In his own time, Géza Csáth (1887–1919), writer, medical doctor, music critic, and composer, was one of the eccentric artists of the fin de siècle Hungarian artistic and journalistic culture, and until the 1960s, few people thought that his oeuvre would one day be included in the national literary canon. The imaginative universe of his literary works, together with the provocative themes of his autobiographical writings about drug addiction and erotomania, his simultaneously austere and passionate writing style, and his adventurous and tragic life story, have been a source of inspiration for numerous artists since the 1970s. One significant aspect of the recognition of Csáth can be attributed to his play Klára Zách, whose contemporary relevance and meaningfulness were discovered in the 1990s by Tamás Fodor, a member of the alternative theatre scene.

When hearing the name or title Klára Zách, Hungarian readers likely associate it with János Arany a national poet’s ballad from the 19th century, or the story from the Képes Krónika [Illustrated Chronicle], one of the earliest surviving codices depicting early national history, and it is unlikely that Géza Csáth comes to mind. Csáth’s one-act musical play, consisting of ten scenes, remained in manuscript for decades and was never staged due to the lack of musical parts. The libretto was discovered in the 1960s and was subsequently included by Zoltán Dér in the first volume of Csáth’s short stories, dramas, and scenes, entitled Ismeretlen házban [In an Unknown House] in 1977. In 1996, Tamás Fodor adapted Csáth’s Klára Zách to stage as a tragicomedy, and Mihály Szajbély included the script in the volume of Csáth’s theatre plays published that year,1 a gesture that directly linked Fodor’s work to Csáth’s textual universe. However, Fodor went beyond a mere adaptation of Csáth’s musical play by incorporating quotations from several short stories by Csáth into the play. In this paper, the focus will be on analysing Csáth’s hyper- and hypotexts in Fodor’s theatre adaptation, which incorporates Csáth’s quotations in an unmarked and somewhat altered form.

The story of Klára Zách arose from the attempted assassination of the Hungarian king, Róbert Károly, in 1330 by Felicián Zách.2 As documented in the Képes Krónika, the primary source of the story is the nobleman Zách Felicián, who was initially an ally of the powerful Hungarian lord Máté Csák, a rival of the king. He then later turned to support the king and launched an attack on Róbert Károly and his family at the royal court in Visegrád. The assassination attempt failed, but the assailant wounded the King’s hand lightly and the Queen’s severely, cutting four fingers. Felician was captured and beaten to death by the court guards. In response, the king ordered that Felician’s severed head and body parts be dispatched to different parts of the country to discourage future attempts and ordered Felician’s children to be executed with special cruelty. The Képes Krónika recounts that Felician’s daughter, Klára, underwent mutilation, losing her nose, lips, and eight of her fingers. She was then tied to a horse and dragged through several towns, compelled to shout “Thus let her who is unfaithful to the king be hanged!” Felician’s eldest daughter, Sebe, was beheaded and his sons were exiled to an island. The Képes Krónika makes no further mention of Klára, nor does it explain why Felician attacked the monarch.

None of the primary sources of historiography mention the alleged motive for the assassination. However, later works suggest that Zách sought revenge for the dishonouring of his daughter.3 This motive has been deemed plausible by posterity, as in the 19th century, the tale of a vengeful father attacking the king inspired countless artists across multiple genres. The most famous rendition is undoubtedly János Arany’s ballad from 1855, while Mór Jókai also references it in his work A magyar nemzet története regényes rajzokban [The History of the Hungarian Nation in Novel Drawings], published in 1860. Most of the works were written for the stage: Károly Kisfaludy, Lajos Kuthy, Imre Vahot, Ede Szigligeti, Kálmán Tóth, Jenő Bajza, and Árpád Abonyi adapted the tragedy of the extermination of the Záchs,4 and Viktor Langer composed an opera inspired by the tragic story of the Zách family.5 The story has become a popular subject not only in (drama) literature but also in the visual arts. Soma Orlai Petrich, Viktor Madarász, and later Aladár Körösfői-Kriesch depicted some of its scenes in oil paintings.6

Csáth had been preoccupied with the idea of setting the story of Klára Zách to music (and then staging it) from a very young age. In a diary entry from November 17, 1902, he wrote that he had composed eight stanzas of music to Arany’s Klára Zách,7 using Arany’s ballad as his main source. In 1907, the subject resurfaced, and Csáth’s diary entry indicated completion of the work.8 However, three years later, in March 1910, he wrote: “I started working on Zách Klára, and the first three scenes are nearly complete.”9 The reason for this discrepancy is uncertain, but it is plausible that he initially attempted a musical version, followed by a shift to the short story form, before revisiting the concept of staging it with music. All we know for sure is that Csáth wrote his short story Régi levél (Old Letter) in 1907, setting the narrative in an epistolary form. During that same year, another event may have also piqued Csáth’s interest in the Zách theme. Ernő Lányi composed a musical play titled Klára Zách, drawing inspiration from Arany’s ballad, which was then performed in Szabadka, Csáth’s hometown. Csáth expressed admiration for the performance in the Budapesti Napló on June 15, 1907:

