Sándor Kányádi | |
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 Sándor Kányádi | |
| Born | (1929-05-10)10 May 1929 |
| Died | 20 June 2018(2018-06-20) (aged 89) |
| Occupation | poet |
| Nationality | Hungarian |
| Citizenship | Romanian |
| Notable works | "In Contemporary Tense" |
| Notable awards | Kossuth Prize Herder Prize |
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Sándor Kányádi (Hungarian pronunciation:[ˈʃaːndorˈkaːɲaːdi]; 10 May 1929 – 20 June 2018) was a Hungarian poet and translator from the region ofTransylvania, Romania. He was one of the most famous and beloved contemporary Hungarian poets. He was a major contributor to Hungarian children's literature. His works have been translated into English, Finnish, Estonian, Swedish, German, French, Romanian and Portuguese.[1]
He was born inPorumbenii Mari (Hungarian:Nagygalambfalva), a small Hungarian village in the region of Transylvania, to a family of Hungarian farmers. He was educated in the nearby town ofOdorheiu-Secuiesc (Hungarian:Székelyudvarhely). Present-dayTamási Áron Gimnázium was hisalma mater.He moved toCluj in 1950. Nowadays, he split his time betweenBudapest and his cottage in the Transylvanian countryside.
Kányádi graduated fromBolyai University (before Bolyai University was forced to merge with the Romanian university to form present-day Babes-Bolyai University) with a teacher's qualification and degree in Hungarian language and literature. He published his first volume of poetry in 1955 while an assistant editor and frequent contributor to several literary magazines, including poems in children's magazines that are still very popular today. His translations are also very popular and includeSaxon andYiddish folk poetry, contemporaryRomanian poetry, and majorGerman andFrench poets. He also gave several literary talks abroad during the 1960s and 1970s to Hungarian communities in Western Europe, Scandinavia, North America, and South America.
He was active in political issues throughout the years, as shown in his numerous works relating to the oppression of theTransylvanian Hungarian minority.[citation needed] In 1987, theRomanian Communist government refused him a passport to visit an international poets' conference inRotterdam, which resulted in his resignation from theRomanian Writers' Union out of protest.[2]
He garnered more than 30 awards and honors, among others:
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