Metropole [Paperback]

Ferenc Karinthy (1921-1992), a trained linguist, was the son of famed Hungarian writer playwright Frigyes Karinthy. Not surprisingly, then, the complexity and confusion of language is the central theme of Karinthy's 1970 novel "Metropole" (originally entitled "Epépé"), the Kafkaesque tale of a hapless narrator stranded on the top floor of the figurative Tower of Babel.

The plot builds upon a basic but very ironic premise: Budai, a linguist, seems to have boarded the wrong plane on his way to a conference in Helsinki and has now ended up in a mysterious city in an unknown country with a singularly incomprehensible language. It is packed to overflowing: human congestion spills from the lobbies out into the streets and Budai is rudely rushed down sidewalks and through lines. Even the solitude of the hotel room he manages to acquire is afflicted by the alien alphabet he encounters in a framed printout presumably of hotel regulations. The overwhelming effect is one of claustrophobia reinforced by a rambling syntax that pushes headlong from page to page in lengthy paragraphs. A harried Budai roams from place to place in time with the narrative rhythm, attempting unsuccessfully to find . . . a way . . . out . . . OF . . . HERE! The very density of the urban dreamscape - its unyielding masses of humanity and mazes of streets, alleys, passageways, myriads of neighborhoods - seems to compress into a solid wall, entrapping Budai as effectively as any stone-and-mortar fortification. The mounting tension is palpable, even as it superficially plateaus when Budai settles into his hotel room, finds some work, and even acquires a sort of girlfriend. Obviously such fragile comfort cannot possibly last: it must prelude some catastrophe, which, when it comes, seems naturally inevitable as the expected fate of a stranger in a wholly strange land.

Yet strangely enough, however, Budai's demeanor throughout his ordeal is not one of panic or outright desperation; on the contrast, he is more perturbed than anything else. He is similar in that respect to many of Kafka's protagonists, particularly Gregor Samsa the giant bug, as an individual whose reaction to a grotesque or extraordinary situation is one of bemusement or annoyance rather than shock or terror. This lends a greater element of realism to "Metropole" that might have been otherwise submerged in emotional bombast. "Metropole" is frightening because it comes across as a probable scenario - not because it is a horror novel in the Stephen King or Dean Koontz sense of the term. In fact, it reminded me, oddly enough, of "Johnny Got His Gun," as a tale of a man locked in a nightmarish scenario and desperate make himself understood. What "Metropole" also does quite effectively is to unearth the subliminal fears of anonymity and invisibility in contemporary society. Indeed, it is a story of individuality and subjectivity taken to their greatest extreme: if each citizen of "Metropole" is actually uttering a verbal articulation of their own private language, as Budai comes to suspect, then maybe the driving force behind modern isolation is precisely this teeming urban obscurity, in addition to Western culture's emphasis on personal independence, personal ambition, personal expression, personal gratification, ad infinitum. If Budai is jarringly cool about his predicament, then perhaps that is because his situation is merely a farcical extension of the realities of modern life.

Despite its relatively unknown status in the United States, "Metropole" is actually considered a modern classic. Its unspecified setting and multilingual protagonist contribute to a greater international, cross-cultural appeal, especially as the nameless city is described as both a wanly generic and strikingly diverse place that any reader anywhere can envision for themselves. The bizarre nature of the story is itself an attraction, since one cannot help but wonder where all this could possibly lead to. "Metropole," therefore, comes highly recommended.

In a moment of distraction, a linguist named Budai slips through the wrong door at the terminal, and, after boarding his plane, settles in for a long nap during the flight. When he wakes, he is hustled onto a shuttle bus and taken to a hotel where he finds it is impossible to make himself understood or understand anyone, despite his familiarity with dozens of spoken languages. Soon it becomes apparent that he has not landed in Helsinki, his original destination, but instead in an unknown, and ultimately unknowable, land - thus begins Budai's lonely, frustrating trek through the maze of 'Metropole', Ferenc Karinthy's only translated work up this time.

