Quote by Gyula Illyés: “Our only task: to look life in the eye.”

This emphasizes the importance of confronting reality directly, without illusion or fear. It encourages honest observation and understanding of our circumstances, even when they are difficult, as the first step towards genuine action and truth.

Written after the Hungarian Revolution of 1956, this poem courageously spoke out against Soviet oppression, urging people to see and acknowledge the tyranny around them, despite the danger of doing so.

Hungarian poet and writer considered one of the defining literary voices of twentieth-century Hungary. His poem 'One Sentence on Tyranny,' written after the 1956 Hungarian uprising and published in 1956, became one of the most celebrated and politically significant poems of Eastern European dissident culture. He remained a leading figure in Hungarian literary life for decades.