Budapest: Between East and West by Victor Sebestyen

Budapest: Between East and West Reviews

• 
  Alexandra

  Things I knew about Budapest before reading this: it used to be two towns, and pictures of Soviet tanks in the streets in 1956. I think that's about it, really.
  
  An intriguing aspect of this book is that it's written by a man born in Budapest, whose family fled Hungary when he was a child. Sebestyen makes no secret of this, and of his connection to the country and the city. So there's a mix of 'objective' history, and also the occasional mention of how things relate to him personally. I like this kind of honesty a lot.
  
  One annoying aspect - and this might just be a personal gripe - isn't peculiar to Sebestyen, and is at least partly a reflection of the historical record (and my personal preferences). The book begins with a very brief look at what is known of the area around Budapest from pre-history, and then moves to what the Romans did. There's barely a discussion of Attila and the Huns. By p30 we're up to the year 1000. p109 and we're already at 1800 and at p272 it's the accommodation between Hungary and Hitler's Germany. The book is 377 pages long. While I know that there's a lot more evidence for the alter centuries, it always makes me despair that history is given such an unbalanced presentation. As if the modern world is the only bit worth discussing. Sigh.
  
  Despite this preponderance of modern history, Sebestyen does give a good overview of the history of Budapest - as Simon Sebag Montefiore notes in the front cover quotation., it's really a history of Central Europe. You can hardly have a history of the city without discussing the history of (what is now) the country; and in this particular case, at least some of what was happening in Austria for a few centuries. And so I learned more about the Turkish occupation, as well as how the Habsburgs managed to create Austria-Hungary as a dual monarchy; and of course the role of Hungary in both world wars and then as part of the Soviet bloc.
  
  The story is largely told chronologically, with occasional chapter breaks about particular themes - one in particular that stood out was about the role of the Jewish population in the city. I had no idea that Hungary had been something of a haven for European Jews, although they were still not safe from the occasional pogrom (because anti-Semitism is apparently just too easy). The way that Jews stood outside of the feudal system, basically - and the incredibly bizarre way Hungarian feudalism was structured, with a massive number of nobles who refused to get into trade or anything similar - meaning that Jewish artisans and traders filled that niche.
  
  This book fits into a tradition of using city histories as a way of looking at changes over time, to everything from culture and tradition to language and politics and everything else. The sub-title is pointed, here: part of Sebestyen's argument is that Hungary doesn't really fit into the way Europe sees itself, and doesn't particularly fit elsewhere either. (The story of Hungarian as a language, and the efforts to revive and develop it, is a particularly fascinating part of the book.)
  
  Thoroughly enjoyable.
• 
  Dominic Arbuthnott

  As a friend of the author, it is always hard not to give 5☆ but Victor Sebestyen has written an accessible, fast-paced and helpful history of Hungary really, with the focus on Budapest. I found the description of Buda and Pest under the Turks very interesting, they were essentially a military outpost, desolate. The book comes into its own once we reach the 19C, in particular its description of the role that Hungarians of Jewish faith played in its magnificent development after the formation of the dual-monarchy in 1867. But Victor is primarily a 20C historian and this shows in the final chapters on the Horthy regime, the seige of Budapest and the post-war rise of the Communists. Most importantly, this book stands up as a bulwark against the current regime's attempt to whitewash the Hungarian people's direct involvement in the Holocaust. I say this not to bash my adopted country of 30 years, but to avoid history, in some way, repeating itself. Germany has come to terms with its past, Hungary still needs to do the same, and I hope Victor's book will help start this process.
• 
  Matthias

  I basically read this book because of a personal fascination for pre-Communist Hungary. However, it were exactly the chapters about the Communist era that read like a page-turner. Just a pity that the book ended with the fall of the Wall. I had loved to read more about the Orbán era.
  
  In spite of the title, the book is rather a general history of Hungary, though with a special focus on Budapest (at times).
  
  Very interesting and well-written book, but with quite some factual and orthographical errors.
• 
  Alexander Mansilya-kruz

  Exemplary historical overview — pleasure to read
  
  The best historical non-fiction book I have read in years, with the right balance of learning and fun. There is a bit of a personal touch yet the book does not feel opinionated. Key figures of Hungarian history feel like real people even though they are concisely portrayed, and the specific details or anecdotes that Sebestyen selects for us are invariably both entertaining and illuminating: a nearly impossible feat for a historian with an infinite stock of sources to choose from. Highly recommended if you are planning a trip to Budapest, whether real or imaginary.
• 
  Trevor

  After spending a week in Budapest earlier this year, I hadn't realised what a chequered and turbulent past Hungary had as a whole.
  
  We know some of it from school learning the first world war etc but what came after WW2 right up until the late 80's was new to me.
  
  After trying to find a good history book on Hungary and failing badly I stumbled across this one.
  
  It's very well written and cheap too. What's not to like?
• 
  Sophie

  Very readable and quite chatty history of Budapest, from its founding to the fall of the Iron Curtain. One of the narrative strands throughout the book is how the high population of Jewish people in Budapest shaped the city, and how they were also frequently mistreated, murdered and discriminated against throughout Hungary's history.
• 
  Kathrin Peters

  Very accessible history of Budapest and Hungary more generally. Not an academic book but trustworthy and readable.