Press coverage

"József  Tari:                    

The Centre of the World – in miniature

During the 1970s and 1980s, Hungarian publishing houses were major contributors in the creation of miniature books, but with the advent of market economy, less and less Hungarian-made miniatures were made. Last year, there may have been 19 or 20 new miniature books published in the country, but in the absence of precise data by the KSH (the Hungarian Central Statistical Office), this is only an estimation by the collectors.

The miniature book titled "The Centre of the World" by Béla Zelei, Sr. was published early this year. The book, a collection of short stories, was created as a present for the author's 85th birthday by his relatives and close friends. Printed by Typografika Kft., located in Békéscsaba, the books are available in two sizes and three types of binding. Typografika, lead by Ferenc Barabás, did an excellent job with the printing. Barabás is the founder of the only currently active Hungarian miniature book club, thus the quality of this book collection is no great surprise.

The four-part collection is made of an A6 size reader's copy and three, 44x66 mm sized miniatures with leather, cloth and soft cover binding, each with its own serial number. These numbers are shared between the three miniature versions, so if someone, for instance, tends to collect books with the serial number 13, they can get them in three different types of binding. Although a reader's copy is available, the miniatures are also easy to read, thanks to the beautiful typography.

The books are bilingual, the stories being available in English and Hungarian: these so-called Janus-books include the original Hungarian stories in one half of the volume, and the English translations in the other. As such, the collection might be of interest to foreign collectors as well.

Such publications are rather significant, due to the small number of miniature books made in the region. Recently, Hungary was considered a major contributor to the publishing of miniatures: in the 70s and 80s, Hungarian miniature publishing was the most prominent in the world. Many collector clubs were established during this period, with an ever increasing number of members, of which maybe a hundred is still active today. While major publishing houses like Szépirodalmi, Helikon and Európa, along with printing houses and the collector clubs, used to publish miniature books, nowadays this trend has almost completely disappeared.

The Hungarian Central Statistical Office does not mention any data in its annual report on book publishing, thus only collector's estimations are available: last year, there may have been 20 miniatures published. Despite this, there are Hungarian miniature book collections which are recognized on an international level as well. Hopefully, "The Centre of the World", being an excellent example of some of the practises in miniature publishing (different types of binding, bilingual format, a reader's copy), will gain the attention of collectors and will encourage publishing and printing houses experienced in miniature making to create more bibliographical rarities."