Memories, Places, Objects: Memory Transmission in Monica Csango’s Fortielser (2017)
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsIn general,
- The terms place and space are used interchangeably. But the meaning actually varies: the term ‘place’ means the ideas of significant location and of possession, and ‘space’ indicates a more abstract concept. On this, the author can look at Tim Cresswell 2004. Place: A Short Introduction (pp. 7‒8).
- The author heavily relies on Lejeune’s approach for a definition of autobiography and memoir. Perhaps they could look at more recent research studies, too. For example:
- Anderson, Linda 2010. Autobiography
- Valérie Baisnée-Keay et al (eds.) 2018. Women’s Life Writing and the Practice of Reading: She Reads to Write Herself
- Leigh Gilmore 2023. The Limits of Autobiography: Trauma and Testimony
Suggestions:
Line 37: The author talks about two academic studies which "have thus far examined Norwegian contributions to the genre", but only discusses one: Langås’s Krigsminner i samtidslitteraturen. The other is in footnote 1. I would probably mention it briefly in the main body of the text for clarity and coherence.
Line 127: Inherited objects and spaces (places perhaps?)
Line 133: Monica Csango (DATE OF BIRTH)
Line 139: clarification needed “and the subsequent impact of these events on the lives of Csango and her 139 father Péter”. Who is the author referring to with Csango, here? Ferenc? Monica?
Line 142-3: “However, this element receives much less 142 attention than the Holocaust and its aftereffects, and it is not relevant to the scope of the article.” This sentence could be put in a footnote.
Line 145-148: paratextual photographs: why are they important? Clarification needed. Also, the explanation provided in the footnote could be in part included in the main text.
Line 177-178: Clarification needed, Csango meaning Ferenc?
Line 189-192: “Her death – and the family’s ensuing access to 189 her apartment and personal belongings – appears to have prompted Csango’s book project, although this connection is never acknowledged in the narrative.” References needed
Footnote 10: translation needed, or is it the original of the translation provided in the text? If the latter, the footnote number should follow the long quotation
Line 200: space needed between she could
Line 208-9: “In the process of writing her family history Csango actively involves her father” what does “actively involves” mean here?
Lines 209-213: reformulation needed, the sentence is not clear
Lines 222-224: reformulation needed, the sentence is not clear: nevertheless and however in the same sentence.
Line 322, 326, 370, 382, 388, 407: original missing in footnotes
Line 359: no emphasis in the quotation
Line 453: The author should clarify where the quotation comes from. It’s not clear as it stands. If from Csango, original needed in footnote
Line 506: “passivity of the majority” clarification needed
Author Response
Reviewer 1
Comments and Suggestions for Authors
General comment 1: The terms place and space are used interchangeably. But the meaning actually varies: the term ‘place’ means the ideas of significant location and of possession, and ‘space’ indicates a more abstract concept. On this, the author can look at Tim Cresswell 2004. Place: A Short Introduction (pp. 7‒8).
Response: This comment was very helpful.
General comment 2: The author heavily relies on Lejeune’s approach for a definition of autobiography and memoir. Perhaps they could look at more recent research studies, too. For example:
- Anderson, Linda 2010. Autobiography
- Valérie Baisnée-Keay et al (eds.) 2018. Women’s Life Writing and the Practice of Reading: She Reads to Write Herself
- Leigh Gilmore 2023. The Limits of Autobiography: Trauma and Testimony
Response: This is a fair point but I have decided not to follow this suggestion, considering that a.) the genre discussion is not in any way a main point in my article, and b.) that I do supplement Lejeune’s approach – with points from both Popkin’s (2015) and Kacandes’ (2012) genre discussions. Lejeune’s genre genealogy (still) offers relevant insights into autobiographical genres, and, further, provides relevant genre descriptions that gives insight into central traits characterizing Fortielser. Also, Kacandes’ term “holocaust family memoir” is based on Leujeune’s genre definition(s).
Suggestions:
Suggestion 1: Line 37: The author talks about two academic studies which "have thus far examined Norwegian contributions to the genre", but only discusses one: Langås’s Krigsminner i samtidslitteraturen. The other is in footnote 1. I would probably mention it briefly in the main body of the text for clarity and coherence.
