This is some book! It opens with the author, Kati Marton, a journalist and author, seeking information from Hungary about the events of her childhood and her journalist parents. She is warned by the case worker that she may not like all that she finds. Lucky for us that Ms. Marton forged ahead and delivers a gripping account of what happens when governments garner too much power.
Hungary at the end of World War Two was a country in the midst of radical changes. Before the war Hungary, especially Budapest, had been a cultural center. There were plays, movies, authors, great food and most of all, a belief in the future. When the war ended all that changed. The Russians were in control and the noose was tightening on all the social freedoms which we take for granted here in America.
Kati Marton was the daughter of Endre and Ilona Marton, two journalists who worked for the Associated Press and United Press, respectively. Endre's parents were Jewish and did nothing to hide that fact. Endre was the grandson of a Rabbi and a devotee of all things Western and he did little, if anything, to hide that.
When the war ended the Russians inherited Hungary as a part of their so-called "satellite" states. The intellectual and political freedoms which were once the norms of Hungarian Society began to fade away. Endre and Ilona Marton decided to ignore all this and continued leading open lives. They even owned an American car, a Studebaker, at a time when there were less than 2,000 cars in the entire country. Their children's clothes came from the hand me downs of the American Ambassador's residence. All this set them apart from the crowd. It also, undoubtedly contributed to their downfall.
When the Hungarian Government banned all foreign reporting, the Martons continued to show up for daily briefings at the American Legation. When the Communists ordered the Legation to cease showing American movies and hosting concerts, as well as shut the library, the Legation refused and the Martons, as reporters, continued to cover these events. This did little to elevate their position with the Hungarian government.
Kati and her older sister Julia, led a life of privlege amidst a background of increasing gloom as the Communists continued their march toward intellectual and political darkness. All around the Martons people whispered their private thoughts to one another. But the Martons kept on with life as if all this would soon pass.
When Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin died in 1955 many people expected that some normalcy would return to the Soviet Union and hence the "satellite" states. Nothing would turn out to be further from the truth. In 1955 Ms. Martons parents were arrested for "espionage", a convenient way to shut down the last remnants of freedom of the press. The children were present when the AVO (State Secret Police and sucessors to the earlier Arrowheads) came in the middle of the night to search the apartment and take the mother away. Their father had already been imprisoned.
To make matters worse, the family friends that had agreed to take care of their children if should something like this occur, backed out and left the children sitting on the sidewalk outside their home.
When Ms. Marton began this quest for the history of her family's ordeal she was told that she was opening a "Pandora's Box" and may regret what she learns. For instance, the file contains not ony the childrens artwork, but depositions by their nanny as well as neighbors. Her parents seperate affairs are recounted in detail in the reports of the agents assigned to watch them. There is no shred of privacy, or dignity, left intact. But sometimes things have unintended effects.
Ms. Marton is able to find solace in the fact that her parents were so human, that they were in some ways flawed. And she takes great pride in the fact that her parents fought, and paid dearly, for their beliefs. In the files of the Secret Police she finds descriptions of things she had forgotten. There are reports that showed how much love and attention the Martons heaped upon their daughters. Some of the most touching aspects of Ms. Martons childhood are restored through reading the files of the Secret Police. Talk about irony!
Eventually, by the early spring of 1956, her parents are released. The files show that the father had agreed to do some work for the Hungarian Government, but there is little evidence to support that he ever made good on that promise.
Eventually the family is reunited and they emigrate to America where Ms. Marton becomes an accomplished writer and author, as well as an award winning correspondent for NPR and ABC.
The lesson learned here is that sometimes the bad guys win, but sometimes they don't. There are no guarantees. But we all share a responsibility to resist the forces that attempt to divide and destroy us. It is evident today, even in America, that truth will always be under assault and that is the responsibility of us all to resist the forces that attempt to engulf the light of truth with darkness.
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