Obviously having my own Prague spring as this was inspired by 677 above, and apart from Kafka, Hasek is the major Prague writer from the early 20th century.
This is a huge (and unfinished) book, like Dead Souls. Svejk is very like the character in Dad’s Army (‘Permission to speak, sir’) and rambles on with anecdote after anecdote whenever he gets the opportunity. Svejk’s wartime journey takes him on a huge epic through East Europe, concluding on the Russian front when he is arrested by his own side having stolen a dead Russian soldier’s uniform. There are a lot of in jokes about Prague and the Austro-Hungarian empire at the time (1st world war) which are a bit lost on me.
I don’t suppose I will ever re-read this but one of those books that you can tick off your bucket list.
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