There's just something about crime. Whether it's enjoying capers like Ocean's 11 or The Great Train Robbery, we tend to romanticize the dastardly wrongdoer despite whatever his or her heinous crimes might be. I've yet to meet someone who was rooting for the cops to catch Hannibal Lector when they were reading Silence of the Lambs. Whatever it is, something happens when we hear the story of someone who flaunts authority and just does something so outside the bounds of society's rules that despite our professed outrage.... we admire the audacity.
So of course the non-fiction book by Julian Rubinstein detailing the life and crimes of Hungarian bank robber Attila Ambrus was a fascinating read. A friend had lent me the book a few years ago and I just now was inspired to read it. I'm sorry I waited so long. Rubenstein's story flows so well and the story of Attila's life is so far-fetched you'd swear it was fiction. Rubinstein's painstaking research shows as he portrays the struggle of Attila's early life and his turn towards crime in vivid detail. By the end, you come to view Attila as a victim of the times.
After the fall of the Soviet Union, the power vacuum left behind in Hungary led to corruption at all levels of government and this not only provided the perfect opportunity for men like Attila, but also endeared men like him to the public. Though Attila's life is fascinating enough, the window Rubinstein provides us into the state of Hungary after the fall of the USSR is equally thought provoking. Rubinstein often cites that while Poland had Lech Wałęsa and the Czech Republic had Václav Havel, Hungary did not have a similar charismatic and effective leader.
I highly recommend this book to anyone who enjoys a good criminal tale (and who doesn't?). But beyond that, I love this book for giving me insight into a country I had little knowledge of, and reminding me that I need to read something by Havel who I've admired since I read this quote: "All too often living normally begins as an attempt to do your work well, and ends with being branded an enemy of society"
Additionally, and this will probably only make sense to myself, I found that the idea that Hungary was much worse off than Poland and the Czech Republic because of its lack of a certain type of leader might lend support to the ideas present in The Starfish and the Spider: The Unstoppable Power of Leaderless Organizations, which despite the title, proposes that the most effective combination would be a hybrid organization that contains elements of both decentralized and centralized control. At some point I'd like to explore this thought a little further.
Finally, since it was a non-fiction book and a recommendation I can cross a few numbers off my list!
No comments:
Post a Comment