Tuesday, April 14, 2015

Hungry for Hungarian

Sherlock Holmes emlékiratai: Bünügyi
Elbeszélések
 -1974 -DW- C-3124.
I once bought a Hungarian Sherlock Holmes edition on eBay. It was a relatively new book, nothing out of the ordinary. The seller was prompt on delivery and accurate on the book's description. At the time, I owned about a dozen Hungarian titles. Not long after I bought the volume, the seller contacted me directly about another Hungarian tome he wanted to sell.  I have used eBay for nearly twenty years and I know there are rules against such direct contact between buyers and sellers, so I did the All-American thing - I bought the offered edition!


This was the beginning of a marvelous partnership with the seller resulting in more than fifty Hungarian titles being added to my collection.  

One of the areas of foreign language collecting is the volumes in a particular language with a specific story and its corresponding text in English. There are many such editions. I have Spanish and English, German and English, French and English and several other languages and English. One of the early ones I bought from Gergely, my Hungarian connection, is Hungarian and German! It  was one of a four-volume set. Over the course of time, I have added the other three  to my collection. I also have one that is Hungarian and English. Still, these are the only languages I have seen that English is not the second language.

Sherlock Holmes’ Krimminalfälle
1990 - Hungarian-German "YELL"
At first the items offered were mainly form the 1980's and 1990's. Soon they started getting older and much more interesting. One of the first ones to really catch my eye was from 1905. Egy család réme: Regény. Sherlock Holmes visszzatérte. A norfolki gyilkosság was published by M. Keresk. Közlöny, Globus'ny and includes HOUN, SIXN, and DANC.  It is listed in De Waal's - C3190. The cover is outstanding featuring a young lady with a floral motif around her oval portrait. Soon A sátán kutyája (HOUN) was offered. This 1918 publication is the most reptilian looking creature I have ever seen. Another cover from 1916 features Holmes wearing a Bowler hat but he looks exactly like Jeremy Brett. It is eerie. This book, Az üldözö "A Study in Scarlet," was published in 1916 by Milliók könyve.

Some of the books are illustrated by Irde Földes, a famous Hungarian illustrated from the early twentieth century. He started his career as a lithographer. He studied at the Iparrajziskola and in the Mintarajztanoda (major art schools in Pest at the time), later he visited München, Berlin and Paris. Besides being a leading figure in poster art, he was a painter and a graphic artist as well. He exhibited his artworks frequently in Budapest, he participated in the Nemzeti Szalon (National Salon) for instance. Starting from the 1910s, his posters overwhelmed the streets of Budapest. Between 1918 and 1919, he opened a design studio with Lipót Sátori, and they collaborated on many poster designs. During the First World Warhe created film, commercial and propaganda posters, and he made one work for the Hungarian Soviet Republic as well. After the war he designed political posters for several parties (most of them depicting Hungary's borders before the Treaty of Trianon). From the 1920s on he lived in Transylvania and his posters rarely appeared on the streets in Hungary.
A nábob kincse  -1916 
Cover illustrated by Irde Földes

Other editions came from Hungary's most famous Doylean collector, Mr. Ferenc Pap. He lived in a small town (but a long name) called Kiskundorozsma. He collected mostly pulp editions and he had a large Conan Doyle collection of early Hungarian ones. There have been more than one-hundred different Hungarian translations of the Canon. With Gergley's help, I am slowly adding almost all of them to my collection.

Egy család réme: Regény.
Sherlock Holmes
visszzatérte. A norfolki
 gyilkosság
 
The first Hungarian translation was published 1897 by Singer and Wolfner kiádasa. Az üldözö  (A Study in Scarlet) was published in Budapest and translated by Fái J. Béla. The next translation was not until 1902 by Lampel, Wodianer ny, a publishing house in Budapest. They published several titles in both hardcover and softcover. Many of the titles were the same, Doktor Holmes kalandjai: Detektivtörténetek (The Adventures of Dr. Holmes: Detective Series) but with each volume containing different stories. The hardcover edition features a bright red cloth-covered board while the softcover editions were small (3 1/2" x 5"). 
Az üldözö  1916

From the covers shown here, one can easily see why I am hungry for Hungarian translations of the Canon. These are just a small sampling of the ones that adorn my shelves. The latest one that is still in transit is a 1922 pulp edition of The Tragedy of Koosko. The reason I bought it was it also includes "The Adventure of Charles Augustus Milverton" and it has another very interesting cover. I can’t  wait but I guess I will have to wait.

Happy Blogging!
A sátán kutyája 1918

Wednesday, March 25, 2015

My Japanese Visit -March 17-24, 2015

More than a year ago Masamichi "Mitch" Higurashi invited me to speak at the Japanese Sherlock Holmes Club in Tokyo. I graciously accepted and began preparations. Other than a brief over night stay at Narita Airport, this is my first trip to Japan. 

The flight is 12 1/2 hours direct from Dallas to Tokyo and it was completely unremarkable - the way I like my flights. As I touched down, I had a moment of panic. Mitch had agreed to pick me up and had made all of my arrangements for the week, I realized that I was not privy to this information and wondered what I would do if for some reason Mich failed to appear. Not to worry, Mitch was waiting just outside of security. He was there with Kiyoshi Arai, who received his investiture in the BSI in January as Sho-in Near Nara. This was a pleasant bonus. Many happy greetings and gifts were exchanged, coffee drank and then the hour or so drive into Tokyo proper.

Masamichi (Mitch) Higurashi, me, and Kiyoshi Arai at Narita.

