Translator: Péter Pallós Reviewer: Ádám Kósa
Good afternoon.
I want to thank you for trusting me enough to show up at my talk.
The first task I want to give you is a metaphorical task,
and you can play with it at home,
and it is to write an anthem.
Let me teach you how to write an anthem.
Be sure to bear the following words in mind:
health, beauty,
splendour, life, lightning, dawn, freedom, glory, love,
luck, joy, faithfulness, wealth,
pride, unity, victory,
battle, happiness, giftedness, strength, heart, and faith.
I've picked these words from the anthems of our neighbouring countries
in Central and Eastern Europe.
I suggest you get down to business.
Register a firm!
There are so many new countries in Africa and Asia these days
that I'm sure there's enough demand for your product.
Let's see another anthem.
(Laughter)
I'd rather not read out the words as it would make you stand up and weep.
Ill-fate, sin, suffering, woeful army,
defeated, whimpered, slave yoke,
thundering clouds, corpses, funeral urn,
sea of blood, ocean of flames -
I've not invented any of them -
death rattle, weeping,
the blood of the dead, rope torture, orphans, misery, grace.
Exceptions:
bountiful, beautiful, and homeland.
Obviously, the difference between these two types of anthem is significant.
One of them is ours.
The other is our neighbours'.
Today, I want to tell you about something
that builds a wall between us and our neighbours.
But this wall can be demolished, and we'll talk about that later.
But before we examine this wall,
here's a poster from taverns of the eighteenth century
where there's a figure for each of a number of nations.
This jaunty hussar is the Hungarian.
A few words were added to each figure for each nation
that they might prepare the traveller
for the sort of people to be met in different countries.
If someone had been coming to us -
they came, of course, because then there was no wall -
the words are: dishonest, cruel, Latin speaking, rebellious, unreliable.
These are not very attractive qualities.
Actually, not many travellers came to us,
because they did not want to meet dishonest, cruel rebels,
even if they spoke Latin.
But this is a pervasive situation
since the nations of Central and Eastern Europe have a common fate,
which relates mostly to the fact that none of these countries are big.
In 1946, the year I was born, István Bibó wrote a fantastic essay,
in which he called these countries small and miserable.
While preparing for my talk, Leo Tolstoy's words came to me,
the fantastic phrase with which he begins "Anna Karenina":
"Happy families are all alike;
every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way."
I would say, "Happy nations are all alike.
But unhappy nations are unhappy each in their own way."
In my talk, I want to tell you about a certain Hungarian ill-fatedness
that, however, makes us happy.
Only foreigners don't know about it.
(Laughter)
(Applause)
Thank you.
That was just the first joke.
It's going to get even better.
The fact is that all of these countries have a tension within them -
and we are no exception -
that arises from their small size and small populations,
and from their past greatness.
Their former greatness and their meagre state today
create tension,
in the way a child forever wants to be bigger.
But sooner or later, the child will be big.
Small nations don't get big.
They were once great.
And that's because all the small nations here
once lived under imperial subjugation.
As such, it was impossible for them to develop into contented nations,
and the prince who might ride in awakening them, bringing development,
rode in too late to give these sleeping nations the kiss of life.
So, when these nations did awaken, they started to compete with each other.
They started to compete with each other for land, for heroes, and for the past.
Miklós Zrínyi is still a contested figure to this day.
The Croats are proud that Zrínyi belonged to them,
and we are proud that he was one of us.
Actually, we can't decide
because poor Zrínyi was born before the nation states.
He's no longer around to have his say.
Then, nationality was largely undefined.
Happily, today within the EU, boundaries are clearer,
though the minds of people still continue to clash.
Timothy Snyder recently wrote a very unpleasant, very disturbing book.
It's called "Bloodlands".
In it, he confronts the fact
that two world wars developed in the region in which we live.
It's not just a region of bloodshed; it's also a snake pit.
The snake eggs are still here.
To get rid of them,
people like you should start to think with me
about where our destiny really lies,
about that ill-fatedness.
The first thing we need to do is to understand
that the space we live in is a nonentity.
Philosophically speaking, nothing.
But this nothingness is not devoid of everything.
We do not find this nothingness deficient, we live and make up for it.
We fill it with content.
In the Hungarian steppe -
I love to visit the Hortobágy steppe with my children -
I always see something.
And when I get closer to what I see, it turns out not to be there:
it's a mirage.
