Celestial Harmonies

by Péter Esterházy

Book Overview

The Esterh zys, one of Europe's most prominent aristocratic families, are closely linked to the rise and fall of the Hapsburg Empire. Princes, counts, commanders, diplomats, bishops, and patrons of the arts, revered, respected, and occasionally feared by their contemporaries, their story is as complex as the history of Hungary itself. Celestial Harmonies is the intricate chronicle of this remarkable family, a saga spanning seven centuries of epic...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0060501081
• ISBN13: 9780060501082
• Release Date: March 2005
• Publisher: Ecco Press
• Length: 846 Pages
• Weight: 1.56 lbs.
• Dimensions: 2.0" x 5.4" x 8.0"

Customer Reviews

A book to be experienced

I cannot adequately describe what it was like for me to have experienced Celestial Harmonies, but I will try: Part I is deceptively simple in its reduction of several generations of Esterhazy men (father, grandfathers, great grandfathers, etc) into "father" and "son." Yet this narrative device allows us to experience Peter Esterhazy's own complex and wonderful family history first hand, with details presented in small "chapters," often out of sequence from one another. These pieces coalesce and provide the reader with an ancestrial memory of this great aristocratic family. Part II is more linear in its presentaion, and focuses on Esterhazy men of the twentieth century and all that was lost to the ravages war, Communism and revolution. It provides a glimpse into a time and a place in the world that I don't often hear about(in the US). Celestial Harmonies is a most rewarding experience and I highly recommend it.

Harmonious - with just a discordant note or two

This will sound like literary heresy, but the first recommendation I would make to those considering reading this book is that they start with Part II, the author's autobiographical narrative, and then go back and try Part I. Peter Esterhazy's "Celestial Harmonies" is an ambitious and unusual literary proposal that really consists of two complementary books within a single cover. In the first part Esterhazy tells the story of his aristocratic family through 371 numbered vignettes, some only a few lines long, others spanning several pages. In the second part Esterhazy looks at Hungary's troubled passage through the 20th century, showing how his family got its first taste of the troubles ahead with the advent of Bela Kun's communist regime in 1919, then enjoyed a brief return to aristocratic normalcy before the Soviet satellite regime of the late 1940s took away all of the family's land, possessions and power. The problem with this book is the construction of the first half, and that's the reason for the recommendation I made above. At some point the first half becomes such rough going that I'm afraid many readers will not make it past the halfway point, and that would be a shame. Esterhazy's approach to the first half was to tell the family's story as anecdotes involving a score of family patriarchs. The anecdotes are not in chronological order but rather skip back in forth in time: in most cases no dates are given. Perhaps Esterhazy wanted to keep his novel from seeming like a history book but I'm afraid the actual effect of his approach will be to send readers scurrying to their bookshelves for an encyclopaedia, as they try to look up a particular battle or Hungarian leader in order to put a given vignette in context. Many of the vignettes are insightful, and a few are hilarious, but as Esterhazy progresses through Part I they become more and more metaphorical, metaphysical, and often simply confounding. For all that, the second half is a poignant memoir, one that reads smoothly, brilliantly evocative of life in communist Hungary and of the sufferings of those families with "inconvenient" surnames, those whose mere birth made them enemies of the state. The insights from the viewpoint of the author's grandfather, a Prime Minister of Hungary towards the end of the Empire, are most interesting, and then the viewpoint gradually shifts to the author's. Esterhazy touchingly shows us his father's struggle to adapt to life in a world where he'd gone from being the heir to one of Hungary's biggest fortunes, to having to live in a one-room dwelling with his family and work a series of menial jobs, the only ones the state allowed him to have. Near the end of the book the author recounts a childhood meal at an expensive restaurant in Budapest, a meal his family was only able to have through the agency of special food coupons for foreigners that they were given by a relation. Only by pretending to be German tourists could the family enter the restaurant a

Man, God and Homeland

I picked this novel up after reading the LA times book review. I was not disappointed; the book is sweeping in its scope without losing minute focus on the actions of individual men. The first portion of the book is devoid of a central character; only family relations exist this early in the story. Esterhazy tears down the walls of Hungarian society and allows the reader to fly over and inspect the scene for himself. Like God himself the reader is privy to all of actions of Peter's countrymen. The scene, at times, is both beautiful and appalling and leaves the reader aware of the continuity of the past and present, aware of how we all are "Fathers" "Mothers" "Sisters" and "Brothers" of one form or another.The second portion of the book is a loose biography of the Esterhazy family stretching from the early 20th century to the early 1960s. Throughout all of the degradations suffered by the family, the father refuses to give up his birthright due to a Count: his Humanism. In order to fully appreciate this book it is essential to have an understanding of Hungarian History and a knack for deciphering opaque references. Every word was carefully chosen so it is necessary to pay close attention to what you are reading, this, at times, slows the rhythm and makes the book seem longer than its 842 pages. If you have the time and will power then pick up this novel