Timar's Two Worlds

MAURUS JOKAI Timar's Two Worlds Maurus Jokai, by common consent the greatest Hungarian novelist of the nineteenth century, was born at Komarom on February 19, 1825. Trained for the law, as an advocate he achieved the distinction of winning his first case. The drudgery of a lawyer's office, however, proved uncongenial to him, and fired by the success of his first play, "The Jew Boy" ("Zsidó fiu"), he went to Pest, where he devoted himself to journalism, in due course becoming editor of "Eletképek," a leading Hungarian literary periodical. At the outbreak of the Revolution of 1848, he threw himself in with the supporters of the national cause. From that time until his death--which occurred on May 4, 1904--Jokai identified himself considerably with politics. Of all his novels perhaps, "Az arany ember" ("A Man of Gold"), translated into English under the title of "Timar's Two Worlds," takes the highest place.