The Tragedy of Man by Mádach Imre

The Tragedy of Man is a Hungarian play by Mádach Imre[1]. In the same vein of Milton’s Paradise Lost and Goethe’s Faust, the Tragedy of Man is a play about God, Lucifer, Man, its quest for wisdom, and their relations. Although the Hungarian Revolution of 1848 profoundly affected contemporary Hungarian literature, Mádach placed himself in the larger European literary tradition, with almost no references to the Revolution or Hungarian nationalism in the play.
   While the play takes place in a biblical setting, it is not a Christian play per se (it is often critical of the Catholic church, Mádach being protestant), rather it is a play in the form of epic, dramatic, poetry that portrays mankind’s struggle for wisdom and hope using biblical and historical settings to highlight this struggle. The play begins as God creates the world and Mankind, and the Archangels praise his creation. However, Lucifer refuses to praise God and deems his work futile, as Man will want to become God over his own world. Lucifer sets out to prove the futileness of God’s work. After Lucifer induces the Original Sin, Adam and Eve are thrown out of Eden, and Lucifer takes Adam through history using illusions in Adam’s dreams. In each scene of the play Adam, Lucifer, and Eve take on different historical characters such as Adam being Pharaoh of Egypt, Lucifer being some subordinate to Adam, and Eve being a non-essential character, subject to Adam’s desire. As Adam and Lucifer reach the 1800s and beyond, Adam begins to take the role of an outside observer in each historical and future scenario. Though Adam before the journey does not recognise his sin and is hopeful for mankind and its future progress and achievements, he realises the futile and hopeless nature of mankind through his visions, each of which he is disappoints and ages him.

   The Tragedy of Man deals, most of all, with mankind’s inability to truly understand the Lord and the vain quest for wisdom. In it, the reader is constantly reminded of the fruitlessness of mankind’s struggles, much like in the Ecclesiastes, but there is a message of hope beyond all hope in the play. Although mankind is like the Eskimo in one of the last scenes of the play, unsure of his God,

ESKIMO
(at the sight of Adam and Lucifer, in a world where the sun has burned out)

                                    And do the gods still live above?
                                    Here they stand now, in the flesh.
                                    Are they good or evil though?
                                    I’ll play it safe and run away.
                                                            He makes to flee

The play is an argument that Man need not understand the ways of God and instead, in the words of God in the famous last line of the play: 

THE LORD

                                    Man, I have spoken: strive on, trust, have faith!

    The play, of course, also deals with a wide variety of themes and ideals. Most notably is the notion of nationalism and liberalism, which Adam first thinks inhibits man, but later realises the value of, as Lucifer shows him a future without nations. Adam asks a question still relevant today; whether or not nationalism, or lack thereof, is worth it:

LUCIFER

                                    […] Don’t you think

                                    That nationalism was a petty concept?
                                    Prejudice gave it birth, and rivalry

                                    and narrow-mindedness were its defence. […]

ADAM

                                    All that I dreamt of is fulfilled at last. […]

                                    I’ve one regret: the nationhood ideal,
                                    Which could have survived […]

                                    Our souls need limits, fear the infinite,

                                    Scattered too wide they lose the power within;

                                    They cling to everything, the past, the future;
                                    I fear too big a world will not be loved
                                    As much as the soil in which our parents lie.
                                    A man who’d shed his blood to save his children

                                    Will shed but tears at best for mere acquaintance.

   Moreover, although Eve is a marginal character, she is also used to give the tragedy a romantic and poetic twist, Eve being the one that saves Adam from his imminent doom, and their poetic declarations of love lightens the mood of their hopelessness, as love so often does:

EVE

                                                                        I tremble, Adam.

                                    And heaven too has fallen silent.

ADAM

                                    I hear it still within your breast.

EVE

                                    When clouds obscure the eye of heaven

                                    I see it still within your eyes.

   Thus, the Tragedy of Man, unique in the context of Hungarian literature, is one of the most noteworthy pieces of Central European literature, and although the role of God in relation to the human condition is not as relevant within the artistic standards and thematic foci of the post- and metamodern culture of the early 21^st century the issue of mankind’s hopelessness in the world is still relevant and interesting, with the play's theme of nationalism being increasingly relevant in the Western world, too. Arguably, some of the poetics of the play has been lost in translation, as this particular translation focused on retaining meaning rather than poetic form. However, the play is tragic, hopeful, and still incredibly poetic, and the argument it presents, that there is hope beyond all hope, is its virtue: it finds a optimistic pessimism within the futileness of mankind’s desire for wisdom.

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[1] Mádach Imre is the native form of his name; Hungarian naming customs order the surname before the given name.