Night School is a volume of loosely interconnected short stories that ironically imitates the genre and appearance of a school reader, with each story presented under the rubric of a school subject, accompanied by mock illustrations and a punch line of questions or assignments. In its carnivalesque romp through culture and history, the book playfully subverts but also seriously critiques and reinvents authorized knowledge, often from a distinctly woman’s perspective. The stories also add up to an unconventional memoir or family history that draws on the author’s multicultural backgound in its alternating perspectives of an insider’s intimate familiarity and an outsider’s bemused curiosity. Beneath the sharp ironic style that often turns into black humor, an undercurrent of intense emotion and sensuality pervades dilemmas of cultural, sexual, national, and linguistic identity.
(Design: Ágnes Eperjesi )
Stories
- "Skatul'ka s fotografiami." "Self-help alebo moc nou-hau." Trans. into Slovakian by Renata Deáková. Revue Svetovej Litertúry 2010/2.
- Night Zoo, trans. Paul Olchváry, Kenyon Review, Spring 2010.
- The Two Fridas, trans. Jim Tucker, World Literature Today, November 2009. (cover & contents)
- “Amikor még csak az állatok éltek” [When There Were Only Animals] in Dzsungel a szívben (Jungle in the Heart), an anthology of stories by women on the mother-daughter relationship. Edited by Zsuzsa Forgács. Jaffa Publishing House, Budapest, 2010
- “ Méreg” [Poison]. Hungarian Lettre Internationale, Fall 2010
- “ Frau Röntgen keze” [Frau Röntgen’s Hand], short story. Körkép 2010 (Best Short Stories, 2010). Eds. Ildikó Boldizsár and Bence Sárközy , Budapest, Magvetõ, 2010. Originally appeared in Mûút journal, 1-2/2009.
- “ Las Meninas”, short story. 2000 journal, 06/2010
- “ Hús” [Flesh], short story. Litera, March, 2010
- “ Amikor még csak az állatok éltek” [When There Were Only Animals], short story. Holmi, journal, 02/2010
- Egy este Erika nélkül [A Night Without Erika], 2000, April 2008, 32-35. Also in Hasítás: Huszonhat magyar író novellája a rockról [Twenty-Six Hungarian Writers on Rock] (Magvetõ, 2008).
- Képzeletbeli Éden [Imaginary Eden], Beszélő, December 2007. 90-93.
- Vénusz-átvonulás [Transit of Venus], Kalligram, July-August 2007; also anthologized in the annual collection of the best Hungarian short stories, Körkép 2008 (Eds. Ildikó Boldizsár and BenceSárközy, Magvető, 2008. 7-14.)
- Seashore, deserted, in Salty Coffee: Untold Stories by Jewish Women (Novella, 2007).
- A Box of Photos (Captions on the back), trans. Katalin Orbán, Eurozine, 2007. Also Ch. 9 of Esti iskola [Night School].
- Self-help avagy a nóhó hatalma [Self-Help, or the Power of Know-How], Hogyan nem (részleges leltár) [How I Didn't: A Partial Inventory] Lettre Internationale , 2006. 62. -63. Also Chs. 16 and 20 of Esti iskola [Night School].
- Film (24/1) , Beszélő, December 2006.
- Éjszakai állatkert [Night Zoo], in Éjszakai állatkert: antológia a nõi szexualitásról [Night Zoo: An Anthology about Female Sexuality], eds. Zsuzsa Forgács, Agáta Gordon, Kriszta Bódis (Jonathan Miller, 2005)
- Holvan Anya [Mother Where], HOLMI, June 2005; also anthologized in the annual collection of the best Hungarian short stories, Körkép 2006 (eds. Ildikó Boldizsár and Bence Sárközy, Magvető, 2006. ). Also Ch. 1 of of Esti iskola [Night School].
- Gustave és Maxime Egyiptomban [Gustave and Maxime in Egypt], Henri Mouhot megkísértése [The Temptation of Henri Mouhot], Mibõl lesz a cserebomlás, avagy választó vonzások [ Double Decomposition, or Affinitive Elections], HOLMI, June 2005. Also Chs. 2, 8, and 3 of Esti iskola [Night School].
- Tengerpart üresen [Seashore, deserted], in Sós kávé: elmeséletlen női történetek [Salty Coffee], ed. Pécsi Katalin, (Novella, 2007).
- "Papafilm", Élet és Irodalom, August 2003.