Tokyo is an amazing city. It covers a vast area but it is very clean and easily navigated. Mitch's GPS, in her cute little Japanese voice, guided us expertly to the parking garage of the Hotel Metropolitan Edmont. This would be my home the entire time I was in Tokyo. We did travel by bullet train the next day to Kyoto but returned to our Tokyo base the next night.

Kyoto, formerly the Imperial City of Japan is located on the island of Honshu. It is nicknamed the City of Ten-Thousand Shrines but we only visited nine-thousand and ninety-one. At the Tokyo Station, we were met by Takahiko Wakabayshi and his wife Harumi.We were also joined by Yumiko Shigaki. All were Sherlockians. The bullet train ride took just over an hour. We arrived and ate lunch before heading out to explore the city.
Don, Harumi, Takahiko, Mitch, Yumiko

Our first stop was Kinkaku, or the Golden Pavilion part of a large complex dating back to the fourteenth century. Another stop was the Zen temple Ryōan-ji, The Temple of the Dragon at Peace. It is considered one of the (if not the) finest surviving examples of Kare-sansui (dry landscape). The fifteen rocks placed inside a small rectangle of white pebbles, raked in between, offers infinite tranquility and possibilities to the observer. Not every stop fulfilled the spiritual realm some were simply for the spirit realm, as was the case when we visited the Gekkeikan Okura Sake Museum. Here we were shown the complete process of making sake and given samples at the tour's end. We explored many more areas but late Friday night boarded the train back to Tokyo.

Saturday morning the conference began. 

For more than twenty years, I have traded books with Takahiko Endo but never met him. 
Takahiko Endo and Don
So at the beginning of the conference, six Japanese Sherlockians lined up in the front of all of the attendees and I was asked to pick out Takahiko. To the pleasure of all, I made the correct choice. The first presentation was by Hiroko Nakashima. She spoke on and showed photographs of 'The Alpine Adventure from Septermber 26-28, 2014'. It was sort of like a homecoming. I saw pictures of many Sherlockian friends like Michael Meer, Marcus Gassner, and Peter Blau. Of course, Hiroku spoke in Japanese, but her photographs were in "English". She has a wonderful eye for taking pictures and later she presented be with three booklets of her exquisite photographs.

I was seated next to Yaeko Amano and she served as my interpreter. She was a God-Sent . After lunch, it was my turn to present. I gave a Power Point titled '101 Damnation's' that featured slides of 101 different foreign covers of the Hound of the Baskervilles and commentary on each. I received laughs at all of the appropriate places and everyone seemed to enjoy the show. The Japanese are extremely polite and many asked permission to take photographs with me afterwards. They are also so very gracious. I was given many, many gifts. I was so honored to be there, I should have been giving all of the gifts.

(Clockwise) Don, Yaeko, Harumi. Takahiko Wakabayshi,
Unknown, Kiyoshi, Yuichi Hirayama, Eiichi Nakahara,
Takahiko Endo.
Many of my new best friends and plenty of my old best friends ventured out to a small traditional Japanese restaurant for dinner. I got to experience Japan like a local, not like a tourist. The beer and sake flowed freely until it was time to stagger back to our hotel. Sunday was the day of my main presentation and being hung-over was a great way to present.

My dear friends Joan Proubasta and his wife Rosa Diaz along with their daughter Marta, Rosa's brother Miguel Diaz, his wife Myriem Sampere and their daughter Adriana were all there on Sunday. Joan's talk began the 74th Japanese Sherlock Holmes Club's meeting. I did not have an interpreter seated with me on Sunday but Joan's presentation was in Spanish so I gathered in bits and pieces of it, better than I could of it had been in Japanese.
Joan Proubasta, Don Rosa Diaz
Once again, the Japanese treated me like royalty and showered me with presents. In total, I ended up with more than sixty new books for my collection. So many that I had to get Mitch to mail them to me at no-telling the cost.

As on Saturday, my talk was after lunch. Mitch made slides so the audience could follow along. 'The Collecting Mania' was my talk I gave the first paragraph in Japanese. I did apologize to the audience for butchering their language. They were gracious as usual and did not throw things at me. The final presentation was given by Kiyoshi Arai, BSI - "History of Immigration of the Canon to Japan Featuring the Centennial of The Valley of Fear Publication.'

There was dinner following the meeting on a top floor restaurant over looking Tokyo. It was a marvelous view but the festivities of the evening far exceeded the view out the window. Five long table seating nearly a dozen Sherlockian each makes for a wonderful night, especially once the sake started finding it's way to everyone.
Hiroko and Don

Keits Yamaguch and Don
More revelers
I found it very funny as the night wore on, everyone started giving the 'Peace Symbol" when their pictures were taken. People were sneaking into other people's pictures and really letting their hair down. The normally reserve Japanese can party as loud as anyone.

I was amazed walking into the restaurant because entering the room, everyone stood and cheered for me. It was like having rock star status. During the two days of the conferences, I received about a dozen new friend requests on Facebook and accepted them all. Now I spend a lot of time using the Facebook translation service.

My cheeks literally ached from laughing so much. That is the trouble with sake it goes down easy and makes me laugh.

Sherlock Holmes Pub
On my final day day, Monday, Mitch took me to the Sherlock Holmes Pub and then we came back to the section of Tokyo that sells used books. Believe it or not, I managed to buy a few items before heading back to our hotel. Mitch's wife Mayuko joined us for the day and for dinner, my new best friend Hiroko Nakashima also joined us. We had a very tradition Japanese meal where I ate raw horse meat for the fist time, and no, it did not taste like chicken.
Hiroko feeding me raw horse. Yum!

And in the blink of an eye, my week in Japan was over. I left on Tuesday morning but not before vowing to return. There is still plenty of unfinished business in Japan for me.

Happy Blogging!