Hungarian Writers’ Union to mark 1956 anniversary with several programmes in 2016

Budapest, December 28 (MTI) – The Hungarian Writers’ Union will organise a series of programmes next year to mark the 60th anniversary of the 1956 anti-Soviet revolution and freedom fight, the president of the union said on Monday.

Programmes will include conferences, exhibitions, a poetry competition for secondary students, poetry in theatre evenings and literature classes on 1956, Janos Szentmartoni told a press conference.

The union will also set up an online “virtual memorial room” allowing viewers to browse among archive documents, sound records and footage about the revolution, he said, adding that plans include publishing a 1956 memorial album and a literary audiobook as well.

The aim is to reach out to the broader public, calling the attention primarily of the youth to the paramount role Hungarian writers and their union had played as “intellectual architects” of the 1956 revolution, he said.

The Writers’ Union has set up a 1956 Memorial Committee tasked with coordinating the programmes and events, Szentmartoni said.

Other members of the body include Sandor Lezsak, Deputy Speaker of Parliament, historians Konrad Salamon and Csaba Gy Kiss, and critic Kinga Eros.

Lezsak said that the Hungarian parliament will organise a memorial day dubbed “Writers in the Revolution” in the House at the end of October when the uprising took place in 1956.

Source: http://mtva.hu/hu/hungary-matters