Articles by Initial Letters

Arany Piroska writes short stories – in a more or less folk tale style. She was born in 1931 in the eastern Hungarian town of Derecske where she attended elementary and secondary school, later earning a teaching diploma in Debrecen and Nyíregyháza. She worked as an elementary school teacher in Derecske for some years. In 1993, she moved to Győr in Western Hungary. In 1998 she completed a writing course in Budapest. Since the 1960s she has been writing down stories she heard in her home village from her grandparents and extended family. This issue of folkMAGazin publishes a story from her book “Kendőmesék” (Magyar Kultúra Kiadó. Győr, 2008.) “Kendő” is the Hungarian word for the headscarf worn by rural married women in this part of the world. The stories reveal the inner thoughts of women from an unspecified time and place along with the ups and downs, gossip, intense social pressure and social life in a Hungarian village community. "A person can never be too careful – the world is full of enemies. And headscarves. Seen from behind them in the church, the women’s rows were all headscarves. Beautiful scarves stored carefully in the wardrobe for holiday wear: cashmere, silk, with roses, whatever looked best on its owner, or the best within their means….” Printed here is “Stolen headscarf” a story about a poor family, their better-off relatives that lived across the street and the disappearance of a favorite silk headscarf.