angst and shows the depths to which people will go for the sake of their love, set against the backdrop of Attila the Hun and his fight with the corrupt later Roman Empire. Simply, its brilliant and well worth a read.

[David Koblos · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wanna be proud of Hungarian culture, traditions, and a heroic ancestry? This book is perfect for that. Not exactly an accurate ethnography, but much more so a lively, action-packed, historical fiction about the Huns, taken from a sympathetic point of view.

[cloudyskye · Rating 4 out of 5]

Géza Gárdonyi is my hero when it comes to historical fiction. I read this decades ago as a teen, but I think I now appreciate it even more. Especially the postscript with Gárdonyi's snarky comments on history writers describing and interpreting the famous battle of the Catalaunian plains. Who was the victor, Aetius or Attila (Atilla in the book)? Both armies withdrew after a senseless bloodbath. The Roman Empire was already on its way out, and the Huns' victories ended with Attila's death a year or two later.

The story is told by Zéta, a fictional first person narrator, originally from Constantinople, who is living with the Huns.
Attila is described as a shrewd, enigmatic, and very charismatic person who manages to unite tribes and races under himself. Most of those peoples have since been absorbed in other nations or have disappeared altogether. We get great descriptions of their appearances and customs.

I like the Hungarian title: "The invisible man", taken from an observation of the storyteller: "I am that Zéta. And I am convinced: no-one knows me ... One can only know a man's face, but he is not that face. He is behind the face. Invisible."

[Maxim · Rating 5 out of 5]

5 stars

[Arsenovic Nikola · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ovo je bila prva knjiga sa istorijskom tematikom koju sam procitao kao dete 5 razred mozda sam i zbog nje zavolio da citam romansiranu istoriju. U svakom slucaju roman je fantastican i vrlo zivo opisuje tadasnji svet i dogadjaje vezane za Atilu hunskog vladara iz ociju roba koji je u njihovom zarobljenistvu

[Isa-Sophie]

The version I read was much shorter than the original and written in simplified Hungarian, so I didn’t get an impression of the style of the author and the inner life of the characters got lost, but I still liked the story. Considering this, I can’t give it a rating

[Jenni D · Rating 4 out of 5]

A lot of morals are written into this story. The story kept me engaged. It was a very interesting depiction of the Hun society in the 5th century. However, I could have done without the descriptions of the many tribes that fought in the war between the Romans and Huns because I couldn’t keep track of them all. Also, too many characters to keep track of.

[Gabi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Általános iskolás korom óta nem olvastam Gárdonyit, és fogalmam sem volt, hogy ennyire tetszeni fog. Az elején megijedtem az E/1-es elbeszélő miatt, mert több E/1-es regényt olvastam az utóbbi időben, és nem mind szolgált örömömre, itt azonban kellemes csalódás ért: Gárdonyi zseniálisan használja ki az elbeszélésmódban rejlő lehetőségeket.
A történet is nagyon lekötött, mert szerettem az Attilás filmet, és érdekes volt nagyjából ugyanazt az érát egy gyökeresen más nézőpontból megtapasztalni.
A mondatok pedig egyszerűen gyönyörűek. Fog még Gárdonyi kerülni a polcra.

[Paula · Rating 5 out of 5]

I just came across this book that I read as a YA on a foreign friends page and its shocking to me to realize this isn't a popular YA book- its AMAZING! it wasn't published in English the first time which I guess is why no one has ever hear of it, but its so exciting and moving... I'm going to find it on my bookshelf right now and read it again. There are very few books on my "keeper shelf" from childhood- Watership down, The good earth, The black pearl, Lion/Witch/Wardrobe, Lord of the Flies- and this one. I'm gonna read it again, starting tonight, and will report back as an adult! I can't wait!

[Arpad · Rating 3 out of 5]

Kvázi-történelmi regény Atilla hun vezér idejéből. A romantikus szál vezet és különösen az első 100 oldal (a 260-ból) kínszenvedés. De ha azon átküzdi magát az ember, a cselekmény izgalamasabb, a csatajelenetek látványosak. A régies nyelvezet kicsit zavaró.

[Zsebenci Klopédia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Érdekes, hogy milyen sokan nem értik ezt a könyvet. Olvassák, de minek...? Várólistacsökkentés? Ezzel a módszerrel igazán butuskának lehet maradni rengeteg olvasmánnyal a hátunk mögött is.

[Sharon · Rating 3 out of 5]

The version of the book I have is the Mandarin Chinese version which was rewritten as part of a childrens history classics collection.
I wasn't used to reading Mandarin Chinese books so reading it was a little strange. The fact that my Mandarin Chinese is not as good as my English also meant that I may have missed some subtle things in the book. And therefore, the rating I give is probably mostly due to my poor reading skills.

I enjoyed learning about the history that the story was inspired by. Yet I was not impressed with the protagonist's constant infatuation which took up a major chunk of the plot, that was really annoying to read. I was also not that into the battle that happened in the book - but hey, that's most of the bloody history.
I thought that the book ended well, in that the ending gave it a shock impact that I did not expect. I was both horrified and shocked by how the protagonist, as a servant, was almost killed to be buried with Attila. The book suddenly became really dark.