Response: I agree. I moved the content from the footnote to the main body of the text, which now reads: «One of them is Madelen Brovold’s article «Minnekultur og minneoverføring i Mona Levins Mors historie (2015) og Irene Levins Vi snakket ikke om Holocaust (2020)», in which she examines the depiction of memory transmission and communicative memory in Mona Levin’s Mors historie («Mothers History», 2015) and Irene Levin’s Vi snakket ikke om Holocaust (2020; English edition: Everyday Silence and the Holocaust, 2024). The other can be found in Unni Langås’s book Krigsminner i samtidslitteraturen […]” (see page 1, first paragraph of introduction).
Suggestion 2: Line 127: Inherited objects and spaces (places perhaps?)
Response: I agree. This comment (also made as a general comment above) was very helpful. I have changed the concept from «spaces» to «places». The sentence now reads: «[…] this article investigates the thematization of transgenerational memory through an analysis of inherited objects and places in Csango’s memoir […]» (see p. 4, last paragraph of the subchapther).
Suggestion 3: Line 133: Monica Csango (DATE OF BIRTH)
Response: I agree. I have added «(b. 1969)» after the author name. The sentence now reads «Monica Csango (b. 1969) is a Jewish Hungarian Norwegian journalist […]» (see p. 4, first paragraph in subchapter «Memory Transmission and Mediators of Memory in Monica Csango’s Fortielser (2017)»).
Suggestion 4: Line 139: clarification needed “and the subsequent impact of these events on the lives of Csango and her 139 father Péter”. Who is the author referring to with Csango, here? Ferenc? Monica?
Response: I agree. I have changed it from «Csango» to «Monica Csango» (see p. 4, first paragraph in subchapter «Memory Transmission and Mediators of Memory in Monica Csango’s Fortielser (2017)»).
Suggestion 5: Line 142-3: “However, this element receives much less 142 attention than the Holocaust and its aftereffects, and it is not relevant to the scope of the article.” This sentence could be put in a footnote.
Response: I agree. I have put it in a footnote.
Suggestion 6: Line 145-148: paratextual photographs: why are they important? Clarification needed. Also, the explanation provided in the footnote could be in part included in the main text.
Response: I agree. I have revised the text accordingly. It now reads: “The story is communicated entirely through verbal text and devoid of visual elements other than two paratextual photographs, in which the most significant one is a black-and-white photograph featured on the book cover, depicting a young couple dressed in elegant fashion typical of the 1930s and 1940s. The photograph appear as documentation of the authenticity of the story the book conveys. In addition to this photograph, the layout of the book cover features barbed wire. The latter reflects a common visual trope in Holocaust literature, where such imagery functions as a symbolic marker of the text’s thematic engagement with the Holocaust, and as such, the visual design of the book connotes the Holocaust. A few examples of book covers employing this visual trope include Art Spiegelman’s Maus II: A Survivor’s Tale – And Here My Troubles Began (1991) as well as various editions of international bestsellers such as John Boyne’s The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas (2006), Roxane von Iperen’s The Sisters of Auschwitz (2018), Heather Morris’ The Tattooist of Auschwitz (2018), and Antonio Iturbe’s The Librarian of Auschwitz (2012). The motif also appears on the 2005 edition of Norwegian Holocaust survivor Herman Sachnowitz’s Det angår også deg («It Also Concerns You»), originally published in 1976. The other paratextual photograph is an author portrait of Csango, which appears on the front dust jacket flap. The author portrait combined with the author presentation, also placed on the front dust jacket flap, and parts of the back cover conveys the author’s ethos. Both of these photographs exemplify the ways in which Csango em-ploys the paratext to communicate the authenticity of the book’s narrative. This feature is commonly observed in Holocaust family memoirs (Kacandes 2012, p. 186).”
Suggestion 7: Line 177-178: Clarification needed, Csango meaning Ferenc?
Response: I have changed it from “Csango” to “Monica Csango”.
Suggestion 8: Line 189-192: “Her death – and the family’s ensuing access to 189 her apartment and personal belongings – appears to have prompted Csango’s book project, although this connection is never acknowledged in the narrative.” References needed
Response: I agree. I have provided one.
Suggestion 9: Footnote 10: translation needed, or is it the original of the translation provided in the text? If the latter, the footnote number should follow the long quotation
Response: It is the latter; the footnote number should – correctly – follow the long quotation, and now it does.
Suggestion 10: Line 200: space needed between she could
Response: I agree. I have fixed it.
Suggestion 11: Line 208-9: “In the process of writing her family history Csango actively involves her father” what does “actively involves” mean here?
