Károly Kisfaludy was a Hungarian

Hungary

Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...

 dramatist and artist, brother of Sándor Kisfaludy

Sándor Kisfaludy

Sándor Kisfaludy was a Hungarian lyric poet, Himfy's Loves his chief work, was less distinguished as a dramatist. He is considered to be the first romantic poet from Hungary. He was the brother of Károly Kisfaludy. He has been set to music by Zoltán Kodály.-References:...

. He was the founder of the national drama.

The youngest of eight children, his mother died in childbirth, and he had a troubled relationship with his father. Kisfaludy began writing poems and songs while in the army from 1804 to 1811. He saw active service in the Napoleonic Wars

Napoleonic Wars

The Napoleonic Wars were a series of wars declared against Napoleon's French Empire by opposing coalitions that ran from 1803 to 1815. As a continuation of the wars sparked by the French Revolution of 1789, they revolutionised European armies and played out on an unprecedented scale, mainly due to...

 in Italy, Serbia and Bavaria. After his return in 1810 he courted a girl named Katalin Heppler, but did not marry. His resignation from the army alienated his father, and he took refuge at his sister Teréz's house in Vas County. He studied art, travelling to Vienna in 1812 and Italy in 1815, but had no luck with either writing or painting until April and June 1819, when his tragedies A tatárok Magyarországon ("The Tatars in Hungary") and Ilka, vagy Nándorfehérvár bevétele ("Ilka, or the Capture of Belgrade") were a great success. He followed them up immediately with other dramas he had written: Stibor vajda ("The Voivode Stiber") and A kérők ("The Suitors"), in September, and A pártutõk ("The Insurgents") in November; and the next year wrote three more. His plays were translated into German, and performed in Vienna.

In 1822 he founded the periodical Aurora

Aurora (periodical)

Aurora was a literary journal founded by Károly Kisfaludy in 1821-2. It was crucial in the development of Romanticism in Hungarian literature, and in establishing Pest as a literary centre....

, for which he was awarded the Marczibányi Prize in 1826, the same year that his father reinstated him in his will. He fell in love with a woman named Nina Löffler, but because she was Jewish he could not marry her. He wrote prolifically for Aurora until his death from tuberculosis

Tuberculosis

Tuberculosis, MTB, or TB is a common, and in many cases lethal, infectious disease caused by various strains of mycobacteria, usually Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Tuberculosis usually attacks the lungs but can also affect other parts of the body...

 in 1830. The Kisfaludy Society

Kisfaludy Society

The Kisfaludy Society was a literary society in Pest, founded in 1836 and named after Károly Kisfaludy, who had died in 1830. It held monthly meetings and was a major force in Hungarian literary life, giving prizes, funding the collection of folk songs, and sponsoring the publication of works like...

 was created in his honour in 1836.

He is remembered for his plays and epigrams, and for poems like his elegy Mohács (1824), on the subject of the battle of 1526

Battle of Mohács

The Battle of Mohács was fought on August 29, 1526 near Mohács, Hungary. In the battle, forces of the Kingdom of Hungary led by King Louis II of Hungary and Bohemia were defeated by forces of the Ottoman Empire led by Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent....

. His life was fictionalised by Mór Jókai

Mór Jókai

Mór Jókai , born Móric Jókay de Ásva , outside Hungary also known as Maurus Jokai, was a Hungarian dramatist and novelist.-Early life:...

in Eppur si muove (1872).

External links

• Some of Kisfaludy's paintings