“The composition comprises distinct themes that are uniquely Hungarian yet strikingly contemporary. The themes of Kázmér’s yearning, the organ music during the church scene, the girls’ sweet melody, and the theme of hopelessness all contribute to the drama. The entire piece is elegant and refined. Mihály Zichy depicted Arany’s ballads in illustrations, and Lányi should do the same in music!”10

All this means that Csáth was increasingly preoccupied with the subject for years. The choice of a historical topic seems odd in Csáth’s oeuvre;11 nevertheless, its 19th century’s adaptations, especially Arany’s ballad, contain various implicit elements that may have caught Csáth’s attention. These elements comprise the issue of sin and punishment, the characters’ vain struggle to suppress their sexual desires, post-coital shame, impulsive murderous tendencies, and brutal murders. Csáth adds his own unique style to the narrative, adapting it to fit his own image. He expertly crafts the story into a typical Csáth tale while keeping the fundamental elements of the original story intact. In the following sections, I will demonstrate how Csáth’s Zách Klára evolves into a true piece of Csáth’s writing and identify the elements he added to enhance and alter the core storyline.

As mentioned previously, Csáth has already told the cruel destruction of the Zách family in a short story in 1907 that he adapted later into a play. The short story, as its title, Régi levél, suggests, was written in epistolary format, where an anonymous letterwriter, a doorkeeper at the royal court, informs his brother of the bloody events at Visegrád. In the narrative, an external narrator, in the position of a bystander, gives a first-hand account, also expressing his own opinion:

“I thought, but more than once, that [Klára] would be disgraced in time. She used to braid her hair into two braids, and as she parted it at the back of her neck, much of her naked white skin was visible, with only faint wisps of hair remaining. It was so unusually provocative, and so unlike any other maiden’s (though most of the girls at court comb their hair in the same way), that the King’s eyes were caught at it, and so were those of Father Franciscus, the court confessor.”12

The letterwriter suggests Klára’s strong attraction affected even influential, powerful men of strong morals. The writer’s tone implies a judgement of Klára’s appearance as flirtatious and provocative. The doorman also notes the sexually exciting effect of “baby fuzzes” on Klára’s neck, a detail that seals her fate, as highlighted in Fodor’s play with a scene titled Pihék [Fuzzes].

After completing the short story, Csáth, similar to Ernő Lányi, opted for a musical adaptation as a potentially more authentic medium to portray the story, as one of his instructions reveals it. “The emotions that lingered on the stage after the prince’s departure were spread throughout the orchestra, creating a sense of sluggish despair that lacked direction.”13 Although the instructions were made for the musical composition, the written music itself was never completed. As such, we must rely solely on textual sources to reconstruct Csáth’s ideas for the piece.

Csáth employs a frame narrative within the musical play, an important poetic technique in his entire oeuvre. Upon examining his short stories, a noticeable trend towards an abundance of works utilising the frame story emerges in 1912, though the technique had already been present in earlier years.14 The play’s opening scene introduces the courtier Mária, who calls out Klára’s name. In the play’s closing scene, Kázmér, the true catalyst of the tragedy, the prince who besieged her with his love, also whispers Klára’s name, framing the events.

Csáth introduces several new characters in the story, including Kornelius, the court physician, who attempts to cure Kázmér’s constant complaints of illness through baths, potions, and stomach-strengthening drops. As a practicing psychiatrist and doctor, Csáth’s works frequently adopt a medical vantage point, utilising the doctor theme in various short stories, often featuring doctor-patient dialogues. Csáth contrasts the teachings of Christian religion with the hedonistic concept of the primacy of bodily desires in his theatrical dialogues. His work also features the juxtaposition and collision of different philosophical and moral viewpoints, another trait of Csáth’s texts. Kázmér, who is reading Ovid’s Ars Amatoria, receives a warning from Gyulafy, tutor to the ruler’s children, that the book contains morally questionable content that he believes is “harmful and poisonous to the soul.” In the confession scene, the super-ego and the id, known from Freudian psychology, are embodied as Klára discloses her secret sexual fantasies and lustful dreams to Father Franciscus, who grants her absolution for her sins in exchange for a few prayers.