Other reviewers - and my own dim memory - insist on comparing 'Metropole' to Franz Kafka's work, and in some ways, I think that, for once, it's an apt comparison. It's most apparent in the idea of the bewildered man trying to make sense out of a society that is alien to him (or he to it), with the critical keys of information that would allow him to operate within that society seeming to dangle just out of his, and the readers, reach. Other comparisons will depend on the reader's assessment of what exactly Kafka was about. Whereas I've always thought of his works as very personal reflections of his percieved incompatability with life, Karinthy's novel is more universal - an example of a common man and the connections to society that shape our identity, connections that are excrutiatingly obvious only once they are severed.

'Metropole' then follows Budai as he tries to make sense of his situation and return home. No attempt at communication is open to him though, whether through a language he recognizes nor through any try at rudimentary sign language. One of the characteristics of the city in which Budai is trapped is its crush of people - everywhere there are crowds, everywhere one must line up for the most basic service, and nowhere will anyone take the time to listen to Budai's strange jabbering. Even when he attempts to walk away from the city, it appears to continue on and on, with no interuption, suburbs connecting back into proper towns with no end in sight.

There is an old story-telling adage for plot development, which advises the author to put his characters in a tree, and then throw stones at them. The last part of the rule is to get them down, but Karinthy may not have been aware of it, since he continues to pelt Budai throughout the book, leaving only a small glimmer of hope near the end. And through it all, Budai degenerates as the time goes by, first be being turned out, for lack of money, from the hotel to which he was originally brought; to sleeping on the street and working as a day laborer in an open-air market. From there, it is too easy to spend his meager wages at the closest bar and let a creeping weariness take over.

This edition of 'Metropole' by Telegram Books has no introduction, and the biographical detail on Ferenc Karinthy is scarce - born in Budapest in 1921, the son of Frigyes Karinthy, author of over a dozen books, and a water polo champion. 'Metropole', first published as 'Epepe', was written in 1970, which surprised me - considering only the artwork on the front cover, I expected something from the twenties or thirties. Translated from the Hungarian by the poet George Szirtes (who also translated some of Sandor Marai's and Gyula Krudy's work), the prose of Karinthy is utilitarian, unlike the fanciful, simile-laden writing of Krudy - better, I think, to illustrate the deadening effect of the city as opposed to Krudy's rustic scenes. But it is not Karinthy's workmanlike writing (by no means inadequate) that is the reason to seek out or to skip 'Metropole'. Instead, the novel is more like a long fairy tale, or perhaps an account of a particularly vivid dream, which is an absorbing look at the relation between identity and society. It also comes bearing blurbs like 'masterpiece' and 'classic', which I think overshoot the mark, although I did enjoy it - more so even than Krudy, whom I also liked, but to be fair, these two Hungarian authors wrote at different times for a different audience. And truthfully, there is really nothing to associate 'Metropole' with Hungary at all. If anything, the closest it comes is in the industrialized and unfriendly atmosphere that, in my ignorance, I associate with Eastern Europe at that time. Not a classic, but interesting still. 4 1/2 stars, rounded up.

Metropole is a 2008 English translation of the Hungarian author's 1970 novel. The word "Kafkaesque" doesn't do justice to this novel. It is not "esque," it is more Kafkaesque than Kafka. What is it about Central Europe?

Metropole depicts a waking nightmare. A Hungarian linguist named Budai boards a plane to travel to a linguistics conference in Helskinki. He falls asleep in flight and wakes up when the passengers are deplaned in a strange city. Not Helsinki. The passengers are taken to a hotel where the protagonist, depite knowing ten languages, cannot make any sense of the spoken or written language. Nor can he find anyone who speaks any of the languages he does. They don't use Roman letters but luckily they use Arabic numerals. At the registration desk they take his passport, and they can't understand a word he says when he asks for it back. Budai is given a room and some local currency in exchange for what cash he has and the story begins.

The city is large and crowded with aggravated, unpleasant people. The people are of reconizably mixed racial types and wear recognizable clothing. The food is similar but all has a sickly sweet taste as do their alcoholic beverages. Budai can find no airports or any place that will have people speaking recognizable languages. There are churches but of no recognizable religion.

The hotel room gives Budai a comfortable base from which to explore and try to find a way out. What will happen when his money runs out? Will he ever make it back home? I won't spoil it for you.

Metropole is a well-written, readable yet highly disturbing allegory. The Cold War Eastern Bloc origins of the novel are obvious. But the fact that it disturbs us today speaks to something about the human condition that hasn't changed.