The Storyteller: Memory, Secrets, Magic and Lies

by Anna Porter

On long walks through the once-grand European capital of Budapest, set on the banks of the Danube, in confidences whispered in splendid fin-de-siècle coffee houses, Vili Racz shared his wisdom and his stories with his granddaughter Anna. Some of his stories were as old as the Carpathian basin and some still held the sting of recent war and hardship. Some were fanciful works of imagination. His tales encompassed the arrival of the Huns and later the Magyars in Europe. He told her of the Turkish wars, of the rise and fall of the House of Hapsburg, and of two devastating world wars. He continued telling her stories through the advent of the Communist era, the 1956 Revolution in Hungary, and the great migration that followed. One day, Anna would have her own stories to tell. She was born during World War II, as bombs rained down on Budapest and a group of Jews hid in the basement of the family house. As Anna grows up in the beautiful but beleaguered city, her grandfather's stories of heroes and strife and survival give her a personal sense of history and of knowing what's right in a country the world seems to have forgotten. The Storyteller is also a vivid and textured saga of the whole Rácz family. There is prejudice and pride, grief and frivolity, violence and glitter, loves, loyalties and betrayals in the tumultuous years from the Second World War to the 1956 revolution and the family's exile to New Zealand. During this time, young Anna briefly goes to prison with her mother, sees her beloved grandfather sentenced to hard labour by the Communists, and witnesses unspeakable human loss in the streets of Budapest at the height of the revolution in 1956. But always at the heart of this engrossing memoir are the amazing stories of her amazing grandfather.

Genres: Hungary, History, Nonfiction, Autobiography, Biography

336 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2000

About the author

Anna (Szigethy) Porter began her Canadian publishing career in 1969 at McClelland & Stewart (M&S) as editorial coordinator, under Jack McClelland’s directorship. Porter eventually rose to become VP and editor-in-chief at M&S. She worked with, among others, Margaret Laurence, Matt Cohen, Al Purdy, Irving Layton, Peter C Newman and Margaret Atwood.
Porter started her publishing company, Key Porter Books, in partnership with Key Publishers' Michael de Pencier in 1982. They published, among others, Allan Fotheringham, Jean Chretien, Joe Clark, Margaret Atwood, Peter Lougheed, Fred Bruemmer and Conrad Black.
Anna Porter is an Officer of the Order of Canada and the recipient of the Order of Ontario.
Anna Porter retired from publishing in April 2005. She is the author of, so far, 12 books.

Reviews

[Chrissie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I totally loved this book. It enthralled me from beginning to tnd. You learn Hungarian history through marvelous stories. You learn the value of storytelling. I feel that a book like this teaches the reader how it was to live in Hungary through the historical events. I am glad I read this book immediately after:Niki: The Story of a Dog. You get a very Kafkaesque view of life. The total absurdity of life. In one book the main character is Communist, while in the other a wealthy landowning aristocrat. Both end up in prison for absurd reasons. Both were so utterly destroyed by this experience. Anothe important issue is how do you raise a child in such times, when daily life demands that you lie. Nothing is what it seems. The reader comes to understand how such a life might feel. And the women - well they are marvelous. Strong. And Vili, the author's grandfather, you will love him too. As I have shown below, the writing is marvelous.

Through page 176: Here is another little taste of the writing:

"I was eight years old and trying to improve my fencing technique in the basement of the old Piarist school, where the priests weren't allowed to teach real school anymore, although they were allowed to pray as long as they didn't mention the government in their prayers."

"My grandfather use to come and meet me at the end of fencing class on his way home from the button factory. Though he was up earlier than I was and he had been lifting heavy stuff all day, he showed no signs of tiredness. He bounced down the stairs, three at a time, not even holding on to the rail as I did, his patched leather gloves hanging out of his pocket, his light wool coat flapping open like a cape. He never bothered to button up, even on the coldest days. He hadn't bought working clothes for the factory. He wore his old suits. 'What's the sense of saving them?' he'd remonstrate with my grandmother. 'When all this is over, they'll be too old-fashioned to wear. '"

"By "all this" he meant the communist government, but he was too careful to say that out loud."

Look at the cover carefully - there you see grandfather and granddaughter, he in his Hussar uniform! Great photos. I so enjoy reading a hardcover book. I bought it second-hand. Hovever there is no map so you must get out your atlas. I still love it.

Through page 76: And it is funny. Two quotes from page 76 follow:

"My grandmother stood up quickly and marched out of the bedroom without putting on her blue dressing gown. Her nightgown was pink and almost transparent. I was really glad she wore underpants."

"Leah's husband was wearing gis grey overcoat unbuttoned and stood with his back to the fireplace as if to warm himself, although I knew no one had set the fire yet. My mother has said he wasn't very bright."

I will not say what has caused the family upproar. The lines are so absolutely marvelous.... Now I am not going to say anymore. I am just going to sit back and suck up the story of this family living in Hungary during tumultuous times.

Through page 39: I absolutely adore the text. Look at the title of this book: The Storyteller: Memory, Secrets, Magic and Lies. You get exactly that! The author, as well as her grandfather Vili, have the knack for telling stories, ie telling about their lives so they become magical tales, revealing secrets, wonderful and ghastly times, magic and lies. I could quote any paragraph and get you to drool for more. Here is about the author's birth, a good place to start:

"I was born during the German occupation of Hungary. The British and the Americans were bombing Budapest."