*

Tamás Fodor adapted Csáth’s musical play into a one-act tragicomedy with twelve scenes and a postlude. Fodor directed the play, which was staged by Studio K, Budapest, in 1996 and won the Theatre Critics’ Award for Best Alternative Performance in the 1995–1996 theatre season. Audiovisual resources for the production are also available. The play was also staged at the People’s Theatre in Subotica in 1999, under the direction of Zoltán Hernyák. The National Museum and Institute of Theatre History, Budapest, has preserved a recording of the performance.15

The dominant narrative standpoint of the plot is indicated by the subtitle “Tragicomedy of Our National Greatness.” The term “our national greatness” draws from Károly Kisfaludy’s play, Mohács,16 and establishes an ironical intertextual connection with it, which is further accentuated by the genre’s code that sharply challenges the historical pathos.17 In Fodor’s play, the events are framed by a chronicler’s summary; thus, he retains the framing narrative familiar from Csáth’s writing. The appearance of the chronicler, who serves as an objective and detached Csáthian narrator, suggests an intention of aesthetic-poetic pattern-tracing. Fodor achieves this, however, not only through structural adaptation but also by incorporating selected passages from prominent Csáth short stories into the dramatic text. These excerpts, often reworked, lack clear indications and are occasionally presented out of context. Nevertheless, the Csáth texts add nuance to the play’s psychological motivations, “validating the events portrayed on stage.”18

In the following examples, I will illustrate Fodor’s quotation technique, how he transforms texts, and how he places them in new contexts. The first text is the opening scene, but the last, in terms of chronology. Court servants Rozi and Mihály wash the corpse of Zách Felicián, and Rozi, an unconditional believer in the king, takes advantage of the situation to express her opinion about the already deceased assassin:

“Rozi: Mihály. Hold on a second. I want something. […]

Mihály: What on earth has come over you?

Rozi: Now that you’re dressed like that. Now it’s Zách Felicián again (spits in the face). It was an occasion.

[…]

Rozi: Just once more. […] If I hadn’t done that, I would have regretted it for the rest of my life.”19

The passage describes a scene reminiscent of the slapping scene from Csáth’s short story Trepov a boncolóasztalon (Trepov on the Dissecting Table). It also touches on the taboo topic of necrophilia.

“‘Wait, Uncle Nikoláj, I want something.’

‘What do you want, you?’

‘You’ll see.’

Vanja tiptoed around the room, looking into the dissecting room. Finally, he stepped up to the corpse, suddenly raised his hand, and slapped it hard three times across the face. After the slaps, the two men looked at each other in silence.

‘I did this, said Vanja, because it would have been a despicable thing not to have desecrated this impudent man, this murderer of robbers, the vilest man that ever rotted in the earth. It was an opportunity!…’

[…] ‘Wait a minute, the other one said, just one more time!’

He started again. And one last snapping slap to the corpse’s face. […] After a while, Vanja spoke:

‘You know, Uncle Nikoláj, if I hadn’t done this now, I would have regretted it all my life.’”20

In both passages, we observe the voices of marginalised individuals who lack agency in shaping events. Rozi punishes Felicián for his rebellion against the ruler, and so does Vanya for the actions of Trepov, who is blamed for the deaths of the masses. However, the ramifications of their actions are inconsequential, and they merely imitate the gestures of justice in a self-congratulatory fashion. An interview with the director indicates that Fodor’s primary focus was to present a subordinate social position and a lower perspective in his tragicomedy.21 The unsettling scene from Trepov, presented at the start of the performance and disrupting the chronological narrative, imbues Felicián’s character—accused by the court’s attendants—with heightened significance. The scene’s inclusion invites repeated reflection throughout the unfolding of the story, prompting the ongoing question of whether Felicián is indeed responsible for the tragic events.

Mihály and Rozi are also the central characters in a reworked scene from Fekete csönd (Black Silence). Tortured by jealousy, the couple made love in the kitchen while cleaning fish, and in Fodor’s interpretation, the citation borrowed from the short story expresses Mihály’s erotic monologue:

“I’ll set your father’s house on fire, fear not, when that ragged daughter of his sleeps in her room, between snow-white pillows. Her breasts rise slowly up and go down. And then there is the fire in her bed. My fire. She wakes up in a bed of fire. And her white feet are kissed dark brown by the red fire. And her head will be bald because her hair is burned. Bald! You hear that, baldy? The father’s beautiful brunette daughter will be ugly; bald.”22

In contrast, the original passage in the short story Fekete csönd is in fact nothing more than the delirium of a broken mind:

“I set fire to the house of the priest because his daughter sleeps in the room, in a snow-white bed. Her breasts rise slowly up and go down. Then the fire hits her bed. My fire. She wakes up in a bed of fire. And her white feet are kissed dark brown by the red fire. And her head will be bald, because her hair is burnt. Bald! Hear that, baldy? The father’s beautiful blond daughter will be bald.”23

The passage’s transposition is evidently informed by a comparable psychological state: the loss of judgement and the release of primal and instinctual impulses. As such, this behaviour is equally characteristic of intentional property destruction and arson as it is of uninhibited sexual behaviour.