Response: I agree. I have revised the sentence and provided some additional information. It now reads: “In the process of writing her family history Monica Csango actively involves her father. Several chapters describe conversations – about Jewishness (p. 115–118), different family members (for instance p. 134–137), and memory transmission and the book project (for instance p. 93–95) – between the two of them.”
Suggestion 12: Lines 209-213: reformulation needed, the sentence is not clear
Response: I agree. I have changed the sentence FROM: “While her grandmother emerges as the most prominent verbal and human mediator of family memory and plays a central role in shaping Csango’s personal understanding of identity and heritage, she lived in Budapest, whereas Csango was raised in Norway by her father – and apparently her mother, about whom the book says very little.”
TO: “[…] Magda thus plays a central role in shaping Monica Csango’s personal understanding of identity and heritage. However, she lived in Budapest, whereas the author was raised in Norway by her father – and apparently her mother, about whom the book says very little. Magda imprinted the importance of familial memory, transgenerational memory transmission, and remembrance in Péter from a young age, as exemplified in this passage […]”
Suggestion 13: Lines 222-224: reformulation needed, the sentence is not clear: nevertheless and however in the same sentence.
Response: I agree. I changed the sentence to “Nevertheless, despite the considerable geographical and ideological distance between postwar Social-Democratic Norway and Communist Hungary, Magda, her trauma, and her grief occupied an immense space in the Norwegian part of the Csango family.”
Suggestion 14: Line 322, 326, 370, 382, 388, 407: original missing in footnotes
Response: I partially agree. I have provided the original quotes (in Norwegian) in footnotes in all cases except two of them (326, 370), in which the quotes are original (and not from Csango).
Suggestion 15: Line 359: no emphasis in the quotation
Response: I agree. I removed “my emphasis”.
Suggestion 16: Line 453: The author should clarify where the quotation comes from. It’s not clear as it stands. If from Csango, original needed in footnote
Response: I agree. I have added “Piatti 2017” in the reference. It now says (Piatti 2017, p. 185).
Suggestion 17: Line 506: “passivity of the majority” clarification needed
Response: I agree. I changed the sentence from: “Additionally, there has been an increase in counternarratives and -memories, including critical historical narratives about the persecution of Jews and the passivity of the majority population (Brovold 2024, p. 74).” TO: “Additionally, there has been a general increase in counternarratives and -memories, including critical historical narratives about the persecution of the Jews and the passivity of the Norwegian majority population during the war (Brovold 2024, p. 74).”
Reviewer 2 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThis is a timely essay, well connected to established scholarship. It brings into the anglophone discussion material from Norwegian, which in itself is already an original contribution. The discussion is mostly fine if not always very daring. One would encourage the author to be more forthright about her views on these texts, offering readings that allow others to discuss. In parts, this is too descriptive (for instance in the beginning of 4, also with some paragraphs that do no quite offer substantial enough material).
The focus in terms of concepts is quite narrowly with Hirsch and her work, which by now has been around for quite a while. It might feel more current if placed in connection with other second-generation literature research (e.g. by Erin McGlothlin) and by publications that try to figure out how postmemory can be conceptualised for subsequent generations and aesthetic forms of representation.
Author Response
Reviewer 2
Comments and Suggestions for Authors:
This is a timely essay, well connected to established scholarship. It brings into the anglophone discussion material from Norwegian, which in itself is already an original contribution. The discussion is mostly fine if not always very daring. One would encourage the author to be more forthright about her views on these texts, offering readings that allow others to discuss. In parts, this is too descriptive (for instance in the beginning of 4, also with some paragraphs that do no quite offer substantial enough material).
The focus in terms of concepts is quite narrowly with Hirsch and her work, which by now has been around for quite a while. It might feel more current if placed in connection with other second-generation literature research (e.g. by Erin McGlothlin) and by publications that try to figure out how postmemory can be conceptualised for subsequent generations and aesthetic forms of representation.
