By Hungary's most celebrated woman writer, a novel about how little we understand ourselves, let alone others, and in consequence how easily we fail, or even betray, those we love.
Magda Szabó Book order
October 5, 1917 – November 19, 2007
Magda Szabó was a Hungarian writer, arguably her nation's foremost female novelist, who also penned dramas, essays, and poetry. Her work delves into the complexities of human relationships and the societal pressures that shape individuals. Szabó possessed a keen psychological insight, crafting prose that captured the nuanced landscape of human experience. Despite her roots in Hungarian culture, her narratives explore universal themes, earning her widespread international acclaim and readership.
- 2023
- 2020
Abigail
- 20 pages
- 1 hour of reading
A cult coming-of-age novel by the multi-award winning author of THE DOOR and KATALIN STREET.
- 2019
The lives of three intertwined families in prewar Budapest are shattered in the German occupation - by the bestselling author of THE DOOR.
- 2015
Iza's Ballad
- 328 pages
- 12 hours of reading
When Ettie's husband dies, her daughter Iza insists that her mother give up the family house in the countryside and move to Budapest. Displaced from her community and her home, Ettie tries to find her place in this new life, but can't seem to get it right. She irritates the maid, hangs food outside the window because she mistrusts the fridge and, in her naivety and loneliness, invites a prostitute in for tea. Iza’s Ballad is the story of a woman who loses her life’s companion and a mother trying to get close to a daughter whom she has never truly known. It is about the meeting of the old-fashioned and the modern worlds and the beliefs we construct over a lifetime.
- 2008
The Gift of the Wondrous Fig Tree
- 267 pages
- 10 hours of reading
Queen Iris is delighted when the all-knowing wondrous fig tree, which stands in the middle of Fairyland, gives her Lala on her coronation day. But Lala is no ordinary fairy child. He shows very little interest in the spells he learns in fairy school and prefers the company of humans, befriending a recently orphaned girl, Beata, and her uncle. The queen hopes her sons behavior will improve after she marries Amalfi, the captain of the palace guard, who already loves the prince as his own.Meanwhile the power-hungry Adderpater, wizard, scholar, and coregent of the land, identifies the cause of the princes strange behavior: Lala has a human heart. The punishment for having a human organ is cruel in Fairyland. Iris will do anything to save her son, even marry the ancient wizard and banish Gigi, the truth-telling unicorn. Will the lights of Fairyland go out forever? Or will Lalas human heart give him the courage to restore justice and happiness?
- 2005
The Door
- 262 pages
- 10 hours of reading
One of The New York Times Book Review's "10 Best Books of 2015" An NYRB Classics Original The Door is an unsettling exploration of the relationship between two very different women. Magda is a writer, educated, married to an academic, public-spirited, with an on-again-off-again relationship to Hungary’s Communist authorities. Emerence is a peasant, illiterate, impassive, abrupt, seemingly ageless. She lives alone in a house that no one else may enter, not even her closest relatives. She is Magda’s housekeeper and she has taken control over Magda’s household, becoming indispensable to her. And Emerence, in her way, has come to depend on Magda. They share a kind of love—at least until Magda’s long-sought success as a writer leads to a devastating revelation. Len Rix’s prizewinning translation of The Door at last makes it possible for American readers to appreciate the masterwork of a major modern European writer.
