When we think about the future, we reflect on the present. In his work A jövő század regénye [Novel of the Next Century], Mór Jókai places the problems of his own time in the next century, thus searching for answers. The present time of the science fiction novel has itself become the past for us. The exhibition invites visitors to take part in a kind of game in which they formulate questions about their own future while thinking about the past, using artefacts and texts from different eras.
“No sooner had he finished his novel than he fell ill, lying in his villa with a fever of forty degrees, and people were worried he might well die. He recovered very slowly… and while still convalescing, he embarked upon his most fantastical novel, Novel of the Next Century, after his two most poetic novels. He had finally found a subject where he could fully unleash his imagination, which was only increased by anaemia and the resulting sleepless nights. What a treat again! A novel about Hungary a hundred years hence, from the time of King Árpád II. It is true that it is just a poet’s dream. Yet what a poet’s dream it is! One in which dreams become realities and realities become dreams…”
“…the whole thing is built on a hypothesis. On an invention that will transform the world.”
Mór Jókai is often referred to as the “great storyteller”. A designation justified by his huge and diverse writing oeuvre. His small notebooks, which he himself called his memoirs, provide an insight into the method he used in his work and everyday life. The entries in the notebooks are not only literary in nature, but also contain numerous notes related to everyday life: payments, shopping lists, and other everyday entries. However, the ideas, data, and inspirations collected for his works are all contained in these notebooks. It is also clear from the notes made for the Novel of the Next Century that although he only began to develop the plot of the work in the early 1870s, when compiling the story, Jókai also drew on his notes he made in the 1850s, using the sources he read at that time for the story. This demonstrates how Jókai used his diverse knowledge to construct the structure of the novel’s characters and the direction of the plot. The open notebook displays a sketch of the novel’s table of contents.
“...this is an extreme mockery of some of the current circumstances...”
“The power of the aerodrome knows no bounds; the two living beings roam in layers of the world that neither man nor animal has ever travelled before. Twenty-four thousand feet above the ground. Higher than the peaks of the Himalayas, of Chimborazo.”
The Novel of the Next Century was published in the daily A Hon in sequels between 1872 and 1874. The story begins in 1952 and presents the history of Hungary and the world until 2000. The basic premise of the novel is that through the application of technical inventions and scientific discoveries, the basic nature of man can be transformed, and the world can be changed. The episode titled The Perpetual Struggle, written with a satirical edge, takes place in Hungary in the 1950s. Its main protagonists are David Tatrangi and the Hungarian ruler, Árpád II of Habsburg. Hungary, ostensibly utopian but actually plagued by crises, is preparing for war with Russia, which has undergone a nihilistic revolution. War eventually breaks out as King Árpád marries Princess Hermione, a descendant of the exiled Russian Tsarist family. The Russians, led by Lady Sasza, attack Hungary. Tatrangi saves the day by inventing the unbreakable and universal substance, ichor, and using it to solve the problem of flight. Using his fleet of aircraft, called aerodromes, Tatrangi stops the invading Russian troops. The victory of the Hungarian armies, which gained the upper hand in the battle, was prevented by Sasza’s skilful diplomatic manoeuvre. To resolve the stalemate, Tatrangi establishes Otthon [Home], a Hungarian state in the form of a republic, in the Danube Delta. The second episode of the novel, The Perpetual Peace, presents the role of Tatrangi and Otthon in creating world peace. After the new wars, the novel concludes with humanity entering a new, happy, earthly paradise, in which social and economic conflicts and problems have been resolved. The conclusion of the narrative opens up interstellar horizons when, in 2000, Earth’s sister planet, Pax, is born thanks to an interplanetary coincidence.
The Mór Jókai’s notebooks, n.d., National Széchényi Library Manuscript Archive
Mór Jókai: Novel of the Next Century, manuscript, 1870–1872, ational Széchényi Library Manuscript Archive
Mór Jókai: Novel of the Next Century, 1873, National Széchényi Library Core Collection