Response:
I appreciate the assessment provided by Reviewer 2. However, the review offers a rather general response to the article. I acknowledge that the article may not be particularly daring and that certain sections may adopt a somewhat descriptive mode, but this is – at least in part – intentional. Further, I do not wish “to be more forthright about her [my] views on these texts,” at least not with regard to Fortielser, if that is what the reviewer is requesting. I do not consider such forthrightness either relevant nor my job as a literary scholar. My views on the other “texts” referenced in the article – understood as previous scholarship and theoretical perspectives cited or discussed (such as those of Hirsch; Hirsch and Spitzer; Kacandes; and Aarons and Berger) – are at times stated explicitly – as in the paragraphs toward the end of subsection 4.1, “Memorial Objects and Their Functions,” where I examine a claim made by Aarons and Berger. More frequently, however, my position is conveyed implicitly through my use and interpretation of these scholars’ concepts and findings. My analytical deployment of these perspectives signals both their applicability to Fortielser and the value I place on these scholars’ contributions.
The reviewer provides two specific suggestions. The first says “In parts, this is too descriptive (for instance in the beginning of 4, also with some paragraphs that do no quite offer substantial enough material).” In an effort to address this suggestion, I have revised this section and supplemented it with substantial textual evidence. The section now appears as follows:
“The theme of transgenerational memory transmission is explored through the relationships between Magda and Monica Csango, and between Magda and her son Péter, but also in the relationships between Péter and Monica Csango, and between Monica Csango and her own son in Fortielser. Moreover, the narrative’s thematization of memory transmission primarily revolves around Magda’s husband Ferenc and (the trauma connected to) his disappearance following his conscription into forced labor in 1942. Although the memoir mostly foregrounds the author as the primary subject of the narrative, Magda emerges as the primary verbal (and human) mediator of transgenerational memory[1] within the narrative, and thus plays a crucial role in shaping the author’s understanding of the Csango family history – as well as of her personal identity. For instance, Magda recounted to Monica numerous stories about her life with Ferenc before and during the war: stories about how beautiful she was (Csango 2017, pp. 12, 15, 37), how they met (pp. 14–15, 21–22), what she was wearing (pp. 12, 15, 37), and how he indulged her with various gifts (for instance p. 36). She made a point of noting that «[w]hat I'm telling you now, Monica, is a great treasure. Take care of it as best you can»[2] (p. [16]). But more importantly, through the way she acted and lived, the way she related to her home, and the care with which she preserved Ferenc’s gifts and letters, she demonstrated to her granddaughter how significant Ferenc was: «Grandmother’s apartment was almost a sacrificial place for Grandfather. She guarded every letter, gift and photograph of him. […] I disturbed the sacred burial ground she had created for him in there»[3] (p. 133). These stories and actions, which emphasize the adventurous love affair between Magda and Ferenc, Ferenc’s admirable qualities, and the profound loss Magda suffered with his disappearance, instill in Monica Csango a fixation on her grandfather. But it was not until she reached adulthood Csango understood the extent of Magda’s impact on her: «What she lost is my loss too. […] I had to grow up to understand […] that I have brought my grandmother's feelings into my life »[4] (p. 40).”
The second specific suggestion of the reviewer states the following: “The focus in terms of concepts is quite narrowly with Hirsch and her work, which by now has been around for quite a while. It might feel more current if placed in connection with other second-generation literature research (e.g. by Erin McGlothlin) and by publications that try to figure out how postmemory can be conceptualised for subsequent generations and aesthetic forms of representation.” This is a fair point, and I do not disagree: Hirsch’s work has been foundational for some time, and I do indeed employ her terminology “quite narrowly”. However, I supplement the concepts developed by Hirsch/Hirsch and Spitzer with perspectives drawn from Irene Kacandes as well as from Aarons and Berger. In addition, I have consulted the work of Erin McGlothlin and several other scholars of second- and third-generation literature while preparing this article. I remain unconvinced, however, that alternative conceptual frameworks would be more productive for my analysis, given my sustained focus on the role of objects and places in Fortielser. For this reason I have decided not to follow this suggestion.
Reviewer 3 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThis article reads Monica Csango’s memoir Fortielser. Min jødiske familiehistorie («Concealments. My Jewish Family History», 2017) with an eye to the transmission of transgenerational memory through material objects and places. The author argues these elements indeed sustain these memories and “acts of transfer” in the narrative. The author cites examples of storytelling and memorial practices, object preservation and dissemination, and cite-specific visits to recall the lost/missing person. The article contributes to the conversation on the memoir as the second article written about the book; it is a novel research question that aligns with the scope of the special edition. It also contributes to the larger conversation on contemporary Jewish-Norwegian literature published in the past decade in Norway.
