Virginia L. Lewis, Professor of German at Northern State University, earned her Ph.D. in 1989 at the University of Pennsylvania, having studied under Horst Daemmrich. She has written numerous works on German, Hungarian, and global literature, and translated novels by Zsigmond Móricz into English.

"Informed by theory and grounded in a critical understanding of Hungarian social history in the first half of the twentieth century, Lewis’s engaging study of the realist novels of Zsigmond Móricz compels readers to think in new ways about questions of human agency amongst Hungary’s lower and middle classes as this played out against the backdrop of capitalist transformation and pronounced social conflicts and injustices in the decades leading up to World War II. Skillfully structured around succinct analyses of seven of Móricz’s key texts, Lewis’s book addresses a sizable gap in the English-language scholarship on one of Hungary’s greatest writers, and will be a welcome addition to the libraries of literary scholars and social and intellectual historians alike." —Steven Jobbitt, Associate Professor of Central and Eastern European History, Lakehead University, Thunder Bay, Canada

• Acknowledgments – Introduction – The Commodification of Sex and the Repression of Agency in Sárarany (Gold in the Mud) – Accommodation and the Destruction of Agency in Az Isten háta mögött (In the Godforsaken Hinterlands) – Greed, Fire, and Agency in A fáklya (The Torch) – Money, Value, and Agency in Légy jó mindhalálig (Be Faithful unto Death) – Nature as Agent in Úri muri ("The Gentlemen’s Spree") – Corruption and Agency in Interwar Hungary: Rokonok (Relations) – An Orphan’s Might: Commodification and Agency in Árvácska (Orphalina) – Bibliography – Index.

Virginia L. Lewis, Professor of German at Northern State University, earned her Ph.D. in 1989 at the University of Pennsylvania, having studied under Horst Daemmrich. She has written numerous works on German, Hungarian, and global literature, and translated novels by Zsigmond Móricz into English.

"Informed by theory and grounded in a critical understanding of Hungarian social history in the first half of the twentieth century, Lewis’s engaging study of the realist novels of Zsigmond Móricz compels readers to think in new ways about questions of human agency amongst Hungary’s lower and middle classes as this played out against the backdrop of capitalist transformation and pronounced social conflicts and injustices in the decades leading up to World War II. Skillfully structured around succinct analyses of seven of Móricz’s key texts, Lewis’s book addresses a sizable gap in the English-language scholarship on one of Hungary’s greatest writers, and will be a welcome addition to the libraries of literary scholars and social and intellectual historians alike." —Steven Jobbitt, Associate Professor of Central and Eastern European History, Lakehead University, Thunder Bay, Canada

• Acknowledgments – Introduction – The Commodification of Sex and the Repression of Agency in Sárarany (Gold in the Mud) – Accommodation and the Destruction of Agency in Az Isten háta mögött (In the Godforsaken Hinterlands) – Greed, Fire, and Agency in A fáklya (The Torch) – Money, Value, and Agency in Légy jó mindhalálig (Be Faithful unto Death) – Nature as Agent in Úri muri ("The Gentlemen’s Spree") – Corruption and Agency in Interwar Hungary: Rokonok (Relations) – An Orphan’s Might: Commodification and Agency in Árvácska (Orphalina) – Bibliography – Index.

Virginia L. Lewis, Professor of German at Northern State University, earned her Ph.D. in 1989 at the University of Pennsylvania, having studied under Horst Daemmrich. She has written numerous works on German, Hungarian, and global literature, and translated novels by Zsigmond Móricz into English.

"Informed by theory and grounded in a critical understanding of Hungarian social history in the first half of the twentieth century, Lewis’s engaging study of the realist novels of Zsigmond Móricz compels readers to think in new ways about questions of human agency amongst Hungary’s lower and middle classes as this played out against the backdrop of capitalist transformation and pronounced social conflicts and injustices in the decades leading up to World War II. Skillfully structured around succinct analyses of seven of Móricz’s key texts, Lewis’s book addresses a sizable gap in the English-language scholarship on one of Hungary’s greatest writers, and will be a welcome addition to the libraries of literary scholars and social and intellectual historians alike." —Steven Jobbitt, Associate Professor of Central and Eastern European History, Lakehead University, Thunder Bay, Canada

• Acknowledgments – Introduction – The Commodification of Sex and the Repression of Agency in Sárarany (Gold in the Mud) – Accommodation and the Destruction of Agency in Az Isten háta mögött (In the Godforsaken Hinterlands) – Greed, Fire, and Agency in A fáklya (The Torch) – Money, Value, and Agency in Légy jó mindhalálig (Be Faithful unto Death) – Nature as Agent in Úri muri ("The Gentlemen’s Spree") – Corruption and Agency in Interwar Hungary: Rokonok (Relations) – An Orphan’s Might: Commodification and Agency in Árvácska (Orphalina) – Bibliography – Index.