In October 1956, a spontaneous uprising took Hungarian Communist authorities by surprise, prompting Soviet authorities to invade the country. After a few days of violent fighting, the revolt was crushed. In the wake of the event, some 200,000 refugees left Hungary, 35,000 of whom made their way to Canada. This would be the first time Canada would accept so many refugees of a single origin, setting a precedent for later refugee initiatives. More than fifty years later, this collection focuses on the impact of the revolution in Hungary, in Canada, and around the world.
Christopher Adam is a sessional lecturer at Carleton University.
Tibor Egervari is professor emeritus at the University of Ottawa. He is a Chevalier of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, as well as an Officier des Palmes Académiques.
Leslie Laczko is chair of the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at the University of Ottawa. He is the author of Pluralism and Inequality in Quebec (University of Toronto Press, 1995).
Judy Young is president of the Canada-Hungary Education Foundation, Ottawa.
The academic level of scholarship presented in this interdisciplinary, edited volume is excellent. The two parts represent cross-disciplinary approaches giving an added value to the existing literature on the 1956 Revolution. In sum, the chapters provide the reader with deep, historical, economic, political, and sociological analyses of the events, by commemorating the heroic aspects of the Revolution as well as its affect on the ordinary people’s life in Hungary and abroad. I would recommend the book for everyone interested in the events and the aftermath of the 1956 Hungarian Revolution. - Emese Ivan, E-Journal of the American Hungarian Educators Association, Volume 5 (2012)