MOLNR, FERENC

born Jan. 12, 1878, Budapest died April 1, 1952, New York City Hungarian playwright and novelist who is known for his plays about the contemporary salon life of Budapest and for his moving short stories. Molnr published his first stories at the age of 19 and achieved his first great success with the play Az rdg (1907; The Devil). Although trained for a career in law, he became instead a journalist and during World War I was a war correspondent. A number of Molnr's plays, including Liliom (1909; Liliom), A hatty (1920; The Swan), and A vrs malom (1923; The Red Mill), were successfully played abroad, particularly in Austria, Germany, and the United States. Some of them were made into films, but these translations and adaptations often emphasized the verbal beauty and romantic plots of his works at the expense of their finely detailed characterizations and their often bitter cynicism and biting irony. Some of Molnr's short stories, especially those collected in Muzsika (1908; Music), are masterpieces; concise and moving, they look beneath the glittering facade of society life to the problems of the poor and the underdog. Among his many novels, however, only A Pl utcai fuk (1907; The Paul Street Boys) achieved much success. Molnr depicted the victory of evil, of egoism, and of immorality, but these elements were offset by his light, amusing touch. He spent the last years of his life in the United States.