Pixel

A collection of stories from a Hungarian writer that treats relationships and love in contemporary life.

Like stars in the sky, pixels may seem like tiny, individual points. But, when viewed from a distance, they can create elaborate images. Each pixel contributes to this array, but no individual point can create the whole. The thirty stories that comprise Krisztina Tóth’s book similarly produce an interconnected web. While each tale of love, loss, and failed self-determination narrates the sensuousness of an individual’s life, together, the thirty stories tell a more complicated tale of relationships. Circumstances that appear unrelated may converge in harmony or heartbreak, just as the events that loom largest may fail to produce a longed-for outcome. These threads often determine the course of lives in unpredictable ways—sometimes comic, sometimes tragic, but rarely in the ways we originally anticipated.

"Addresses the crises facing Europe today: the influx of immigrants and resulting xenophobia, mounting anti-Semitism and anti-Roma bigotry, the validity of the European Union versus nation-specific loyalties. . . . Even as Tóth slices her characters into single limbs and facial features, there’s no escaping their interconnectedness. In this way, Tóth makes the concept of a national 'border' seem laughably arbitrary." LitHub
"Krisztina Tóth is a poet, and it shows. She definitely has a way with words. She is precise, careful, even frugal with them. There is not one that could be removed without the delicate structure collapsing. And the words themselves are always well thought-out; Tóth makes them shine, sometimes brings a surprising colour to them. I wish I were able to read Hungarian … The precision of the English version of Pixel has to be assigned at least in part to the translator, Owen Good. I often thought, while reading, that his job required talent and craftsmanship, but also the precision and steady hand of a medieval miniature painter or filigree maker." European Literature Network

Krisztina Tóth is a poet, writer, and translator living in Budapest. She is a noted translator of, among others, literary fiction, children’s literature, and song lyrics from French. Owen Good is a translator and teacher at Péter Pázmány Catholic University in Budapest. His work has been published in Modern Poetry in Translation, Ploughshares, and The Poetry Review.

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