We were preparing for his 80th birthday, not his death. Less than three weeks ago, we were discussing the aesthetics-centered number of the Korunk magazine, and yes, about our plans for next summer in his home on Croitorilor Street, which in itself has become a topos of cultural history, the venue for important encounters and conversations, filled with living memories and spirit. A true Cluj model.

His death, his disappearance, had not presented itself as a real possibility not even after his serious heart operation. However, there is no doubt, a different Lajos Kántor came home from the Semmelweis University Heart and Vascular Center in Budapest: translucent, ever peaceful, a sort of fragility never before associated with him permeated his being. Not a sense of failure and surrender, by any means, but gentleness, silence and acceptance.

As one who has already been on the other side of time and his heart was filled not with dread, but, on the contrary, by “a peace that reigns over all reason”. The previously known fire and constantly renewed energy was replaced by the radiance of his soul.

I have taken his books off the shelf one by one, and I have brought them to my study. It is Lajos Kántor who looks at me from each book, that forever sharp, inquisitive, open gaze that was permeated by his belief in the meaning of his writing, in the charge of interpreting things. We all referred to his stamina with envy, the work he did, the puritan rhythm of his days, which had taken him from one book to the next and lured him to engage in various adventures into different genres. Still, for me, beyond all the books, what remains is Lajos Kántor’s gaze. As he looks at the connections that exist between people and things, works and creators, revealing and shedding light not only on writers and painters, but also on the human beings within them.

Lajos Kántor wrote and revealed the story of time itself within each of his sentences. He was a community spirit, his sense of individual achievement lied also in the joy of a community and in the hope of renewal.

Our recent encounter, yes, the dinner and our plans. When we sat down at the table, Júlia, his wife, asked me to say a blessing before dinner. I recited Psalm 20, one of my favorites. One of its lines goes: “May he give you the desire of your heart and make all your plans succeed”. After the Amen, Lajos’s kindness and delightful serenity, and Júlia’s joy washed over the dinner table. While on our way home, even my wife noted that somehow, our souls had been mysteriously lifted.

This has also proven to be a last supper, God proposes, God disposes, the heart stops, and it ceases to further measure man’s time - which is immeasurable anyway.

His life work remains with us, of course, but he does not, although we would continuously need him as well.

András Visky