Meet Bakos Ferenc: The electrical engineer who became the architect of Hungarian Haiku.
From the High-Voltage Lines of the Desert
to the Silence of the Balaton.
For over fifty years, Bakos Ferenc has lived in Siófok-Kiliti, observing the world with the dual gaze of a engineer and a mystic. A member of the renowned 'Generation of Peters' in the 1970s, he transitioned from the grotesque realism of prose to the crystalline discipline of Haiku. He is the bridge between the yellow sands of the Libyan desert and the winter ice of Lake Balaton—a poet who engineers moments of silence in a noisy world.
About
Ferenc
The Silence of the Sand & Lake: The Literary World of Bakos Ferenc
Bakos Ferenc (b. 1946) is a literary singularity. An electrical engineer by trade, he spent decades working on the oil fields of Libya, Iraq, and Kuwait, only to return to Siófok-Kiliti to write poetry of crystalline clarity. Between the high-voltage lines of the Middle East
and the winter reeds of Lake Balaton, Bakos Ferenc has engineered a poetry of precise observation. A hidden gem of Hungarian literature, he is the quiet architect of the country’s Haiku renaissance.
Recognitions and Awards
1991
Founding of the International Haiku Association (Tokyo) membership
2015
Publication of the bilingual collection Desert Wind in the USA
2022
His oeuvre declared a Somogyi Érték (County Cultural Treasure).
2025
Awarded the Magyar Arany Érdemkereszt (Hungarian Golden Cross of Merit)
Publications
Csonttollú Madarak Tele
(Winter of Waxwings, 1975)
His debut short story collection, marking the "Generation of Peters" era. Praised by Lázár Ervin for its sensitive grasp of the adult-child bond, it captures the "grotesque realism" of 1970s Hungary before his shift to poetry.
Harmat hull a peóniába
(Dew Falls on the Peony, 1988)
A Taoist-inspired radio play exploring love through the dialogues of Emperor Huang-ti. A cultural phenomenon, it resonated so deeply with the national psyche that it was broadcast on Hungarian Radio for twenty-five years
Szindbádia
(1993)
A novella cycle mapping "Szindbádia," a metaphorical island where the desert lies at the foot of the Mátra mountains. Through the engineer-writer Hankó, it navigates a surreal world of "haiku ships" and "Sindbad’s women," fusing the Eastern oil fields with the geography of the heart.
