Blessed Charles of Austria

 Blessed Charles of Austria: A Holy Emperor and His Legacy by Charles Coulombe, 374 pages

The subtitle of this biography of the last of the Habsburg monarchs is certain to raise a few eyebrows.  At best, Charles was helpless as Austria-Hungary went down in defeat in the last years of World War I, ultimately being dissolved by the victorious Allies into a handful of feuding ethno-states.  What kind of legacy could he have?  More generally, how is it possible for an emperor to be "holy"?  Did not the high priests of Enlightenment indelibly write their verdict that "no one can reign innocently" across the pages of history in the blood of Louis XVI and his family?

As Charles Coulombe relates, the life of Blessed Charles was dominated by three great loves - his God, his family, and his people.  These were not competing, but complimentary, just as his love for his wife only reinforced his love of his children, and his children his love of his wife.  These were loves tested, proven, and refined through suffering, yet loves to which Charles remained faithful with his whole heart.  It is for this reason that he has been raised to the altars of the universal Church even as the men who supplanted and persecuted him are increasingly maligned or forgotten.

It is no doubt possible to construct a coherent biography of Charles of Austria, based entirely on his external acts, which portrays him as yet another incompetent Machiavel, interested only in power, badly exercising it when he had it and futilely attempting to regain it after he lost it.  This would seem superficially plausible, but would miss the inner life of the man and the self-sacrificial ideal of rulership he represents.  It would also do nothing to change the disastrous course the world has been on since at least 1914.

Realm of St Stephen

The Realm of St Stephen: A History of Medieval Hungary 895-1526 by Pal Engel, translated by Tamas Palosfalvi, 371 pages

As the ninth century neared its end, a new wave of nomadic horsemen from the Eurasian steppes invaded and settled the Carpathian plain.  They called themselves the Magyars, and were of Finno-Ugraic stock, but their neighbors called them by the names of their Turkic predecessors, the Onogurs and the Huns.  Unlike those earlier arrivals, however, the Magyars managed to establish a stable state and, not unrelatedly, converted to Christianity.  The kingdom of Hungary survived for centuries until buried under the last and greatest Turkish power in the form of the Ottomans.  What remnants survived were absorbed by the Austrian Habsburgs, but the memory endured until the reestablishment of the kingdom in the nineteenth century.

There are a paucity of sources for early medieval Hungary, and what sources exist require careful sifting.  Engel carefully employs archaeological and linguistic evidence to give as accurate a picture as possible, and if this is sometimes not as full a picture as might be wished, the author deserves credit for recognizing the limitations of current knowledge.  The result is a landmark work that not only expands the readers knowledge of Hungarian history, but also provides for illuminating comparisons with analogous developments in other parts of medieval Latin Europe.

The World's Most Orphaned Nation

"... The World's Most Orphaned Nation" by Joseph Cardinal Mindszenty, 111 pages

Joseph Mindszenty was ordained a priest in 1915.  He was briefly imprisoned during the Hungarian revolutions that followed the defeat of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in the First World War.  He was ordained Bishop of Veszprem in 1944, only to be imprisoned after a German-backed coup brought the fascist Arrow Cross party to power that same year.  After the end of the Second World War, he became Archbishop of Esztergom and Primate of Hungary, and was named a Cardinal by Pope Pius XII.  In 1948 he was arrested by the Soviet-backed communist government, and tortured into confessing to a litany of crimes including conspiring with the US to start a third World War and plotting to crown Otto von Habsburg as King of Hungary.  When the puppet government lost power in 1956, Cardinal Mindszenty was freed, but during the Soviet invasion and occupation which followed he was forced to take refuge in the American embassy in Budapest.  For 15 years he was unable to set foot outside the embassy, lest he be arrested by the waiting secret police.

In 1962, this book was published by an American relative of the Cardinal, collecting selections from his speeches, sermons, and writings.  There are some quite powerful passages, such as the account of his ordination of ten priests in a fascist prison in 1944 - Mindszenty relates that the candidates had to share a single candle, a single surplice, and a single cassock, but each had his own assigned prison guard.  It is interesting to hear voices raised against the deportation of Jews in 1944 also oppose the deportation of ethnic Germans in 1946.  Unfortunately there is little in the way of introduction for the individual pieces that make up this patchwork book, so that it is difficult to tell when and under what circumstances a sermon was given or a pastoral letter issued, which rather dulls their effect overall.

Great reading for anyone interested in the aftermath of World War II, resistance to tyranny, or human rights in general.

Love & Treasure

Love & Treasure by Ayelet Waldman
334 Pages

When Jack Wiseman dies he leaves his granddaughter a mystery, to find the owner of the necklace he took from the fabled Hungarian Gold Train, a cargo of the property seized from the Jews of Hungary before they were sent to their deaths.  The reader is quickly swept up in Wiseman's recounting of his role of guarding the train in 1945 and his granddaughter's search 70 years later. 

Richly detailed, Waldman leads the reader through a maze of clues.