A tizenharmadik : Jókai Mór Életem című verses önéletrajzáról = The Thirteenth. On Jókai Mór’s Poetic Autobiography My Life

Fülöp, Dorottya (2024) A tizenharmadik : Jókai Mór Életem című verses önéletrajzáról = The Thirteenth. On Jókai Mór’s Poetic Autobiography My Life. IRODALOMTÖRTÉNETI KÖZLEMÉNYEK : A HUN-REN BÖLCSÉSZETTUDOMÁNYI KUTATÓKÖZPONT IRODALOMTUDOMÁNYI INTÉZETÉNEK FOLYÓIRATA, 128 (1). pp. 96-110. ISSN 0021-1486 (nyomtatott); 1588-0834 (elektronikus)

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Abstract

Jókai Mór’s poetic autobiography, was written in his old age during a personal crisis following the writer’s second marriage. In the poetic memoir, which is an unusual work of Jókai’s, he places his life journey (seen as a series of failures and new beginnings) in the context of salvation history. This makes sense in the encounter with the “embodiment of love”, reminiscent of Nagy Bella (young actress, second wife of Jókai), since this “embodiment of love” leads the protagonist to the experience of divine grace. This monumental poem, almost a thousand lines long, appeared in print only after Jókai’s death in the 1910 and 1911 issues of Az Újság, and was long forgotten. Török Zsuzsa’s 2015 study was the first attempt to draw professional attention to the poem and to place it in the context of his oeuvre, but the text has not developed a significant reception history and many questions remain unanswered. By examining previously overlooked sources, the study explores the conceptual and editorial principles employed in the poem and seeks to answer questions such as: why Jókai, who was primarily considered a prose writer, wrote his autobiography in verse; what might have prompted him to reflect on his life’s journey in a new, systematic way; why the first wife, Laborfalvi Róza, is not mentioned in the text; and how the poem fits into the network of other texts in the oeuvre.

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