Árpád Tóth

Árpád Tóth (14 April 1886 – 7 November 1928) was a Hungarian poet[1] and translator.[2]

Árpád Tóth
Tóth circa 1907
Born	14 April 1886 Arad, Austria-Hungary
Died	7 November 1928 (aged 42) Budapest, Hungary
Nationality	Hungarian
Occupation	Poet, translator

Tóth went to Gymnasium (high school) in Debrecen and then studied German and Hungarian at the University of Budapest. In 1907, his poems began to appear in the papers A Hét and Vasárnapi Újság and after 1908 in Nyugat. In 1911, he became a theater critic for the paper Debreceni Nagy Újság.

In 1913, he became a tutor to a wealthy family and received a little income from writing but still lived in poverty.[3] Tuberculosis led him to rest at the Svedlér Sanitorium in the Tatra Mountains.

During the period of the revolutionary government after World War I, he became secretary of the Vörösmarty Academy, but lost the position and couldn't find new work after the government's fall. He remained poor and sick with tuberculosis for the rest of his life, succumbing to the disease in Budapest in 1928.[4] His prolonged suffering led him to consider suicide at one point – although he did join the staff of Az Est in 1921.

In Debrecen, a gymnasium named of after him. In April 2011, the Hungarian National Bank issued a commemorative silver coin celebrating the 125th anniversary of the poet's birth.[5]

Works

He was a major lyric poet and contributed to the Nyugat School. His core themes focused on fleeting happiness and resignation.

He translated Milton, Oscar Wilde, Shelley, Keats, Baudelaire, Flaubert, Gautier, Maupassant, and Chekhov.[6]

References

1. The Hungarian Quarterly, Volumes 3-5. Hungarian Quarterly. 1962. It is to the author's pleasure that two of Toth's poems could be published in English in the supplement to this article. It is worthwhile to get acquainted with this fine-stringed and soft-speaking poet
2. Noth, Ernst Erich (1968). Books Abroad. University of Oklahoma Press. 42. The majority of the translations are outstanding, thanks to the participation of all the important Hungarian poets and translators: Sandor Weores, Gyula Illyes, Lorinc Szabo, Dezso Kosztolinyi, Arpad Toth... Missing or empty |title= (help)
3. Czigány, Lóránt (1984). The Oxford history of Hungarian literature from the earliest times to the present (Reprint ed.). Clarendon Press. p. 319. ISBN 0198157819. His family inheritance of poverty and tuberculosis accompanied him all his life; and he died of the latter at the age of 42, on 7 November 1928
4. Konnyu, Leslie (1964). "Modern Magyar literature: a literary survey and anthology of the xxth century Hungarian authors". 2 (3–4). American Hungarian Review. The faultless poet died from tuberculosis at Budapest in 1928 Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
5. "'Árpád Tóth' hungarian collector coin". Numismatics Hungary. 14 April 2011. Retrieved 23 October 2014.
6. Martin, Seymour-Smith (1985). The new guide to modern world literature (Revised, reprint ed.). P. Bedrick Books. p. 707. ISBN 0872260003. Arpad Tóth (1886-1928), one of the leading translators of his day (Baudelaire, Flaubert, Keats, Milton, and others)