The Pimpernel from Árkod

A comparative analysis of Magda Szabó's novel Abigail and Emma Orczy’s The Scarlet Pimpernel

Authors

  • Orsolya Tóth

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5195/ahea.2024.559

Keywords:

Magda Szabó, Emma Orczy, middlebrow literature, popular culture, Twentieth-century Hungarian novel, intertextual aspects, dual-identity hero

Abstract

The paper focuses on the registered but barely discussed intertextual aspects of Magda Szabó’s prose, which can be linked to the popular culture of the first half of the twentieth century. The comparative analysis compares one of her most famous novels, Abigail, with Baroness Emma Orczy’s Pimpernel stories and the relatively late entry in the Pimpernel franchise, the 1941 film “Pimpernel” Smith, directed by and starring Leslie Howard. The paper concludes that The Scarlet Pimpernel may have influenced the story and characterization of Abigail, particularly the portrayal of the dual-identity hero, Mr. Kőnig. It is also suggested that the novel’s schematic historical representation can be linked to Magda Szabó’s choice of literary template.

Author Biography

Orsolya Tóth

Orsolya Tóth is an Associate Professor at the Department of Classical Literature History and Comparative Literature, University of Pécs, Hungary. Her main area of research is eighteenth and nineteenth-century Hungarian literature and philology, especially the works of Ferenc Kazinczy. Her books are The Ephemeral and the Imperishable (The Discursive Limits of the Literary Approach of Kazinczy and his Contemporaries) (In Hungarian); 2009, Past and Present (Studies on 19th Century Hungarian Literature) (In Hungarian), 2017. Toth.orsolya@pte.hu

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Published

2024-09-12

Issue

Vol. 17 (2024)

Section

General Articles

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