Béla Köpeczi

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Béla Köpeczi (2007)

Béla Köpeczi (born September 16, 1921 in Strasbourg am Mieresch ( Aiud ), Transylvania , Romania ; † January 17, 2010 in Budapest , Hungary ) was a Hungarian cultural historian and politician .

Live and act

Béla Köpeczi was born in Aiud ( Hungarian Nagyenyed , German  Strasbourg am Mieresch ) in Transylvania in 1921 . He graduated from the Kolozsvári Református Kollégium, a Protestant secondary school in Cluj-Napoca ( German  Klausenburg ). In Budapest he then studied French language and literature as well as Romanian linguistics . Later, Italian added. During the Second World War he moved to Germany, where he worked as an interpreter for the International Red Cross . From autumn 1946 he continued his studies at the École Normale Supérieure in Paris . He also served as secretary of the Hungarian Institute and as Paris correspondent for the Hungarian Telegraph Office. He finished his studies in 1949 at the Sorbonne Université . In the same year he returned to Budapest and began to teach at the Chair of French Language and Literature at Eötvös Loránd University (ELTÉ). Here he was in the 1960s, habilitation and from 1965 to 1967, he held the post of Managing Director and from 1967 to 1970 as vice rector.

Köpeczi worked for the Hungária and Művelt Nép Könyvkiadó publishing houses. He began publishing cultural studies publications in 1953 when he was deputy director and then head of the General Directorate for Publishing. In addition to his research on the history and literary history of the 17th and 18th centuries, especially the Enlightenment , his work on existentialism , the " New Left ", socialist realism and the cultural development of Hungary should be mentioned. He did pioneering work in his main research area, the Rákóczi era, and he was also widely known for his editing of the (in the original) three-volume History of Transylvania, which has been translated into several languages. His Hungarian cultural history since the end of World War II was published in 1986 by Kossuth, Budapest, in Hungarian ( A magyar kultúra útja 1945–1985 ) and in 1994 by Corvina-Verlag, Budapest, in French ( Histoire de la culture hongroise ). There is no German-language edition.

Köpeczi was also editor-in-chief or member of the editorial team of several scientific journals as well as a member or leader of professional groups and scientific organizations. He was most satisfied with the presidency of the Hungarian Research Society of the 18th century, which he founded. He also held various offices as a cultural politician . From 1963 to 1965 he headed the cultural department of the Central Committee of the Hungarian Socialist Workers' Party . In 1967 he became a corresponding member of the Magyar Tudományos Akadémia (MTA; Hungarian Academy of Sciences ) and from 1976 he appeared as its full member. He worked on the Academy's Board of Directors from 1970 to 1982. At times he was deputy general secretary , at times drawing general secretary of the Magyar Tudományos Akadémia. From June 25, 1982 to June 29, 1988 he was Minister of Culture , then, among other things, President of the Hungarian Council (1988–2002) and Chairman of the Hungarian UNESCO Committee (1989–1998).

Awards (selection)

Works in German translation (selection)

  • (as editor :) Rebel or Revolutionary? Petofi in the mirror of his diary entries, letters, pamphlets and poems. Selection, introduction, connecting texts: Béla Köpeczi. Odeon / Corvina publishing house, Budapest 1973.
  • Ferenc Rákóczi. Hungarian press office, Vienna 1976.
  • Cultural Revolution in Hungary. German by Miklós Pogány. Corvina-Verlag, Budapest 1978, ISBN 963-13-0025-3 .
  • Idea, history, literature. Translated from the Hungarian by Mária Borbély. Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin / Weimar 1979.
  • Reason of State and Christian Solidarity. The Hungarian uprisings and Europe in the 2nd half of the 17th century. Translated from the Hungarian by Mária Bobély. Böhlau, Vienna / Cologne / Graz 1983, ISBN 3-205-00538-4 .
  • (as editor) Brief history of Transylvania. Translated from the Hungarian by Harriett Ferenczi. History Institute of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest 1990, ISBN 963-05-5667-7 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f Ortutay Gergely: Elhunyt Köpeczi Béla. Életének 89. évében, hétfőn elhunyt Köpeczi Béla, a Magyar Tudományos Akadémia rendes tagja, egykori főtitkára, művelődés- és irodalomtörténész, nyugalmazott egyetemi tanár. In: nol.hu. January 18, 2010, accessed August 4, 2020 (Hungarian).
  2. ↑ a b blurb on idea, history, literature .
  3. ^ Péter Kozák: Köpeczi Béla. irodalomtörténész, folklorista, művelődéstörténész. In: nevpont.hu. 2013, accessed August 4, 2020 (Hungarian).

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Köpeczi, Béla
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Hungarian cultural historian and politician
DATE OF BIRTH September 16, 1921
PLACE OF BIRTH Aiud , Transylvania , Romania
DATE OF DEATH January 17, 2010
Place of death Budapest , Hungary