[Carlos Wang · Rating 4 out of 5]

2016年的國際書展主題是匈牙利，這本小說是十九世紀末二十世紀初的作家Gardonyi Geza寫的作品，背景是以一個虛構角色為主題，圍繞著五世紀的傳奇人物Attila，述說的一段“愛情故事”。

大家應該都對這個作者很陌生，我也是在書展文宣偶然看到，然後跑去出版社那小小，完全不起眼的攤位，趁著不到兩百台票的折扣買下來的。河中文化比較知名的是我順便帶走的另外一本《阿拉伯人眼中的十字軍東征》，不過它新出了一本講維也納圍城戰的小說，算是少數有符合這次書展主題的出版社吧。回到作者身上。Geza在匈牙利是頗知名的作家，寫作風格界於寫實與浪漫之間，更重要的是，他搭上了當時開始流行的一種歷史小說寫法：用虛構角色去穿插真實故事，這在十九世紀末是很“新”的。而且這本《匈奴秘境》講的Attila又是匈牙利人心目中的祖先，雖然這點不無可疑之處，但在當時應該是很多該國人都認同，有其“政治正確”跟“民族大義”。當然，隔一百多年，又是在千里之外的台灣，如今是完全感受不到這種情境。坦白說，做為小說，它的情節平淡老梗，主角威能強大之外，可取之處大概只剩下歷史情境部分，作者真的描寫的入木三分，不負盛譽了。

最後非說不可的是，基本上本書可以算相當的用心，但也非常的失敗。它的主題冷門，譯者或出版社準備了精美的插圖跟新繪的地圖，值得稱道，但是，編校這塊卻讓我大搖其頭。從錯別字開始，跳行，斷句，甚至連標點符號都亂搞，真的很想痛批：「這樣水平你敢拿出來賣喔？比我大學時代的報告校對還不如耶！」我看這本書的時候旁邊拿著立可帶跟原子筆邊看邊改，雖然我知道我不會再看第二次但就是想這麼做。大概手賤吧。

回想起書展的時候去它的攤位，那兩位工讀生看筆者跑來指定找這本書的樣子，我在想她是不是也很詫異會有人想買.....

[Emi Kottasz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hungarian classic, about the times of Attila the Hun. A Greek slave Zeta falls in love with a hun girl and begins to obsess about the lives and ways of the Huns. Attila is portrayed as a powerful, rugged yet intelligent man who is simply carrying out God’s will in destroying and conquering others. He’s much admired by his own people and by the girl that Zeta is in love with. Zeta goes to battle to have a chance of winning Emôke over and after much blood and destruction he manages to get home only to realise he is still no more than a slave.

[Góczán Judit · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gyermekkorom meghatározó olvasmánya! Fordulatos, érzelmes, érthetetlen és misztikus, ami egy birodalomban, egy uralkodó fejében és egy ember szívében zajlik!
Érdekes volt majd 30 év múltán újraolvasni, az emlék-vázlatból újra felidézni a teljes történetet, más árnyalatokat előhúzni, rég elfeledett színekkel színezni… Szeretném még egyszer eljátszani ezt ezzel a történettel! Megérdemelné, de nekem azt még ki kell érdemelnem! ,-)

[Dani Christo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Az Egri csillagok rossz emlékei után ez könyv teljesen megváltoztatta a véleményemet Gárdonyi munkásságáról. A nyelvezet néhol elgyönyörködtetett, máshol meg fejtörést okozott a mára már nem használt szavak miatt. Aki szereti a történelmi regényeket, annak mindenképpen kötelező darab.

[Max Vertrauen · Rating 4 out of 5]

A really interesting historical fiction depicting a slave's life in the camp of Attila the Hun. Aside from a few plot holes and unresolved story lines it is quite entertaining. I really liked the detailed descriptions of the peoples and places.

[Szanacska · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nem tudom miert kezdtem el olvasni. Az egri csillagok anno gyerekfejjel kellett (!), hogy a kezembe keruljon, es mivel hosszu volt, nem olvastam el. Ez most fiatal kozepkorukent elvarazsolt. Nagyon jo a hangulata, az erzes, amit araszt, a tortenet....szuper! Orulok, hogy eolvastam.

[二六 侯 · Rating 4 out of 5]

這全譯本故事相當精采，匈牙利版的插圖雖不符時代但甚美，然而標點校對真是不忍卒睹。

[Баш Стефан · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jedna od omiljenijih knjiga moga detinjstva 🤠

[Mert M]

nice

[Ioannidesz Evjeniosz · Rating 5 out of 5]

Csodas!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Hógolyó · Rating 5 out of 5]

I had a huge crush on Attila.

[Marion · Rating 5 out of 5]

Esos clásicos que se leen de un tirón con facilidad. Perfecto.
Hermosa lectura

[Brady Longmore · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thoroughly enjoyed this turn-of-the-century coming of age story. Reminiscent of Treasure Island.

[Bof · Rating 3 out of 5]

3,75

[Tim Margon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Verodostojen sprehod v preteklost in odkrivanje sveta Hunov skozi oči na vzhodnorimskem dvoru izšolanega sužnja.

[Alex · Rating 3 out of 5]

main character did too much stupid shit for my taste

[Đào Kiên · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bản Việt ngữ là Tâm Hồn Bí Ẩn