Background
EÖTVÖS was born on September 3, 1813, in Budapest, Hungary.
EOTVOS JOZSEF
EÖTVÖS was born on September 3, 1813, in Budapest, Hungary.
In the first short-lived constitutional government of Hungary, he became minister of education (1848); he received the same post in the AndrássyAndrassy cabinet of 1867 and continued to hold it until his death.
Eötvös first novel, The Carthusian (1842), was a great success. It purports to be the autobiography of a weak and emotional French count, who finds peace in a monastery after a life of bitter disillusionment and destructive love experience. Eötvös own spleen and pessimism make his pages glow with romantic emotions, in spite of his involved style and his constant philosophizing. The Village Notary (1845) and Hungary in 1514 (1847) are unmerciful attacks on mean, uncultured officials, both in Eötvös century and in 1514 at the time of the Peasant Revolt. The Sisters (1857) maintains the thesis that happiness can live in a hut and misery in a palace. Eötvös best know play is a satire, Hurray for Equality! (1844). His poetry is in the reflective style of Uhland; his orations and his political pamphlets are considered among the best of his age. His son, Baron Loránd von Eötvös (1848-1919), professor of physics at the University of Budapest, carried on studies in gravitation and invented many instruments, including the Eötvös torsion balance for measuring the density of underlying rock strata.
EÖTVÖS has a son: Loránd von Eötvös.