They Were Divided: The Transylvanian Trilogy, Volume III (The writing on the wall)

by Miklos Banffy

Patrick Thursfield (Translator), Katalin Banyff-Jelen (Translator), Patrick Leigh Fermor (Foreword), and Kathy Banffy- Jelen (Translator)

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"Perfect late night reading" JAN MORRIS
"Banffy is a born storyteller" PATRICK LEIGH FERMOR
"Totally absorbing" MARTHA KEARNEY
"So evocative" SIMON JENKINS


The final volume of Miklos Banffy's panoramic trilogy of the dying years of the Habsburg empire.

They Were Divided reflects the rapidly disintegrating course of events in Central Europe. In the foreground once again the lives of Balint, with his ultimately unhappy love for Adrienne, and his fatally flawed cousin, Laszlo Gyeroffy, who dies in poverty and neglect, are told with humour and a bitter-sweet nostalgia for a paradise lost through folly.

The sinister and fast moving events in Montenegro, the Balkan wars, the apparent encirclement of Germany and Austria-Hungary by Britain, France and Russia, and finally the assassination of Franz Ferdinand all lead inexorably to the youth of Hungary marching off to their death and the dismemberment of their once great country.

Volume three of the epic, sweeping and wholly immersive trilogy that began with They Were Counted, and continued with They Were Found Wanting.

Translated from the Hungarian by Patrick Thursfield and Katalin Banffy-Jelen
With a Foreword by Patrick Leigh-Fermor
WINNER OF THE WEIDENFELD TRANSLATION PRIZE

  • ISBN10 191005092X
  • ISBN13 9781910050927
  • Publish Date 8 September 2016 (first published 12 June 2001)
  • Publish Status Out of Print
  • Out of Print 30 January 2024
  • Publish Country GB
  • Imprint Arcadia Books
  • Format Paperback (B-Format (198x129 mm))
  • Pages 368
  • Language English