Regarding the general comments, there are many strengths to the article. Locating Csango’s memoir in the broader conversation of Holocaust literature and Holocaust studies scholarship was very helpful, as was the theoretical approach and conceptual framework that informed the author’s reading of the text. It was a clear departure from Unni Langås’s previous study on Csango’s text, as described. Overall, the manuscript is quite clear, relevant to the field, and well-structured. It reads well and will be of interest to readers of the journal and scholars searching for site-specific analysis of a Holocaust family memoir (Kacandes – line 171).
Attention to a few specific questions might clear up some details for the reader. Page 3 speaks of the theoretical framework with Connerton’s acts of transfer and analysis of material remnants aligning with Hirsch and Spitzer. Perhaps this is too literal, but there are very few actual comments in the article that speak of how Csango attains the physical objects and material remnants – the gifting, the inheritance, the transmission. The author analyzes the presence of the objects but often omits how they came to Csango, which leaves open questions as to whether things skipped Csango’s father or if everything stayed between the women (grandmother to granddaughter). Is there a gendered element in the gifting and transfer? Is this part of the titular “concealment” in the Csango family? If Peter (as son and father) he is “a central figure” (line 213-214) in the text, why does the author dedicate so little attention to him in the article? Similarly, starting on page 5, transgenerational memory transmission from Grandmother Magda is clearly defined, but again here there are questions about the father’s (Peter’s) absence in this process. Did the chairs set out (line 254) happen around a dinner table in Norway or in Hungary? Did the narrator learn to smell the objects from observing Grandma Magda or from stories of her behavior? Or are these acts things her father brought to Norway that the narrator observes another step/generation removed? Little commentary shows how verbal and non-verbal acts come through Magda and Peter or clarifies if some acts/objects became more important than others for the narrator based on that process of transmission. Does it matter for intergenerational transfer of memory? This ambiguity contrasts sharply to the strong analysis of the spaces of the famous New York Café. These may be small, insignificant details, but it might strengthen the analysis of the embodiment and sensory experience of the narrator’s connection to these objects (as is done with the cigarette case and ash tray set).
Finally, the statement about Ferenc’s “emigration to India” on page 7 (line 281) seems like it deserves more treatment or contextualization than the brief mention given. Was this an active disappearance where he was the agent, or was he disappeared by political persecution? It seems that this detail matters for how his absence and memory is cultivated, and how the family mediates their trauma through generations.
Author Response
Reviewer 3
Comments and suggestions:
This article reads Monica Csango’s memoir Fortielser. Min jødiske familiehistorie («Concealments. My Jewish Family History», 2017) with an eye to the transmission of transgenerational memory through material objects and places. The author argues these elements indeed sustain these memories and “acts of transfer” in the narrative. The author cites examples of storytelling and memorial practices, object preservation and dissemination, and cite-specific visits to recall the lost/missing person. The article contributes to the conversation on the memoir as the second article written about the book; it is a novel research question that aligns with the scope of the special edition. It also contributes to the larger conversation on contemporary Jewish-Norwegian literature published in the past decade in Norway.
Regarding the general comments, there are many strengths to the article. Locating Csango’s memoir in the broader conversation of Holocaust literature and Holocaust studies scholarship was very helpful, as was the theoretical approach and conceptual framework that informed the author’s reading of the text. It was a clear departure from Unni Langås’s previous study on Csango’s text, as described. Overall, the manuscript is quite clear, relevant to the field, and well-structured. It reads well and will be of interest to readers of the journal and scholars searching for site-specific analysis of a Holocaust family memoir (Kacandes – line 171).
Attention to a few specific questions might clear up some details for the reader. Page 3 speaks of the theoretical framework with Connerton’s acts of transfer and analysis of material remnants aligning with Hirsch and Spitzer. Perhaps this is too literal, but there are very few actual comments in the article that speak of how Csango attains the physical objects and material remnants – the gifting, the inheritance, the transmission. The author analyzes the presence of the objects but often omits how they came to Csango, which leaves open questions as to whether things skipped Csango’s father or if everything stayed between the women (grandmother to granddaughter). Is there a gendered element in the gifting and transfer? Is this part of the titular “concealment” in the Csango family? If Peter (as son and father) he is “a central figure” (line 213-214) in the text, why does the author dedicate so little attention to him in the article? Similarly, starting on page 5, transgenerational memory transmission from Grandmother Magda is clearly defined, but again here there are questions about the father’s (Peter’s) absence in this process. Did the chairs set out (line 254) happen around a dinner table in Norway or in Hungary? Did the narrator learn to smell the objects from observing Grandma Magda or from stories of her behavior? Or are these acts things her father brought to Norway that the narrator observes another step/generation removed? Little commentary shows how verbal and non-verbal acts come through Magda and Peter or clarifies if some acts/objects became more important than others for the narrator based on that process of transmission. Does it matter for intergenerational transfer of memory? This ambiguity contrasts sharply to the strong analysis of the spaces of the famous New York Café. These may be small, insignificant details, but it might strengthen the analysis of the embodiment and sensory experience of the narrator’s connection to these objects (as is done with the cigarette case and ash tray set).