The reality of the mirage and its insubstantiality
that goes with this space that is a nothingness without time
is the substance of Sándor Petőfi's poetic image of Pató Pál.
Pató is still with us today,
and if he were invited to speak at TEDx, he would have yawned:
"Must it be today?
There's still time, I'll do it tomorrow."
Tomorrow he'd think he'd do it the next day.
It's no accident Pató is not in the list of TEDx speakers.
He'll never, ever get to give his talk,
unlike me, for whom Pató sets no example.
I hope you let him set no example to you either.
But if we look for heroes among Hungarians, among us then,
we find they act rather strangely.
I was at a psychiatric conference today.
It was about diseases,
and manifestations, which, while not universal,
generally apply to Hungarians.
They include alcoholism, drug abuse,
and sudden suicide, which is now, thank God, in decline -
the rate is still high compared to other EU countries,
but it's lower than it was.
But I'd say that by disregarding our bodies,
by disregarding ourselves,
we make up for that decline
with our addictions,
alcoholism,
overindulgence at the table without taking enough exercise.
All this results in death at a younger age.
And that's not all there is to it,
because that earlier death also means there's time spent in illness,
which reduce the number of years of healthy life.
We disregard our bodies.
If I disregard my body,
and meet someone who also disregards their body,
there is a strange social interaction between us,
which is characterized by a "levy mentality".
What's a levy mentality?
Later I will talk about the book "Credit" by István Széchenyi.
After I finished the book -
it's not an easy read, but I recommend you all to read it once in your life -
I suddenly realized that this book by Széchenyi
is not a book on economics but a book on social psychology.
He got the idea from me in 1830!
I wasn't alive then.
(Laughter)
Few people have read the book the way I did,
because I realized there was another mentality
that Széchenyi did not write about,
a mentality he wanted to leave behind and deny,
something he fought against:
the levy mentality.
But what is it?
It's when I fear that someone might take something from me.
Today, I had no fear of wearing a nice jacket,
elegant shoes, great Versace trousers.
Not like I might have if I had a levy mentality,
when I'd have come looking like a destitute,
lest any of you started thinking
I'd be good for stumping up social security contributions,
(Laughter)
or handing out a loan.
So, the levy mentality is when I present myself negatively,
so that others won't even think of taking anything from me.
And others exhibit this same mentality.
If two such people meet,
we can guess what kind of interaction there will be.
It will not be based on trust, but on distrust and suspicion.
We need to add
that this is also held towards the state and its institutions,
meaning that we are unable to cooperate with either the state or each other.
There is one solution, which is subversion -
termed "anomie" or "anomy" in sociology -
whereby only I am to succeed.
If it is only I who is to succeed,
it is empty individualism,
about which Elemér Hankiss wrote excellent articles in the 80s.
In essence, empty individualism is when I want to succeed,
and I don't give a damn about others.
But others don't give a damn about me,
and so no one gets anywhere.
This result is what psychology calls a social trap.
The situation is aggravated by what I call a "culture of grievance and complaint".
When I teach my international students what it means to be Hungarian,
I just give them a list of our national holidays.
(Laughter)
The first holiday -
(Applause)
I see I've found an appreciative audience -
the first is Memorial Day for the Victims of the Communist Dictatorships;
the second, indeed sad, is Memorial Day for the Victims of the Holocaust;
the third commemorates the Revolution of 1848,
and the War of Independence
which was crushed and formally ended with the Surrender at Világos.
Then, in between, there's mourning on the Day of National Unity,
which commemorates the Treaty of Trianon on 4 June.
Then, at the end of the year, 23 October,
and 4 November, which we just celebrated.
There is only one holiday, 20 August, ingeniously created by PM József Antall -
if we forget about chieftain Koppány -
which really -
(Laughter)
brings the nation together.
At last there is a holiday that glorifies us.
We must realize that these days are repeated every year.
It's like having a wound,
and then, as soon as it starts to heal, on 1 January, you scratch it,
and on each holiday you sprinkle salt on it,
and groan and whine with the pain
as you celebrate ... (Laughter) ... and sing the Anthem,
and then the Szózat, in which Hungarians are to find their graves in Hungary.
This is repeated annually.
This labyrinth leads us to the Minotaur,
to the Hungarian Minotaur,
which is the one we have to kill.
This will be harder than the fight Theseus had,
as this Minotaur lives within us.
