بقول ايوان كليما هاشك و كافكا هر دو چك بودند، هر دو نويسنده، به فاصله كوتاهي از هم بدنيا اومدن واز دنيا رفتن، ولي تو شهري مثل پراگ می توان دو دوست خوب را یافت که در نقطه مقابل هم باشند هاشك فرصت اتمام شاهكارش رو نداشت،شايدهم اين یک توفيق اجباري براي كتاب بود

Αν δεν ήταν κακή η μετάφραση και η επιμέλεια θα το βαθμολογούσα θετικά.

از جنگ زیاد خوانده‌ایم، دیده‌ایم و شنیده‌ایم. هم با جنگی که درایران رخ داده آشنا هستیم (البته به دلیل خط قرمزهایی که وجود دارد نه با همه‌ی جنبه‌هایش) و هم با جنگ‌هایی که در دنیا درگرفته‌اند. در این میان می‌توان گفت که دو جنگ جهانی قرن بیستم از همه بیشتر شناخته شده‌اند. شوایک را نیز از یک منظر می‌توان روایتی از جنگ جهانی اول دانست. یاروسلاو هاشک که خود از نزدیک در این جنگ حضور داشته، با طنزی تلخ که هیچ‌کس از زیر تیغ تیزش نمی‌تواند فرار کند به نقد از جنگ در درجه‌ی اول، و اجتماع در دیدی وسیع‌تر دست می‌زند.
هر نویسنده‌ای ترفندی دارد و می‌توانم بگویم که یاروسلاو هاشک از یکی از بهترین روش‌ها استفاده کرده است: سربازی ساده –و گاهی وقت‌ها (اما نه همیشه) خل– که از ماجرایی به ماجرایی دیگر برده می‌شود. این سادگی ذاتی شوایک (که نویسنده وی را
Good Soldier
یا سرباز غیور می‌نامد) به صحنه‌ها و شخصیت‌های عجیب، پوچ، ریاکار، و گاه دوست‌داشتنی اضافه می‌شود و روایتی جذاب و خواندنی خلق می‌شود .
شاید از زاویه‌ای، حتا بتوان موضوع جنگ را موضوع دوم کتاب در نظر گرفت و گفت که شوایک، در مورد خنده است. می‌توانم با اطمینان بگویم بهترین کتاب خنده‌داری است که تا به حال خوانده‌ام و بهترین اثر هنری خنده‌داری است که تا به حال با آن روبه‌رو شده‌ام. شوایک سرباز غیور ساده‌ای است که آن قدر داستان و حکایت بلد است که فکر می‌کنی بیش از همه‌ شخصیت‌های کتاب عمر کرده و پیری به نظر می‌رسد بی‌آنکه خود از خردی که دارد باخبر باشد و این جهل او نیز در خدمت روایت و خنداندن ما به خوبی استفاده می‌شود. به نظرم بیراه نیست اگر بگوییم شوایک ترکیب کاملی است از دن کیشوت و مهترش سانچو پانزا، البته بی‌آنکه چیزی از هویت مستقل خود شوایک کم شود.
مشاهده‌ی جنگ از خلال چشمان تیزبین شوایک چیزی است که هیچ‌کس نباید آن را از دست بدهد، چون جنگ یکی از بدترین پدیده‌هایی است که همیشه با زندگی انسان‌ها درآمیخته است و انسان بزرگی چون شوایک شما را با دیدگاه جدیدی از جنگ آشنا می‌کند.


این را هم باید اضافه کنم که ترجمه‌ی این کتاب شاید یکی از بهترین‌ ترجمه‌هایی است که تا به حال خواندم.

da best

واقعا نمی‌دونم حسم به این کتاب‌و چطوری باید توضیح بدم، هم دوسش داشتم، هم نه!
خیلی خوشحالم که خوندمش و تونستم شوایک‌و بشناسم، این شخصیت داستانی به اندازه‌ای در فرهنگ چک رخنه کرده که ایوان کلیما در بخشی از روح پراگ گفته:
"...مردمان پراگ از واژه‌ی کافکارنا برای توصیف پوچی زندگی‌شان استفاده می‌کنند، و توانایی‌شان را برای بیرون کشیدن نور و روشنایی از میان اینهمه پوچی برای رویارویی با خشونت به مدد شوخی و مزاح و مقاومت بی‌نهایت منفعلانه از واژه‌ی شوایکووینا استفاده می‌کنند."
(ص ۵۸)

