Customer Reviews

The Czardas (Spanish Edition)

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When I first started reading Czardas I thought that it would be light entertainment, a book not to be taken seriously. I quickly realized that the frivolity and froth of the first few chapters only serve to emphasize the sudden and tragic intrusion of history into the life of the mixed Hungarian/Jewish Ferenc family. The book takes us through the lives of this family, and particularly the two "enchanting Ferenc sisters," Eva and Amalia, as they find love, build families, and suffer the privations and tragedies of two world wars and the advent of Hungarian communism. The author has painstakingly recreated a lost world of pre-war summer dances and tulle dresses, the horrors of a cholera outbreak among WWI troops, vibrant 1920's Budapest society, the glamour and danger of Berlin in the 1930's, the devastation of the Nazi takeover, the grinding poverty of the peasants, and the harshness of Communist rule. The reader can almost hear the czardas music playing, taste the champagne and strudel, and smell the cabbage soup wafting from the peasant huts. I have read this book at least five times, and each time I enjoy another aspect of it. Highly recommended for anyone interested in 20th century history, life in Hungary, or just a good, absorbing read!

As implied in the title of my review, the book has echoes of Gone With the Wind, and yet it is an original work. I read it when I was in college and I still remember events and characters very clearly. The book is entertaining and it will certainly move you as well. Definitely worth buying.