Finally, the statement about Ferenc’s “emigration to India” on page 7 (line 281) seems like it deserves more treatment or contextualization than the brief mention given. Was this an active disappearance where he was the agent, or was he disappeared by political persecution? It seems that this detail matters for how his absence and memory is cultivated, and how the family mediates their trauma through generations.
Suggestion 1:
Perhaps this is too literal, but there are very few actual comments in the article that speak of how Csango attains the physical objects and material remnants – the gifting, the inheritance, the transmission. The author analyzes the presence of the objects but often omits how they came to Csango, which leaves open questions as to whether things skipped Csango’s father or if everything stayed between the women (grandmother to granddaughter). Is there a gendered element in the gifting and transfer? Is this part of the titular “concealment” in the Csango family? […] Similarly, starting on page 5, transgenerational memory transmission from Grandmother Magda is clearly defined, but again here there are questions about the father’s (Peter’s) absence in this process. Did the chairs set out (line 254) happen around a dinner table in Norway or in Hungary? Did the narrator learn to smell the objects from observing Grandma Magda or from stories of her behavior? Or are these acts things her father brought to Norway that the narrator observes another step/generation removed? Little commentary shows how verbal and non-verbal acts come through Magda and Peter or clarifies if some acts/objects became more important than others for the narrator based on that process of transmission. Does it matter for intergenerational transfer of memory? This ambiguity contrasts sharply to the strong analysis of the spaces of the famous New York Café. These may be small, insignificant details, but it might strengthen the analysis of the embodiment and sensory experience of the narrator’s connection to these objects (as is done with the cigarette case and ash tray set).
Response:
I – to a certain extent – agree. This is a good point. I have revised the following section, briefly addressing these questions. The added text is marked in bold: “The passage also gestures toward a memorial practice that remains otherwise unexplored: the family’s habit of setting out food and empty chairs for the dead. Building on this, this passage provides a clear example of the book’s impressionistic style, marked by anecdotal narration and significant gaps that are left to the reader’s interpretation. It appears that these acts of remembrance are undertaken exclusively by the Csango family in Hungary, rather than forming part of a sustained memorial practice maintained by Péter or by (the adult) Monica Csango in Norway. However, this remains ultimately unclear. The same applies to Monica Csango’s inherited objects from Ferenc: it remains largely unclear where, when, and under what circumstances she acquired them. The absence of further commentary on these actions thus leaves the reader to interpret its significance within the broader narrative. Should Magda ultimately be understood as the only person who sustains this memorial practice? Should Csango’s account be interpreted literally or metaphorically […]” (p. 10)
Suggestion 2:
If Peter (as son and father) he is “a central figure” (line 213-214) in the text, why does the author dedicate so little attention to him in the article?
