It was written by Bela Illes, a Hungarian of Jewish descent who was born in what is now Košice, Slovakia in 1895. He was a left-wing writer and journalist who wrote this autobiographical novel between 1937 and 1939 while in exile in the Soviet Union.
Part One - New Wine - Vol I pp. 7 - 179
In Part One of Carpathian Rhapsody we are introduced to young Géza Bálint, A Hungarian Jew who is the narrator of the book, as he describes his early life in the city of Berehove in what is now Zakarpattia Oblast (province) of western Ukraine near the border with Hungary. His father had vineyards and a winery and enjoyed his Hungarian wines. Berehove has long been the cultural centre of the Hungarian minority in Ukraine. While the Hungarians were the minority, the Jewish citizens sided with the Hungarians in opposition to the native Rusyns of the region, giving the Hungarians control over the political offcies of the city. The book describes a culture where Jews were below Hungarians, but that the local Rusyns had the least status in the community even though they were the largest group. When a beloved friend commits suicide a distraught Géza goes to live with his uncle and aunt in Svalyava for several years where he attends school and learns more about the class distinctions of the area and the "cultural superiority of the Hungarian race." This section ends when Géza's father goes bankrupt and has to sell his home and business in Berehove. The family moves to Budapest because his mother said everybody could make a living there.
Part Two - Men Of The Forest Vol I p. 181 - Vol II p.82
While in school in Budapest, with his parents trying to survive and his country Jewish background isolating him from the upper class Hungarian students, Géza starts to develop Socialist beliefs. After several years of struggle, a rich uncle finds Geza's father a job as a woodyard warehouseman in a small forest village which the author calls Peméte near Sighet, Romania. The lumberyard was culturally segregated with Hungarians running the business, and Jews as middle managers, while the majority Rusyn population got only the lowest paying and most menial work. The remoteness of the village made harvesting the lumber difficult work, and the lumberyard had difficulty making a profit. The workers put in long hours with hand saws and axes for very little money and could barely survive. At times the workers were visited by labor organizers who taught them how to stage slowdowns and demand higher wages. These meetings happened away from the eyes of the police and management, during the night, deep in the forest around campfires. Rusyn nationalists also visited these campfires to stir up the oppressed workers against the Hungarian and Jewish owners and management. The police and the government tried to suppress the leaders of the movements but with little success. All the while rumors of a coming war build. This section ends with the beginning of World War I.
Part Three - Gergely Zsatkovics's Kingdom - Vol II pp. 83 - 284
Wikipedia says that "Gregory Ignatius Zhatkovich was an American lawyer and political activist for Rusyns in the United States and Europe. He was the first governor of Carpathian Ruthenia, the Rusyn autonomous province of Czechoslovakia and the only American who was a governor of any territory that was or became part of the Soviet Union."
This section of the book covers the very confusing years during and after World War I when what we know today as Zakarpattia Oblast, Ukraine was being separated from Hungary and ruled by an American lawyer from General Motors.
Wikipedia describes this section as follows. "The highly partisan book presents Zhatkovich in a negative way, claiming that he was the dupe of American and French business and military interests, and that he had little control of or interest in the territory placed under his charge. The book also asserts that the imperial interests which placed Zhatkovich in charge were mainly interested in using the territory as a conduit for arms and ammunition to the anti-Soviet Polish forces fighting the Polish-Soviet War of 1920, then going on directly to the north, and that Zhatkovich had to resign after failing to stop local Communists from holding strikes as well as repeatedly sabotaging the railway line from Prague, through which the munitions were passing."
I think this book would be of interest to Rusyn-American descendants of the people of Carpathian Ruthenia and it is sad that the book only went through one printing in Hungary. I could not find copies of the book for sale in the USA, and was only able to find a copy in a large university library. I can understand that with its strong Socialist leanings, it may not be of interest to everyone.
