You need to sign in or sign up before continuing.
Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.9 AVERAGE
3.9 AVERAGE
challenging
funny
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Subtitle: Svejk has a story for that...for everything that happens to him, or might happen. He's got a story. It will be long and convoluted. It will make sense ONLY to the Good Soldier Svejk. But he will share it.
At times hilarious and sobering and frustrating and boring...this book really needed an editor. As I read about it, I learned only Part 1 seems to have been plotted. The rest may have been improvised...to someone taking dictation...And Hasek died before he wrote the last two parts...What a story of a story.
So, the question for me, that I have not satisfactorily answered, is this: Is Svejk really as simple-minded as he seems, or is he playing us all, or is he so very good-natured that nothing gets him down, or is he just trying to drift through life with the least amount of tension and friction? I don't know. I learned in Czech, there is a verb, 'to svejk' which means to pretend obedience to avoid unpleasant situations by feigning incomprehension...That makes me laugh.
Along Svejk's journey...not quite to the front after 750 pages...we learn of all Hasek's frustrations with the world...with the Germans, with Jews, with the clergy and the church, with the military, with law and order...he was a bomb-thrower and he had plenty of targets. And Svejk has a story for each. Svejk is jailed more times than I can remember...he's put in hospitals, one a hospital especially for malingerers. He is threated with all manner of violence, he is yelled at. He is mistreated. And he keeps smiling. When he's thrown off a train to the regiment's first stop, he walks...in the wrong direction. But he meets delightful and helpful people along the way. He never seems to have a ticket when he needs a ticket, but he keeps smiling and moving forward. Maybe that's the secret of Svejk...just keep moving, smiling. Assume positive intent, and explain yourself respectfully. And always have a story.
Minor characters' responses to Svejk bring the humor...people who buy pure-bred dogs, only to find they've been swindled. Lt. Lukas, who seems to go apoplectic every time, thinking he's finally lost Svejk, seems his orderly show up...again. Baloun, the batman who is always hungry, Marek, who writes the regiment's history...ahead of time. Dub who is loopy.
Critics call this one of the first comic anti-war novels. Military leadership is a ripe target for Hasek, and he lampoons them all. There is no glory in war...only stupidity. No national mission, no heroic sacrifice...only stupidity. And there is an abundant supply of booze and women. This book has been banned for the Czech army...would be demoralizing. And Nazis burned it in their bonfires. In some ways, Hasek's comic attack is just as devastating as Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front, also burned by the Nazis as they mounted their own war.
The last adventure, where Svejk borrows the uniform of a Russian deserter, to try it on for size, and finds himself taken prisoner...by his own army who doesn't believe that he's on their side, is the most outrageous, and saddest. The causal brutality and intolerance shown by his leaders to others is on full display. Svejk cleverly tells them exactly how they can truly learn if he is a Czech or a Russian...but the German in charge of the prisoners is so intent on hanging him, that the telegram supporting his story almost goes unread.
This is the father of other great comic antiwar literature and film...Catch 22, MASH, for sure. Would love to see what Svejk would think of that.
At times hilarious and sobering and frustrating and boring...this book really needed an editor. As I read about it, I learned only Part 1 seems to have been plotted. The rest may have been improvised...to someone taking dictation...And Hasek died before he wrote the last two parts...What a story of a story.
So, the question for me, that I have not satisfactorily answered, is this: Is Svejk really as simple-minded as he seems, or is he playing us all, or is he so very good-natured that nothing gets him down, or is he just trying to drift through life with the least amount of tension and friction? I don't know. I learned in Czech, there is a verb, 'to svejk' which means to pretend obedience to avoid unpleasant situations by feigning incomprehension...That makes me laugh.
Along Svejk's journey...not quite to the front after 750 pages...we learn of all Hasek's frustrations with the world...with the Germans, with Jews, with the clergy and the church, with the military, with law and order...he was a bomb-thrower and he had plenty of targets. And Svejk has a story for each. Svejk is jailed more times than I can remember...he's put in hospitals, one a hospital especially for malingerers. He is threated with all manner of violence, he is yelled at. He is mistreated. And he keeps smiling. When he's thrown off a train to the regiment's first stop, he walks...in the wrong direction. But he meets delightful and helpful people along the way. He never seems to have a ticket when he needs a ticket, but he keeps smiling and moving forward. Maybe that's the secret of Svejk...just keep moving, smiling. Assume positive intent, and explain yourself respectfully. And always have a story.
Minor characters' responses to Svejk bring the humor...people who buy pure-bred dogs, only to find they've been swindled. Lt. Lukas, who seems to go apoplectic every time, thinking he's finally lost Svejk, seems his orderly show up...again. Baloun, the batman who is always hungry, Marek, who writes the regiment's history...ahead of time. Dub who is loopy.
Critics call this one of the first comic anti-war novels. Military leadership is a ripe target for Hasek, and he lampoons them all. There is no glory in war...only stupidity. No national mission, no heroic sacrifice...only stupidity. And there is an abundant supply of booze and women. This book has been banned for the Czech army...would be demoralizing. And Nazis burned it in their bonfires. In some ways, Hasek's comic attack is just as devastating as Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front, also burned by the Nazis as they mounted their own war.
The last adventure, where Svejk borrows the uniform of a Russian deserter, to try it on for size, and finds himself taken prisoner...by his own army who doesn't believe that he's on their side, is the most outrageous, and saddest. The causal brutality and intolerance shown by his leaders to others is on full display. Svejk cleverly tells them exactly how they can truly learn if he is a Czech or a Russian...but the German in charge of the prisoners is so intent on hanging him, that the telegram supporting his story almost goes unread.
This is the father of other great comic antiwar literature and film...Catch 22, MASH, for sure. Would love to see what Svejk would think of that.
Teatan alandlikult, et see raamat on nüüd loetud ja rohkem ma seda kätte ei võta! Polnud kohe kindalsti minu tassike teed :(
3,5 ⭐️
První část byla skvělá, ale pak už to šlo jen z kopce.
První část byla skvělá, ale pak už to šlo jen z kopce.
من ترجمه کمال طاهری رو خوندم از نشر چشمه که خیلی ترجمه خوبی بود به نظرم.
در مورد کتاب هم داستان های شوایک به نظرم جالب بودن و صادق بودنش ماجرا رو باحال میکرد
در مورد کتاب هم داستان های شوایک به نظرم جالب بودن و صادق بودنش ماجرا رو باحال میکرد
adventurous
funny
lighthearted
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
funny
lighthearted
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
这部我曾被propaganda式简介劝退而错过多年的经典真的太有趣了，读起来就不想放下，也让我对satire/black humor有了兴趣。书中有大量的对话，所以听有声书比默读的体验好很多。在当下读这本书还意外的产生了一点现实意义，帅克为想要“躺平”的青年们提供了面对时代荒谬性的一种油滑的反抗形式，以可笑对抗可笑。
“长官，您放心，我很喜欢干不被许可的事。这种事我卷进过好几档子啦，自己连晓得也不晓得”
“长官，您放心，我很喜欢干不被许可的事。这种事我卷进过好几档子啦，自己连晓得也不晓得”
A fun reading experience but not one I feel the need to see through -- Svejk's adventures are bite-sized and worth dipping into, but the entirety is more numbing than exciting and I'm quite content to've read the joyful and sharply-satirical first two books.
Beg to report, sir, that this book puts Kafka in the shithouse.
Could not get into it. May try again another time.