
KARINTHY FRIGYES
In a bustling 1920s Budapest café, a melancholy poet finds himself embroiled in an odd encounter with a sharply dressed stranger who introduces himself as John Devil. The stranger, a businessman with a mysterious air, offers the poet a lucrative contract to supply a strange liquid, promising swift payment and a taste of prosperity. Intrigued yet uneasy, the poet wrestles with the absurdity of the deal, his emotions swinging between desperation and curiosity as he prepares to fulfill the terms.
The story unfolds with vivid humor and a touch of the surreal, capturing the poet’s frantic attempts to meet the bizarre demands while navigating his own doubts. As he juggles creative longing and the lure of easy money, the narrative paints a lively portrait of early‑twentieth‑century urban life, where ordinary cafés become stages for extraordinary bargains. Listeners are drawn into a whimsical yet thought‑provoking tale that questions ambition, temptation, and the cost of a seemingly simple agreement.
Language
hu
Duration
~3 hours (228K characters)
Publisher of text edition
Project Gutenberg
Credits
Produced by Albert László from page images generously made available by the HathiTrust Digital Library
Release date
2020-08-07
Rights
Public domain in the USA.
Subjects

1887–1938
A sharp-witted Hungarian writer whose humor, satire, and curiosity about modern life made him one of the most beloved literary voices of early 20th-century Hungary. He is also often remembered beyond literature for the story that anticipated the idea later known as “six degrees of separation.”
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