اما شوایک برای من جزو کتاب‌هایی بود که زیادی بومی به حساب می‌اومد، از اون بومی‌هایی که افراد خارجی خیلی راحت نمی‌تونن باهاش ارتباط برقرار کنن و یک سری از قسمت‌هاش همین‌طوری فقط می‌گذره و می‌ره.
با همه‌ی این‌ها اما، شوایک با بلاهت‌های هوشمندانه‌ش تا سالیان زیادی قراره توی ذهنم ماندگار بشه‌‌ و بعضی از موقعیت‌هاش دوباره من‌و به خنده بندازه.


بخشی از کتاب:
"لعنتی، میگه من اصلاً فکر نمی‌کنم. چرا اصلاً فکر نمی‌کنی؟"

"به عرض مبارک می‌رسونم واسه این اصلاً فکر نمی‌کنم که تو سربازی این کار واسه سربازا قدغنه. قديما، وقتی تو هنگ ۹۱ خدمت می‌کردم، جناب کاپیتان همیشه بهمون می‌گفت: سرباز نباید با مغز خودش فکر کنه، بالادستیاش به جاش فکر می‌کنن. همچین که یه سرباز شروع کرد به فکر کردن، دیگه سرباز نیست، خوکه، سیویل شیپیشوئه. فکر کردن حاصل دیگه‌ای نداره..."
(ص ۱۱۹)

I had been wanting to read this book for decades. I know it has a reputation, and it lives up to it! Every page is rich with humor, absurdity, and biting sarcasm with regard to war, modern life, and bureaucracy. In its genre, I have not read a better book.

I know this translation by Jasper Parrott is only one of many; and I've read that there is another that is supposed to be better. I have only this to go on and I loved it. Hasek wrote more tales of The Good Soldier Svejk, but since his adventures appear to go on and on, I started with his first, shorter book, which gave me a good introduction.

Reread notes:
Reread 2023. As good as the first time. Amazing how similar Hašek's actual life was to this story of his. Worth reading are:

His biography on audible: https://www.audible.com/author/Jarosl...

His wikipedia entry: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jarosla...

This is considered a classic and humorous anti-war satirical story. The anti-hero soldier Svejk is a Czech in the Austria-Hungary empire army, an ethnic group lorded over by the dominant Austrians. Svejk acts idiotically as his means of dealing with the idiocy of the military and the war – it is WWI. His idiotic behavior subverts the military process around him and shows the clumsy incompetence of military officers, clergy and other authority figures. The book is a long series of Svejk’s crazy experiences with these people as he travels to assignments in Hungary and then on to the eastern front in Galicia, located in what is, at least for now, modern day western Ukraine.
My problem was that the amusing stories and comments largely failed to amuse me. That made the long trek through the 752 pages of events a slog rather than a pleasure. I did finally laugh and chuckle during the trip to Galicia and the events in the last quarter of the book. Maybe it took me time to get in sync with the humor or maybe I just paid more attention as I approached the finish line and knew I could make it.
I planned to rate this as 2 stars. However, the book is littered with wonderful and simple illustrations by Josef Lada that never failed to capture my interest. They also helped me to visualize the story. In recognition of these wonderful illustrations, which warrant 5 stars themselves, and that I did chuckle more toward the end, my rating is raised to 3 stars.

Amusing and brilliantly narrated by David Horowitz.

