OPINION: Hungry for recognition in Hungary

A recent report says that one third of Hungarians believe that Jews have too much influence on the country’s business life. In fact, on many occasions, they haven’t had enough influence. The cemeteries in Vienna bear mute witness to this fact. 

In the early 19th century, one third of the women in childbirth in the Vienna General Hospital died of puerperal fever. In 1847 a Hungarian Jewish doctor called Ignaz Semmelweis put it down to doctors examining dead bodies and then the women, without washing their hands.

Nobody would listen because he was a Hungarian Jew. In 1865 he had a nervous breakdown, was committed to an asylum and beaten to death by the staff within a couple of weeks. Years later Lord Lister came to the same conclusion and gave the credit to Semmelweis.

There are 80,000 Jews in Hungary today. In 1944 some 440,000 were killed by the Nazis.

Not surprisingly, many Hungarian Jews emigrated to Britain. Among them was Sir Alexander Korda, the only British film maker to produce pictures which could compete with Hollywood’s best. His brother, Vincent Korda, was a brilliant art director. Among the famous actors of his day was Leslie Howard, who was killed in an air crash during the war. The finest cinema company was Odeon and that was founded by Oscar Deutsch, also from Hungary.

Among the Hungarian Jewish journalists was the food critic, Egon Ronay, and Arthur Koestler was another. Among the Hungarian Jewish businessmen is George Soros and among the sportsmen was the British and Commonwealth Heavyweight champion, Joe Bugner.

Today there are still descendants of Hungarian Jews gracing our stages; among others, Michael Macintyre’s grandparents were Hungarian Jewish, and Stephen Fry comes from the same origins.

Hungarian Jews worked for other religions as well. The first mosque in Britain, the Shah Jahan in Woking, was designed by Gottlieb Wilhelm Leitner  in 1889.

There are 80,000 Jews in Hungary today. In 1944 some 440,000 were killed by the Nazis.

Dennis Gabor, a Hungarian born electrical engineer, emigrated from Germany before the war and in 1971 won the Nobel Prize for Physics for inventing Holography, which is lensless three dimensional photography. Other Hungarian Jews who won Nobel Prizes were George de Hevesy for Chemistry in 1943, George Olah for Chemistry in 1994, Imre Kurtesz for Literature in 2002, John Harsanyi for Economics in 1994 and Avraham Hershko for Chemistry in 2004. That’s six Hungarian Jews, a remarkable number.

It wouldn’t seem unreasonable to suggest that if you could attract more Hungarian Jews to your country, you might improve your balance of trade considerably. The one third of Hungarians who don’t agree might take the contributions their Jews have made more seriously.

Of course, there will always be uninformed and prejudiced people but, happily, it is much easier today to make progress on merit, rather than suffer the indignities which plagued our ancestors.

• Derek Taylor is an historian