I'll name two more things to guide us to this monster.
The first is false realism, when we mix up what is probable with the improbable.
We call the improbable probable,
and the probable improbable.
The trauma of the Treaty of Trianon might come solely from Endre Ady,
who foretold what was likely to happen
while all other political forces,
PMs István Tisza and Mihály Károlyi,
were blind to it.
They thought it couldn't happen,
an impossibility.
Unfortunately, impossibility can turn into possibility
within the framework of this Hungarian heuristic system
which István Bibó called false realism.
After taking care of the bad news, let's look at the good news.
Because there is some too, believe me.
First, I've already referred to the book by István Széchenyi -
the credit-mentality one.
We must show ourselves to be both worthy of receiving
and worthy of giving,
when others will also show themselves worthy of being given to.
If we start to lend psychologically,
then sooner or later we'll move into financial matters:
we'll receive credit, and also give credit.
There's one word that describes what this is based on,
and that word is "trust".
And trust is very much lacking in Hungarian society.
The emptiness I described before with the mirage in the steppe,
and the Pató Pál attitude,
that emptiness will disappear
and be filled with content, meaning, and intent,
when mistrust, suspicion, and resentment, give way to omnipresent trust.
And why not?
"Why not?" is not just the name of a café bar in Budapest.
Everyone here who speaks English knows the meaning of this question.
But most Hungarians don't really know any foreign languages.
By the way, I forgot to tell you
there's a simple reason for all the phenomena I've spoken about:
our language is rather unique.
We speak a language little related to any other.
But "Why not?" is so easy that anyone can remember and learn it.
How do we respond to it?
One way is with credit, trust, and a non-zero-sum game.
In game theory, this means you do not concern yourself
with the other earning or getting more,
or benefiting from more contacts or cooperation.
Ultimately, I don't seek to gain my pleasure at the expense of the other,
but that his joy should be my joy.
We need to find higher common goals.
We need to look for common resources.
We are happy to figure something out together,
and achieve it.
As more people become involved,
a network will develop that will spread like wildfire,
and a nation will come about
within which networks of people
trust and help one other to succeed.
These networks don't work in isolation, of course,
but as István Bibó wrote,
as small circles of freedom.
By small circles of freedom he meant
that I am free to trust the other,
I am free to come up with any idea
and able to put it into practice.
It's one thing to come up with something, and then think,
"Why do it?
The other won't do it."
Then, the idea vanishes from me like a disintegrating soap bubble.
The aim of small circles of freedom is to network the whole nation,
to create a successful nation
with successful citizens and successful communities.
And the two cannot be separated.
Where are our Olympic successes
when we have schools full of children who can't swim?
A swimmer like Katinka Hosszú can be very important.
She's a role model for me, though I'm not a very good swimmer.
But she will only be a national heroine if she becomes a movement,
and children see her as a role model to follow.
The aim of the small circles of freedom is to follow examples.
But that is only possible
when there are charismatic people who create and manage these circles.
Finally, there's one last aspect not to be ignored.
It's about generations.
A generation is not just
the hundreds of thousands of children born each year in Hungary.
A generation will come about
when these hundreds of thousands of children
experience some kind of shared historical event
that sets them apart from their predecessors.
But this is only one condition for a specific generation.
My generation, for example, is the generation of 1946.
We were born after all the horrors visited on Hungary up until 1945.
Of course, further horrors awaited us.
From this point of view history was rich.
We were able to compete with our parents who had experienced more traumas.
But the point is,
the generation sitting here today,
is, by and large, a generation with no traumas.
Intergenerational dialogues have certain patterns
described 2,600 years ago by Anaximander.
He wrote this:
"Time divides men in this way,
that those born later are innocent compared to those born earlier."
That innocence, which is the property of young people of all generations,
ought to be a great source of power.
But my generation could not take advantage of this innocence
because the age we lived in
couldn't be beaten by tricks of generations.
But now it seems to me that with the new technology
and the new geopolitical circumstances,
the new Hungarian generation,
the new Hungarian youth armed with this innocence,
facing the sins of their parents
without ever forgetting and forgiving them,
will be able to avoid repeating the sins of their predecessors.
They will exit the labyrinth,
kill the Minotaur,
and have as a result a new Hungarian nation.
A successful one.
A network builder.
A nation of young people
who will no longer be afraid to look their children in the eye.
Thank you for your attention.
(Applause)(Cheering)