In March, readers will be able to reacquaint themselves with the delightfully libidinous hero of In Praise of Older Women, when Stephen Vizinczey's novel is reissued as a Penguin Modern Classic. However, that does not include readers in Canada, the country that gave the novelist new life (and a beloved wife) when he was on the run after the Hungarian revolution more than 50 years ago.
In a twist perfectly fitting for one of the strangest literary histories in Canada, In Praise of Older Women will remain out of print in Vizinczey's adopted country. Why? Well, first you have to understand the man, and the novel that shook Canada to the soles of its sensible shoes when it became a self-published phenomenon in 1965.
First, the man: At 76, he is cantankerous, charming, combative, alarmingly well-read. He's as fierce as mother bear when it comes to protecting the reputation of his two novels, In Praise of Older Women and An Innocent Millionaire, and as cranky as a father bear with a sore paw when it comes to nursing old slights. Twenty years ago, his British publisher told an interviewer, “Some publishers are terrified of him, there's no doubt about it – you either like him very much or you're frightened of him.”
Vizinczey and Gloria, his wife of more than four decades, whom he met when he moved to Canada.
“Difficult” is a word that is often used to describe him, but Vizinczey would say he's not difficult; he just cares – a lot. He doesn't seem so fearsome when he's sitting with Gloria, his wife of more than four decades, his rock and staunch defender, in the living room of their flat in London. (A nursery teacher named Lady Diana Spencer used to live below them; to this day, tourists still stop in the street and gaze up at her window.) The walls are lined with books by Dostoevsky and Stendhal, and his own novels in various translations.
Vizinczey, stout and handsome with watchful, hooded eyes, has a memory filled with sales figures (more than five million copies of his books sold) and reviews (from a French-Canadian journalist: “He is of one those rare writers who can inspire enthusiasm and identification in the reader.”) Bad reviews, and bad publishers, are also stored in that memory, never far from hand.
For years, he has fought to have In Praise back in print in English. Now that the moment is near, he has the air of someone who has had justice long denied. “The truth does not date,” he says, explaining why his most famous novel will always have an audience. “This is what morons who go by fashion do not understand.” His pugnacious jaw is set, but he might be softening a bit toward the morons now that his baby is being reborn, swaddled in the luxurious covers of a Penguin Modern Classic.
Canada saved me from ideology, helped me focus on human nature
What a story it's been until now: In Praise of Older Women is the semi-autobiographical story of Andras Vajda, who begins as an 11-year-old “whoremaster” in Budapest, procuring women for the American army, and desperate to trade cigarettes with any woman kind enough to take his virginity. His various erotic adventures take him through Hungary and Europe and finally to Canada, where he seduces a colleague's wife at an academic conference at Lake Couchiching. It is full of erotic interludes that are playful but reverent, funny and touching. It's hardly racy by today's standards, although it displays an emotional sophistication well ahead of its time; it's not surprising that in 1965, this was considered too hot a potato for publishers to touch.
