Ervin Lázár (1936–2006) was a writer, dramatist, and, thanks to his classic books for children, a household name. His novel The White Tiger (1971) established him as a major writer for adults.
(In White Tiger, a huge white tiger casually walks up to the hero of the story as he is about to enter a hotel for his lunch break and refuses to leave his side, fulfilling all his wishes, whereby he becomes omnipotent. As the story imperceptibly slides into the political arena of Communist Hungary, it poses the question: Given the power to do good, why does man revert, time and again, to aggression instead?) Since 1971, Lázár has also written a number of children’s plays and radio plays. Two anthologies of his stories for adults appeared in 1994 (My Seven Lovers) and 1997 (Little Angel), respectively. His final book, The Golden Bird of Youth, contains the stories told by an illiterate Gypsy and adapted by the author. Ervin Lázár was awarded a number of prizes for his works, among them the Andersen Prize and the Hungarian Kossuth Prize.
