In the historical public consciousness and in cult literature, Széchenyi was usually portrayed as a lone towering mountain peak, without any companions – friends, allies, colleagues, etc. In the ‘lonely Széchenyi’, cult texts elevate the misunderstood genius, towering above his contemporaries, to an almost superhuman status, while those critical of him see him as a ‘cold man of reason’, incapable of positive human emotions, who simply saw in the people who came into contact with him ‘resources to be exploited’.
The size of the correspondence alone belies the myth of the “lone hero”: his extraordinary web of contacts clearly makes several people his friends.