Response:
I – at least partially – agree. I have made an effort to strengthen the analysis of Péters role as a mediator of memory within the narrative, especially in the section the reviewer commented on. The section now reads as follows:
“Magda thus plays a central role in shaping Monica Csango’s personal understanding of identity and heritage. However, she lived in Budapest, whereas the author was raised in Norway by her father – and apparently her mother, about whom the book says very little. Magda imprinted the importance of familial memory, transgenerational memory transmission, and remembrance in Péter from a young age, as exemplified in this pas-sage:
“Grandmother has spent all her waking time talking about Grandfather, mourning him. Organizing the things he left behind. Labeling the gifts she received from him. And not least: reminding Dad of the responsibility he bears as his son. That he is obliged, both as his father’s son, but also out of respect for her, to keep him alive in our consciousness.” (p. 163)
Péter consequently emerges as another central mediator of transgenerational memory transmission both within the family and the narrative, not least because he is described as consumed by genealogy and the search for unknown family members the past 40 years (pp. 94, 119–120). Csango even claims that he talks about his father Ferenc «every single day» (p. 30). In the process of writing her family history after Magda’s passing, Monica Csango therefore involves him. Several chapters describe conversations – about the family’s Jewishness (pp. 115–118, 120–121) and family members such as Ferenc and his brother Bandi (cf. for instance pp. 134–137), Magda’s personal archive of old photographs and letters (pp. 95, 104), and the book project (pp. 93–95) – between the two of them. Nevertheless, despite the considerable geographical and ideological distance between postwar Social-Democratic Norway and Communist Hungary, Magda, her trauma, and her grief occupied an immense space in the Norwegian part of the Csango family. Her narrative accounts, commemorative, and bodily practices as well as many of her personal possessions, including her apartment (cf. Hirsch and Spitzer 2006, p. 355), shaped both Péter’s and Monica Csango’s perception of the past growing up. But as Csango grew older, many of Magda’s personal possessions in the form of Ferenc’s former possessions – that Magda had carefully preserved before passing them on to Csango – appears to have become the primary medium of memory transmission, alongside a few places where Csango seems particularly inclined to affectively engage with the past.” (p. 7–8)
Suggestion 3:
Finally, the statement about Ferenc’s “emigration to India” on page 7 (line 281) seems like it deserves more treatment or contextualization than the brief mention given. Was this an active disappearance where he was the agent, or was he disappeared by political persecution? It seems that this detail matters for how his absence and memory is cultivated, and how the family mediates their trauma through generations.
Reponse:
I agree. I have added the following text in the presentantion / general analysis of the book (on p. 5):
«The title Fortielser («Concealments») is a more charged term than silence and, by extension, implies an active prevention of disclosure or recognition of «that which ought to be revealed» and thus «improper secrecy» (Merriam Webster, s.v. «concealment», December 13., 2025). The book’s exposition indicates that the narrative is concerned with the suppression of painful memories connected to the loss of family members: «In my family, the people who disappeared were worshipped as (if they were) alive. […] Words were exchanged between people, yet meaning resided in all that remained unspoken. No one liked to talk about what had happened; my family preferred to stay silent.» (p. 9). In light of the interplay between the back-cover text and the image of barbed wire on the book cover, the exposition indicates that both the losses and the silence are connected to the Holocaust. There is an apparent tension between the implications of the title and textual signals such as the example from the exposition and the family’s – especially Magda’s and Péter’s – recurrent practice of speaking about lost family members throughout the narrative. More importantly, however, the significance of the title is re-framed by the turning point of the narrative – which occurs towards the end of the book – in which Monica Csango discloses that Ferenc may not actually have perished in the Holocaust but instead might have survived and emigrated to India (2017, pp. 151–154). In 1978, both Magda and Péter learned of the existence of a shop in India called Csango, which bore a striking resemblance to the shop that Ferenc – and later Magda – had operated in Budapest. They discovered that the owners had purchased the shop in the late 1940s by a gentleman named Csango. Twenty-five years later, Monica Csango decided to pursue the matter further by making a documentary film. The film is called Evig din (2005) and traces her investigation. It suggests that the shop may once have belonged to Ferenc, although no definitive conclusion could be reached. When confronted with the possibility of her husband’s survival and subsequent immigration to India, Magda even acknowledges her awareness of it. She recalls that Ferenc, in a letter written prior to the war, stated that if anything were to happen to him, he would not return, as he did not want her to witness him in such a state (Csango 2017, p. 153). In other words, she has actually actively prevented disclosure of «that which ought to be revealed» (Merriam Webster, s.v. «concealment», December 13., 2025)! The title – as well as Magda’s behavior, not in the least her «eternal hope that her beloved had survived» – thus takes on a whole new meaning. By the narrative’s conclusion, Magda is revealed not simply as difficult or narcissistic but as a manipulative liar, driven less by grief than by a desire to preserve her own ego. As stated by Monica Csango: «Because there is clearly a difference between being abandoned and someone dying from you. She has performed the role of the grieving widow very well, structuring her entire life around it».»
The original mention / analysis of the turning point and Ferenc’ possible survival, I have revised to the following (to prevent repetition): “As previously mentioned, Csango reveals that Ferenc may have survived the Holocaust and emigrated to India (2017, pp. 151–154). This revelation situates the family’s preparations for the return of lost relatives not simply as acts of remembrance […]” (p. 9)