"My grandfather had been trying to round up nurses to attend to my mother in the emergency wing of the Frigyesi Hospital. The nurses were too busy with the wounded and the dying to pay attention to a young girl's first birth. My mother was barely seventeen and no one had bothered to tell her about childbirth. It had taken her quite a while to figure out how people got pregnant, and that was shocking enough without the pain that followed. Luckily, Vili had the brilliant idea to knock her out with morphine and extract me howling into the wartorn world."

Here, the author's mother is telling her daughter about how she met her father:

"'I want to tell you about your father,' she said."

"There was no point in telling her I didn't want to hear, so I looked up at her, thinking that if only she would hurry up we could get into the circus where the laughter was getting lounder."

"'There use to be boxes - balconies where whole families sat,' she continued more slowly than I wanted. 'Istvàn was in the next balcony. He had a few friends with him. All, except your father, were in uniform. He was very dashing with his grey felt hat and kid gloves, his striped trousers and the way he came over and kissed Grandma's hand, then Sari's and Leah's (her sisters), and last mine. At sixteen, not many men kiss your hand. He bent right over mine and looked at me the way men use to look at my sisters, not the way anyone had looked at me before......'"

Wait till you read about the sisters.

History and biogarphy and wonderful writing and dialogue. Just my cup of tea.

First few pages: Some authors make you believe your are reading a fairy tale, when it is in fact about real people. In their blood they are storytellers. Here follows a quote from page 18 about Petronella,the paternal grandmother of the author's grandfather. The person speaking is the mother of the author's grandfather. She is speaking to her son about his grandmother:

"The marble of the pool, she told him, had come from the Carpathian Mountains, near his ancestral home. It had been a gift for his grandmother Petronella Racz. She had been a tiny woman, but fearless. It was Petronella who had taught Vili's father, György, to fence. She had been fast on her feet, quick with her blade, and her eyes never wavered. She rode a horse like a man. Her dark hair fanned out behind her, her skirts rode up to her knees, she held the horse so tight between her legs that she could leg go of the reins and still control him. It is how Hungarian ride, effortless, light, always in control."

I love it. History and learning about different cultures, couldn't be more entertaining. So far so good.

[Brenda D · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book while I was visiting Budapest and it was very meaningful to experience the past while at the same time enjoying present-day city highlights!

At first I found the author's style jarring - fragments of the past were presented - often with gaps with stories that were (seemingly) unconnected to previous narrative. Written like the memories of a child or "remembrance of times past". Gradually a clearer picture emerged, particularly after I visited the House of Terror (Budapest), I had a better understanding that the stories represented the reality of experiencing events as if they were occuring in the present - events that are currently happening - rather than distanced through a telling which includes the context in history or how things would turn out for those involved. This is a unique approach that is also very evocative.

I started with a "3" rating in the beginning but as I persisted I moved toward a "5" - in the end I decided upon a 4 or 4.5 given that I often had to look up people and events on wiki to have the necessary context for what was happening. It would have been helpful to have photograph to accompany the story (I read an e-version) so perhaps the hard copy includes these and a family tree as there were a lot of names (and husbands!).

In the end, I would highly recommend reading this book - particularly if you are thinking of visiting Budapest (and you should be thinking of visiting Budapest - it is an amazing city!)

[Derrick Grose · Rating 4 out of 5]

Anna Porter reveals a very personal history of Hungary as it is revealed through the stories and lives of her grandfather, her mother, herself and other family members. She reflects on the tragedies in the struggle to preserve Hungarian identity through the rise and fall of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, two World Wars and the Cold War. It is fascinating to read a consciously subjective account of how people experienced, coped with and interpreted the events of history.

[Dorothy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This memoir by Anna Porter of Key Porter Books was well written and extremely informative about the world she lived in both in WWII and post war years in Hungary. I wonder about the total veracity of the conversation and memories details within the book as the conversations between she and her grandfather are very detailed. He is a man of contradictions but a central part of her world. I find much in common with her relationship with her grandfather and the larger than life personality that he surrounds her with and am appalled by what the people in her country went through. An interesting read but one that didn't prove impossible to put down.

[Peggy Walt · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved reading this book by Anna Porter, Canadian publisher/author. I've met her a few times over the years at ACP meetings, and she always seemed a no nonsense, practical sort of person. Having now read what she lived through as a child in Hungary, it's no wonder she doesn't suffer fools gladly. I learned a lot about Hungarian history (although sometimes got confused) and her storyteller grandfather is a once in a generation character. Highly recommended.

[Candace · Rating 5 out of 5]

Anna Porter takes the reader back into the lives of those living through the Nazi and Soviet occupation of Hungary. She tells her story through narrative, historical reference and through the marvelous tales she heard from her beloved Grandfather, Vili.
Her childhood voice is truly authentic, and her writing is engaging.

[Lindasp · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great way to learn Hungarian history in story-telling form and Anna's grandfather, Vili, was a very talented story teller. I was fascinated by what the family went through from WWII, the Revolution and then their exile to New Zealand. I can hardly imagine what Anna did even as a young child in that situation.

[Cadillacrazy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book tells the story of the hungarin people and the destruction that war brings through the eyes of a proud old man(the storyteller) and his granddaughter (the book writer). It is well-written, and interesting.

[Robt. · Rating 3 out of 5]

I seem to have read a Canadian paperback edition not pictured here.

[Nicole · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this one - her grandfather's storytelling skills seem to have been passed on.