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Alexandra Ell

"These fragments I have shored against my ruins"

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May 1, 2026, 12:36 AM

Adrenaline as an Anaesthetic for Auschwitz

A Ferris wheel in the outskirts of Kraków, Poland (Photo courtesy of the author)

A Jewish‑school teacher in Budapest recently proposed a two‑day trip for 16–18‑year‑olds: one day at the Auschwitz‑Birkenau Memorial, the next at a Polish theme‑park, complete with rollercoasters and bumper cars. Her stated reason was that Auschwitz is “too depressing”...

Apr 16, 2026, 9:12 AM

Competing Calendars of Holocaust Remembrance in Hungary

The Memorial to the Victims of the German Occupation. (courtesy)

While Holocaust remembrance is often invoked as a universal moral consensus, this apparent unity dissolves when one considers the multiplicity of its commemorative forms. In Hungary, International Holocaust Remembrance Day (27 January), Yom HaShoah (27 Nisan, 13–14 April in...

Apr 12, 2026, 4:38 PM

The Violin With No Voice (For Children And Sensitive Readers)

The violin with no voice (Photo courtesy of the author)

Speaking about death and loss is never simple, and speaking to children about them is harder still. The Holocaust — six million lives extinguished, countless worlds erased — resists comprehension even in adulthood. Yet memory does not vanish when...

Apr 11, 2026, 5:53 PM

Hungarian Elections 2026: Security, Silence, and the Boundaries of Belonging

The Hungarian Parliament building by night (Photo courtesy of Inez Korontos-Porath)

With the elections approaching, international attention has turned towards Budapest once more. The stakes are high, but not only for Hungary. The outcome will be read abroad as a test of the durability of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s illiberal...

Apr 10, 2026, 7:17 PM

The Indefinite Article of Erasure: From ‘The Holocaust’ to ‘a holocaust’

Auschwitz (Photo courtesy of the author)

A recent New York Post headline reads: New Yorkers issued stark warning about opening ‘Pandora’s box’ of doctor‑assisted suicide: ‘Like a holocaust’. At first glance, the phrase “like a holocaust” might seem like just another exaggerated political metaphor. But...

Mar 29, 2026, 12:48 AM

The Rhetoric of Silence: Three Logics of Complicity

The Berlin Wall (Photo courtesy of the author)

In moments of political crisis, one claim returns with striking regularity: “silence makes one guilty”. It appears in legal texts, prophetic poetry, and public manifestos with the confidence of a universal law, as if the link between muteness and...

Mar 24, 2026, 7:57 PM

Belgrade, 1999: On Memory and the Moral Limits of Redeveloping Ruins

The ruins of the General Staff Building Complex in Belgrade (Photo courtesy of the author)

In the mid‑2010s, I lived on Admirala Geprata, a quiet street in central Belgrade just blocks from Nemanjina, where the bombed‑out Yugoslav General Staff complex loomed like a scar that would never heal across the city’s main artery. Every...

Mar 20, 2026, 12:30 AM

Broken Wings Over Empty Villages: Hungary’s Memory of 1944

The Memorial to the Victims of the German Occupation with the Living Memorial in the foreground (Photo courtesy of the author)

1. There is an old story about Operation Margarethe, the German occupation of Hungary in March 1944. A German general asks: “How long would it take to occupy Hungary?” “Twenty‑four hours if we go in as enemies,” comes the reply, “but at least three...

Mar 12, 2026, 1:24 PM

Queues of Gold: Crisis and the Practice of Belonging

Still from a government film depicting citizens donating gold during the 1998 IMF crisis. The Korean caption reads: “A gold‑collecting campaign showing the people’s resolve to overcome the IMF crisis.” (By IM Film - https://vimeo.com/134916511, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=70230849)

Earlier this week, I spoke with someone I had known in another lifetime, back when I lived in South Korea. We have not met for two decades, yet across years and continents, we have remained in touch, and as...

Mar 4, 2026, 2:24 PM

Shoes on the Danube Bank: Where the Dead Have No Graves

Shoes on the Danube Bank (Photo courtesy of the author)

“The shoes are full of stones scattered in them.” The sentence landed with the dull thud of something that should not be possible and stopped me cold. She had just stood at the Shoes on the Danube Bank — Budapest’s...

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About Me

Freelance editor and translator based in Budapest, Hungary.

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