© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2017 | doi 10.1163/18763308-04402011 east central europe 44 (2017) 216-248 brill.com/eceu Discourses of Contemporary History in Hungary after 1989 A Fragmented Report János Rainer M. Hungarian National Széchényi Library, 1956 Institute; Eszterházy Károly University, Eger, Hungary rainer@rev.hu Abstract The study examines Hungarian historiography since the Hungarian democratic trans- formation. Its main question is how Hungarian history writing was able to reformulate itself during the short period after 1989. In academic and public discourse one can observe parallel processes of de-ideologization and re-ideologization towards a one- sided commitment to the national(istic) viewpoint. The study starts by setting the general scene and examining the politics of memory within the fields of general focus, i.e., the discourses of memory politics and institutions. Afterwards, it discusses two focal themes in greater detail: 1956 and the Kádár era on one hand, and the Horthy era on the other. The discussion follows the order in which these themes emerged in the discourse. It also contains a short overview of the memory politics linked to the given theme as well as the various currents in history writing, narrating and interpreting these important issues of the national historical canon. Keywords Hungarian contemporary history – historiography – memory politics – Eastern Europe – post-Communism – interwar era – 1956 Hungarian revolution – Kádár period The two and a half decades that have elapsed since the Hungarian democratic transformation is a short period of time in historiography. Nevertheless, giv- ing an account of this period that covers the whole span of history writing is very difficult, even in the case of such a small country as Hungary. A 2011 book