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{{Short description|Hungarian writer}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=June 2025}}

{{Infobox writer

| name = Adam de Hegedus

| image =

| caption =

| pseudonym = Rodney Garland

| birth_name = Adam Martin de Hegedus

| birth_date = {{Birth date|1906|12|14}}

| birth_place =

| death_date = {{Death year and age|1955|1906|10}}

| death_place = Marble Arch, London

| resting_place =

| occupation = Writer

| language = English

| nationality = Hungarian

| education =

| genre = Fiction
Gay literature

| notableworks = The Heart in Exile

| awards =

| signature =

}}

Adam de Hegedus (1906–1955) is a Hungarian writer best known for his work published under the pseudonym Rodney Garland.

; Early life ==

Adam de Hegedus was born in Budapest in 12 December 1906.{{Cite web|url=https://www.the-independent.com/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/invisible-ink-no-258-rodney-garland-9969073.html|title=Invisible Ink No. 258: Rodney Garland|first=Christopher|last=Fowler|author-link=Christopher Fowler|date=9 January 2015|website=The Independent|access-date=22 June 2025}}{{Cite web |url=http://www.elisarolle.com/queerplaces/a-b-ce/Adam%20De%20Hegedus.html |work=Queer Places |title=Marble Arch: Adam De Hegedus |via=ElisaRolle.com |access-date=24 June 2025}} His father was an official at the Hungarian treasury.

{{Cite web|url=https://neglectedbooks.com/?tag=rodney-garland|title=Rodney Garland|website=Neglected Books|date=4 March 2022|access-date=24 June 2025}}

; Career ==

In 1934, de Hegedus's short story "The Golden Cock" was published in Lovat Dickson's Magazine, volume 3, number 1, July, page 20.

{{cite magazine |title=The Golden Cock |first=Adam |last=de Hegedus |date=July 1934 |magazine=Lovat Dickson's Magazine |volume=3 |issue=1 |page=20}}

Christopher Fowler of The Independent suggested that ""the only book for which de Hegedus is remembered" is his 1953 gay-themed novel The Heart in Exile. The story of a psychiatrist who investigates the death of his male ex-lover, it has been called the first gay detective novel.{{Cite web|url=https://www.valancourtbooks.com/the-heart-in-exile-1953.html|title=The Heart in Exile (1953) by Rodney Garland|website=Valancourt Books|access-date=22 June 2025}}{{cite web |url=http://www.huffingtonpost.com/trebor-healey/early-gay-literature-redi_b_5373869.html?ncid=fcbklnkushpmg00000050 |title=Early Gay Literature Rediscovered |first=Trebor |last=Healey |work=Huffington Post |date=May 28, 2014 |access-date=May 31, 2014}}

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Here’s a pseudonym created for a single book. Adam Martin de Hegedus was born in Budapest in 1906. His father was an important official working in the Hungarian treasury. When Adam was 21, he travelled to England in order to read up on international law and learn English, in preparation for a career in the Hungarian diplomatic service. Dividing his time between his Kensington lodgings and the British Museum, he became fascinated by London life, so much so that he abandoned his impending career for journalism, writing for The Observer and certain periodicals.

In 1934, he wrote The Golden Cock, which didn’t make much of a splash, and a volume of autobiography that partly described his life as a van driver. But de Hegedus had a secret; he was enjoying London life because it allowed him the freedom to be gay. In Paris he befriended André Gide, but soon returned to London and settled for good. A melancholy, private man, it’s hard to say what made him take the extraordinary step of writing a gay novel, 14 years before homosexuality was decriminalised in Britain.

Produced under his Garland pseudonym, The Heart In Exile chronicled homosexual life in wartime and post-war London, telling the story of a gay married psychiatrist whose determination to discover the truth about his former lover’s suicide leads him into what one reviewer described as an “underground” and the “humiliations of this half-world, viewed with detachment but without distaste”. Even the good reviews were unwittingly condescending: “It can arouse no disgust, only a deep pity, coupled with new understanding.”

Subtly delineated, sombre, and grittily realistic, the book was a shock success and ran into several British and American editions, even though (or perhaps because) it was packaged with increasingly gaudy covers. The New York Times described it as a “sensitive and deeply perceptive story of the homosexual and his underworld”. De Hegedus followed it with other gay-themed books, including a thriller, The Troubled Midnight. As a historical document The Heart In Exile remains an important volume, and is the only book for which de Hegedus is remembered. Indeed, very little else is known about the author. Five years after it was published, he committed suicide somewhere in London’s Marble Arch area. Perhaps we don’t want to be reminded of the nation’s sexually hypocritical class system, or gruesomely depressing times when socially stigmatised “inverts” were forced to lead double lives or risk blackmail.

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• The Troubled Midnight (1955) by Rodney Garland{{Cite web|url=https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/a/rodney-garland/the-troubled-midnight-2/|title=The Troubled Midnight by Rodney Garland|website=Kirkus Reviews}}{{Cite web|url=https://dividinglinebooks.com/products/garland-troubled-midnight|title=The Troubled Midnight / Rodney Garland / 1954 Gay Novel First Edition|website=Dividing Line Books}}{{Cite web|url=http://www.amazon.com:80/troubled-midnight-Rodney-Garland/dp/B0007HQ2NU|title=Amazon.com: The troubled midnight: Books: Rodney Garland|website=www.amazon.com}}{{Cite web|url=https://lycanthiabooks.com/book/garland-troubled-midnight-first-edition/|title=Rodney Garland, The Troubled Midnight, first edition, 1954}}{{Cite web|url=https://blackwells.co.uk/bookshop/product/The-Troubled-Midnight-by-Garland-Rodney-pseud-for-Adam-Martin-de-Hegedus/2900000781047|title=The Troubled Midnight.|website=blackwells.co.uk}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.alta-glamour.com/pages/books/82397/rodney-garland-alan-martin-de-hegedus/the-troubled-midnight|title=THE TROUBLED MIDNIGHT | Rodney Garland, Alan Martin de Hegedus}}
• Rodney Garland
• :Category:British spy novels

; Works ==

; As Adam de Hegedus

• "The Golden Cock" (1934), short story in Lovat Dickson's Magazine
• Hungarian Background (1937), non-fiction
• Don’t Keep the Vanman Waiting (1944), non-fiction
• Rehearsal Under the Moon (1946), novel
• The State of the World (1946), non-fiction
• Patriotism or Peace? (1947), non-fiction
• Strangers Here Ourselves (1949), non-fiction
• Home and Away (1951), non-fiction
• The Struggle with the Angels (1956), novel

;As Rodney Garland

• The Heart in Exile (1953), novel
• The Troubled Midnight (1954), novel

; References ==

{{Reflist}}

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