La Nouvelle revue de Hongrie et ses amis Français (1932–44). La Cause Hongroise: Une Machine a Voyager dans le Temps Pour les Catholiques et les Jeunes Non-Conformistes
The New Hungarian Review and its French friends (1932-44). The Hungarian cause: A time machine for Catholics and young non-conformists

Summary/Abstract: Hungary in the 1930s was a pretext for some contemporaries, just as it is again for the historian. In the perception of French people, especially young nonconformists, Catholics and certain monarchists, Hungary was an anachronistic world in which they could observe the contours of their own aspirations and contradictions; the Hungarian cause was, in a way, an outward manifestation of their own situation at the dawn of the modern world. The majority of these Magyarophiles were conquered by the Hungarian Review (1932-44), a magazine written in French in Budapest under the direction of Georges Ottlik and Joseph Balogh. However, the nature of the Hungarian objectives, as well as the constraints which weighed on the magazine, made that, in reality, these very rarely reached a real communion of spirit with their French friends. Despite these divergences, it appeared to me that the Franco-Hungarian friendship of the 1930s followed a general evolution in three phases, linked, on the one hand, to the territorial revision prospects for Hungary, and on the other hand in the future of Europe in general: Hope (1932-36); Faith (1935-39); Charity (1939-44). Hungary in the 1930s is a way of observing, in particular circumstances, the challenge of modernity as well as the difficulties faced by men who had to confront it in scattered ranks despite their efforts to form a coherent front, placed behind the Hungarian flag.

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