Articles by Initial Letters

Kassák Klub Guests – Sebő Ferenc’ column – WEÖRES SÁNDOR. This second installment in Sebő’s series, tells about the time in 1975 when Hungarian poet and writer Weöres Sándor was guest at the Kassák Klub dance house to speak with the young people there. The ’Kassák Klub’ was Sebő Ensemble’s regular gig from 1973 onward. It was held at the Kassák community center in Budapest’s 14th district where the practice was to hold a ’dance house’ (with live music and folk dancing). During the breaks there were related cultural events in an apparantly relaxed format – such as conversations with writers, performances by other musicians, art exhibitions, etc. Weöres Sándor (1913–1989) was a Hungarian poet, writer, literary translator, philosopher, literary historian and museologist. At the Kassák Klub he spoke about the rhythm of his poems that Sebő Ensemble had chosen to set to music. Sebő writes here that earlier on when asked to set certain Weöres poems to music, he had asked, ‘Why those? They are already music’. At Kassák Klub they asked Weöres about a work of his called ‘Psyché’ – which had received some tough criticism. Weöres described it as ‘the work of an imaginary woman…with it I wanted to present the literary language and spirit of the end of 18th, beginning of the 19th century’. Also mentioned here in Sebő’s recollections is Kodály’s interest in Weöres’ work – [Kodály:] "…Weöres is one of the few Hungarian poets who seem to know that Hungarian poetry should not lose touch with its ties to Hungarian music." Weöres also spoke about the ‘Cseremisz’ (Mari or Cheremissan) songs Kodály had asked him to work with that had become so popular with Hungarian school children. By Sebő Ferenc.