Beniak, Valentin
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* Chynorany, 1894. Feb. 18.– † Bratislava, 1993. Nov. 6. / Slovak poet and translator ; ; An outstanding member of the Slovenská katolícka moderna group that emerged in the 1920s. He worked as a village clerk, and during the Slovak state he was an official employee of the presidential office of the republic. He was politically passive, and devoted a significant part of his poetic energy to translating modern Hungarian poetry. In 1943, he participated with 8 companions in the anthology Na brehu èiernych vôd organized by Emil Boleslav Lukáè and Rezső Szalatnai. ; – After 1945, his fate took a turn for the worse. He was declared, with gross exaggeration, to be an exponent of the fascist Tiso regime, and was not even given a modest job that matched his professional qualifications. His difficult situation was once again helped by his extensive translation work from Hungarian literature. After Hviezdoslav and before Štítnický, he also translated The Tragedy of Man, Csongor Vörösmarty and the Fairy, and Dezső Szabó's The Forsaken Village. The most significant translation was once again a Hungarian poetry anthology. It was published under the title Veèerná blýskavica (1957), and its sole translator was Beniak. The 470-page volume contains a total of 234 translations of poems by seven poets (Ady, Babits, Gyula Juhász, Dezső Kosztolányi, Árpád Tóth, Attila József, Gyula Illyés). ;
Literature: Turczel Lajos: Valentín Beniak's Hungarian literary connections. = T. L.: Irodalmi hódolások és séret- yelővénilítások, 2000.
;T. L.