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Dominik Batthyani and Ladislaus Battyani, who both live and work in Vienna, wrote in the letter published in Austrian daily Die Presse that the play, performed at a festival in the Austrian capital, is a ?dangerous game? that mixes reality, truth and poetry.
The play recalls the massacre of 180 Jewish-Hungarian forced labourers by Nazi leaders being entertained by Countess Margit Batthyány, born Margit Thyssen-Bornemisza, in the fortress of Rechnitz in Austria in March 1945.
The two Battyanis acknowledge that it appeared the ?wife of our great uncle? knowingly hid two Nazi officials after the war, and they said it was not their intention to defend her. But they said they felt the piece ?distances the reader or the audience from the truth?, quoting a long list of instances in the play that describe Margit Batthyány?s direct participation in the massacre.
The Battyanis acknowledged the weight of Jelinek?s words as a Nobel Prize winner and warned that her piece could serve to obscure the truth.
?The fight against racism and for human dignity also has to do with the fight against the use of simplifications, against prejudices and clichés. Should we not avoid these means too when working with history??, the said.
Source: Hungarian News Agency (MTI)
