Mattie the Goose-boy
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Mattie the Goose-boy, or Lúdas Matyi, is a Hungarian epic poem written by Mihály Fazekas (1766 - 1828) in 1804 and first released in 1817. It is based on a folk-tale of unknown origins.
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[edit] Plot
[edit] Prologue
In the beginning, Matyi, who is a young peasant boy, is trying to sell his geese at the market. He gets into trouble because of the local senior, Dániel Döbröghy. The lord proclaims the geese as belonging to himself and orders his servants to punish Matyi with 50 punches on his back. Matyi makes vow to vengeance, that he repays the punishment three times to the lord.
[edit] The first repayment
Three years after Matyi had been punished, Döbröghy is on to build a castle for himself. The construction goes on very slowly, because of the lack of profession. Matyi identifies this and dresses as an Italian architect-maestro, than he visits the construction site. Matyi lures the lord and his servants to the nearby forest to gather wood for the structure. He orders the soldiers to harvest the forest, and he also orders them singing "pam-pam" while chopping the timber. After all he lures Döbröghy to the top of the highest hill and ties him on it with a rope. Than he hits the 25 on his back.
[edit] The second repayment
After being thrashed, Dániel Döbröghy is being cured in his fancy new castle. He orders his soldiers to get him a real doctor, because his wound isn't getting better. The servant go to seek a doctor. Matyi knows about the plan and he dresses as a German battlefield medic. He is brought to the lord and ordered to cure him. He sends the whole folk of the castle out to the nearby field to collect some special herbs. Certainly, he needs fictional plants, but he uses the silliness of the soldiers. While everybody is out harvesting, Matyi gives Döbröghy the second revenge. After that he frees the geese of the village, which formerly were imprisoned by the lord.
[edit] The third repayment
It's now winter and the date of the yearly market. Döbröghy knows that Matyi will surely repay the punishment, so he orders his servants to search to whole market for suspicious people. They don't find anything because Matyi now doesn't wear any mascare. He makes an alliance with a local horserider boy. The boy lures the whole army to the forest, because they think that they're chasing the real Ludas Matyi. But they make a mistake, because the real one stays at the place and finds Döbröghy. The lord now publicly gets his last third of punishment.
[edit] Edification
The poem was an ironic advice to the lords of Hungary, not to penetrate the peasants needlessly. It also emphasises the intelligence of the poor.
[edit] Importance
Lúdas Matyi was the first commonfolk hero in Hungarian literature who is victorious over his lord. The poem represented the relationship between nobility and the folk as well, and it emphasised the problems of the Hungarian agro-society in the late 18th century.
Much later the communist dictatory created movies of the story and emphasised the superiority of the workers and the poor.
The tale is a bent mirror to the Hungarian society.
[edit] Lúdas Matyi in the media
1867-1872 - a paper with the title: Lúdas Matyi - The entertaining pictured newspaper of the Hungarian folk. The author, Károly Mészáros, was imprisoned for 10 years because of showing Franz Joseph as the Crucified Jesus.
1922 - The first Lúdas Matyi film, directed by Alfréd Deésy.
1949 - Lúdas Matyi film, directed by Kálmán Nádasdy and László Ranódy. Starring: Imre Soós.
1945-1992 - the weekly paper Lúdas Matyi was the only authorized parodic paper during the communist era. Lúdas Matyi ironically represented the dictatorship and the Hungarian society comprising all of its participants. The paper was extremely popular, the record amount of selled sheets was 650,000. The paper was allowed to publicate caricatures of politicians, military leaders and the society, but was suspended between 25th October 1956 and 21st February 1957.
