Last month, French historian Thibaud Gibelin’s book about Prime Minister Viktor Orbán hit Hungarian bookshops. The book, Viktor Orbán is playing to win (Orbán Viktor győzelemre játszik), was originally published in France in 2020.
The historian told the news portal Index that “the Hungarian Prime Minister has a European dimension, which makes him a significant player on a continental scale.” The book is published by MCC Press, the publishing house of Mathias Corvinus Collegium (MCC). Thibaud Gibelin is currently a visiting lecturer at MCC in Hungary.
According to Gibelin, “in just a few years, Viktor Orbán has become the face of Central Europe for the French public,” and he wanted to explain to them the driving forces behind Central European policy. The historian recalled that one of the reasons he wrote his book was that French political analysts had no understanding of the 2018 election victory of Viktor Orbán and Fidesz.
I have sought to juxtapose facts and put the current situation in historical perspective. The book was a success on the right but met with a suspicious silence on the left. It is the first book published in French on recent Hungarian politics that does not consider Hungarian ambitions since 2010 to be suspicious or guilty,”
he explained.
Featured photo via Facebook/Orbán Balázs