Between the Lines: The Diary of Margit Kassai

Margit Kassai

Margit Kassai uses her quick thinking and wit to survive the Nazi occupation of Budapest in 1944, the terror of the extremist Arrow Cross regime and the Soviet siege of the city until the early months of 1945. Jewish by birth but a convert to Lutheranism, Margit knows this makes little difference to the antisemitic officials and manages to elude roundups by working in children’s homes under a false identity. As hunger forces Margit to travel across the bombed-out city to look for food and take care of the children and those she loves, she knows she is always one wrong step from an explosion. Margit’s diary, addressed to her husband who has been taken away for forced labour, is written with a wry self-deprecation, an unflinching eye for details and a kindness that shines through her own desperation. Stuck between the Soviet front and Nazi and Hungarian Arrow Cross persecutors, Margit asks her husband to read Between the Lines of her darkly humorous true story.

Introduction by Gergely Kunt

“… Her unvarnished, sharp commentaries on the interactions between Jews thrown together by murderous measures and between Jewish and non-Jewish Hungarians make the book especially valuable to students of history. And her snapshots of apocalyptic scenes, broken-down social fabric and constant hunt for food in post-siege Budapest are unforgettable. Kassai’s keen eye for sociological detail and her awareness of the broader political context place her book in the company of celebrated wartime diaries such as those written by Jenő Heltai and Miksa Fenyő.”

- Judith Szapor, author and professor, McGill University

“… The memoir-diary is also stylistically significant, not least for the self-irony predominant throughout the text, which can of course be read as a kind of trauma-processing. Its very special style, preserved in the brilliant translation, brings back something of that bygone rich urban Jewish culture and humour, which survived only in fragments after 1945.”

- Éva Kovács, deputy director of academic affairs, Vienna Wiesenthal Institute for Holocaust Studies

At a Glance: Hungary; Converted to Lutheranism in 1941 but still targeted by Nazi regime; In hiding and under a false identity in Budapest; worked in Red Cross children’s homes; Written in 1945 and translated from Hungarian; Arrived in Canada in 1948

344 pages, including index

Recommended Ages: 16+

Language: English

back to Book list

Book Cover of Between the Lines: The Diary of Margit Kassai

‹ ›

Read an excerpt

Between the Lines: The Diary of Margit Kassai

The Age of Uninterrupted Slaps in the Face

Pest!!!!!!!!! Tuesday, March 6, 1945

My dear, sweet Pippancs,

It has been more than six months since I was last able to write you a diary letter as I used to do when I added a few lines to the page every day, keeping you informed of every insignificant and trivial thing that had happened to me. It seemed almost as if keeping a continuous process going was no problem at all. By now you may have heard that some things have happened to me, to Budapest, to the Jews, to Hungary, etc., that can’t be called either trivial or insignificant, and I have gradually developed what I have concisely named a caesura complex. I’ll explain in a moment what that means, but it’s certain that this year has caused a caesura, a break, in your life just as it has in mine. This year cut me off sharply and pitched me against a completely different situation, in which I too became something completely different. Surely the same applies to you too, doesn’t it? The essential part of the caesura complex is the fear that the new Kiskas and the new Gregi may no longer suit each other. I’ve often imagined that having been God knows where during this time you have found another woman to get used to. That would be quite natural, and something of the kind could also have happened to me, although not so easily, because you know how many men were exterminated around here. Then I also imagined that one day you would come home, there would have been no other woman and the new Kiskas would suit you, but you would suddenly ask what had happened, what it had been like. You would expect me to tell you about the whole year, and I would stand there not knowing what to tell. How could I tell it, what could I tell, if the biography of every single person who has come through it alive is a six-volume adventure story? One day we would walk down the street in Budapest together, and I would point out some passersby who seemed so insignificant that at other times we wouldn’t even see them but, believe me, each of them is the hero of a novel — and what’s more, the hero of a very thrilling novel.

Note: Don’t expect a historical account from me. Other people could explain the historical, political, and strategic side of the affair much better than I could even trying my hardest. I only want to report what happened to ME, what the whole thing was like for ME. And — I repeat — I’m doing it to resist the caesura complex.

My dear Pipus, it was April 8 when we said goodbye last year. You patted my cheek with a typical Pippancs gesture and said lightly: “Try to stay alive. Okay?” I said (less lightly): “Okay.” Well, I did try, and I suspended all spielbergerisms. I’m not saying that I don’t owe a lot to trying. But that wasn’t all. If I’m here today it’s thanks to

Béla,
Béla,
Béla,
the traditional bad luck of the Spielbergers, which always turns into good when faced with a question of life and death,
an astonishing series of lucky coincidences and
my indestructible nervous system.

*Note: If you are affiliated with an educational institution in Canada, books can be ordered free of charge. For more information click here.

Previous Next

About the author

Margit Kassai (1909–2000) was born in Budapest, Hungary. She and her husband, György Tolnai, left Hungary for France in 1946, where they had a daughter. In 1948, Margit immigrated to Canada, settling in Toronto with her family. She worked in the Department of Political Economy at the University of Toronto for many years. Margit was fluent in Hungarian, German, English and French, and she was an avid photographer. Between the Lines is the translation of the Hungarian edition of Óvoda az óvóhelyen, published in 2020.

You see, Pipus, I’m just saying — this followed me around throughout the whole game, this mad and incomprehensible series of lucky coincidences. This is how bombs, missiles, Arrow Cross raids, police raids, etc., always hit the ground five minutes before me or eight minutes after me, two metres to the right of me or five metres behind me….

back to Book list