If we examine the reception of Fodor’s performance, it is worth recalling István Tasnádi’s review of the performance at Studio K from 1996. As Tasnádi says, “Tamás Fodor has transformed the ballad theme into an analytical drama. The story is not a parable of the guilty and the innocent, the good versus the bad. Here, man meets man, which is a rather sinister thing.”24 However, this important statement is worth refining. It is that Fodor adapts Csáth’s treatment of the ballad theme: it was Csáth who transformed the story into an analytical drama, and Fodor’s interpretation only nuanced and deepened it further. According to Mihály Szajbély’s review of the performance, at the narrative’s core Csáth’s true interest lied in the complex psychological situation. It presents a dilemma: why did Klára and Kázmér’s mutual attraction result in tragedy and bloodshed, even in the absence of clear culprits?25 The unhappy ending is, without a doubt, predictable: the conflict between moral standards and sensual desires, the battle against repression, and the outburst of instincts can only culminate in a tragedy. Fodor extends this sobering situation even further, emphasising Csáth’s conclusion that repressed desires can lead, even if indirectly, to the development of fatal impulses.

The narrative of Klára Zách possesses inherent storytelling quality, as János Arany already noted and reinforced through balladic fragmentation, elliptical structure, and the silencing of the antecedents. However, Csáth (along with Fodor) obliterates obscurity by elevating the psychological motivations of the characters, where analytical and scholarly understanding clarifies and reveals the mysteries.

Both Csáth and Fodor approach the story without emotional bias: Zách Felicián is no longer a symbol of personal rebellion and self-sacrifice against a foreign power, nor is Klára a symbol of virginity and purity. The character of Kázmér is also nuanced, and neither version portrays him as a heartless rapist. Zoltán Dér considers the play’s novelty to lie in the development of the character of Kázmér within the context of Csáth’s drama:

“The uniqueness of Csáth’s play, in comparison to Arany’s ballad, is that Prince Kázmér is compelled by the weight of a deadly ailment to seize the single opportunity he envisions for redemption from Klára Zách. His actions are not premeditated but propelled by the overwhelming intensity of the moment and the illness-induced fever. He not only benefits from, but also falls victim to, the abnormal passion that overtakes him.”26

The symbolism in Fodor’s production effectively upholds the plot. The wall clock lacking hands connotes a timeless story and problem. Even though the knotted rope dangling on the wall is not tied around anyone’s neck during the performance, it acts as a prologue by foreshadowing the tragic outcome of the events. The mirror, which all characters gaze into during the play, forces characters to confront themselves and each other, highlighting the validity of psychological interpretation. Meanwhile, the tub in the centre of the stage is multi-functional, transforming from a dining table to Rozi’s washtube during Klára’s erotic dream confession. Rozi replies to Klára, who is tormented by her lustful dreams, in the words of Father Franciscus, (who is absent as a staged person from Fodor’s version): “A dream itself is not a crime, only if you think about it. If you take delight in it. That’s what Father Franciscus told me. Ten Pater Nosters and ten Hail Mary, and penance is done.”27 But this is also where the sexual encounter will take place, and Felicián will either be submerged in the water basin or his body will be placed on it, as depicted in the earlier scene.

Although Fodor could not completely compensate for the lack of musical accompaniment, he approached the source material in a manner that confirmed Csáth’s “presence” in the drama’s text. Fodor stressed the psychological approach’s validity by integrating excerpts from Csáth’s short stories into his tragicomedy. The selection may have been influenced by the necessity of storytelling, but the hypotexts, which have been highlighted, transformed, and inserted into the dramatic text, are a set of familiar and characteristic motifs from the Csáth text. Fodor expands upon the themes of Csáth’s textual universe, including violence, sexuality, conscience, and defence mechanisms, through additional texts taken from the short stories. This approach presents Fodor’s work as not only an analysis of Csáth’s artistic objectives but also a contribution to them. This is supported by his choice of a genre from Csáth’s body of work that references the Art Nouveau, Impressionist, and later Expressionist movements of the period. The author presents Csáth as a multifaceted thinker who perceives music, imagery, and narrative as intertwined. The scope encompasses not only the protagonist but also Csáth himself, who seeks to convey his artistic universe.

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