شوایک سرباز چکی‌ست که راه به راه حرص همه را (از جمله‌ شمای خواننده را) با روده درازی هایش در‌می‌آورد. اما همین که با شخصیت او اخت بشوید همانا قاه قاه خواهید خندید و همواره انگشت حیرت به دهن می‌گزید و از خود می‌پرسید که این شوایک سرباز غیور واقعا خل است یا اینکه از فرط دانایی ست که چنین می‌کند و چنان می‌گوید.
نویسنده در غالب طنزی سخت تلخ و سخت خنده‌دار جنگ را به سخره و باد انتقاد می‌گیرد و وجوه غیر انسانی آن را هرچه بیشتر برجسته می‌کند. فساد سران ارتش و کلیسا و بی‌ارزش بودن جان سرباز و مردم برای آنها از جمله نکاتی‌ ست که در کتاب بسیار به آن پرداخته شده است. من یقین دارم خواندن شوایک برای ما ایرانی ها چه بسا دوچندان بامعنی ست چرا که بدبختانه کشور ما هم گویا مدام در یک جنگ جهانی با دشمنی ناشناس به سر می‌برد. قسمتی از کتاب که برای من تجلی روشن وضعیت مملکت خودمان است این بود که:
جنگ در دزدی هم به دلیری نیاز داشت. سررشته‌داران و مباشران آذوقه با نگاهی پر مهر به هم نگاه می‌کردند، انگار بخواهند بگویند: «یک جان در چند قالبیم، می‌چاپیم برادر، خلاف جریان آب شنا کردن کار دشواری است، اگر تو به جیب نزنی یکی دیگر خواهد زد، و تازه پشت سرت خواهند گفت برای آن نمی‌دزدی که دیگر به حد کافی دزدیده‌ای.»

So many composers have translated stories into music. I was thinking that if this story could be translated into an operetta, or even a cabaret, it would become a medley of innocence, honesty, madness, brutality and a world happily going mad, while we, the audience, laugh ourselves to death, merrily tapping our feet to the rhythm of the orchestra.

I had the same feeling and reaction when I read Captain Corelli's Mandolin by Louis de Berniers. And then later on with 100-year-old Man Who Climbed Out The Window And Disappeared‎ by Jonas Jonasson.

The absurdity makes you laugh, while the situation makes you cringe. To top it off, the story is based on true events, as related by the author after WWI.

The author introduced his main character in the preface as the hero of an epoch. An ordinary modest unrecognized man in the streets of Prague, who did more for the war than men such as Napoleon. His heroism even overshadowed Alexander The Great. If you would ask his name, he would answer in simple and modest tone: "I am Svejk."

He was the talk of all citizens in the Kingdom of Bohemia when they were still under Austrian rule. His glory will never pass away.

Svejk, the Czech, burst onto the scene when he decided to join the Austrian Hungarian Army. But like a more contemporary Mr. Bean, he had the knack to turn any situation into something bizarrely, and often annoyingly, funny. He will be called a prize lunatic, a thorough-paced rascal, double-dyed blithering idiot, a prize ass, a thickheaded booby, lousy skunk, a blithering jackass, a ghastly idiot, a God-forsaken idiot, a freak of nature, a fat-headed lout, a devil of nuisance, a brainless booby, a degenerate. He was officially diagnosed as feeble-minded from his previous stint in the army, and developed arthritis in the meantime. Yet, it did not hamper his desire to be a loyal soldier and report for service when the First World War broke out.

Svjek had the gift of the gab to talk himself into, and then out of trouble, with a vast trove of memories he used in confirming his good-natured, kindness. He had a touching air of gentleness with which he drove people to acts of cruelty or kindness against him. But with his optimistic psyche firmly in place, he always experienced these acts as superb hospitality or professional conduct of some kind.

If historical fiction is your religion, and the genre's authors your sect, this unique book, 1st published in 1921, is a must-read. Your faith might be woefully challenged by the sheer brilliance of combining comedy with tragedy to create this kind of satirical wonder-work or masterpiece. Venturesome, boundary-pushing elements elevate this book into the realm of classic excellence, which sadly, are often ignored and replaced by the mundane, the poor airborne nothingness, being pushed to the top by publishers. This book is a once in a lifetime experience.

It is indeed an early introduction to the literature of the postmodernism in which everything is questioned, ridiculed, protested. In this case it is the futility of war, the almost blasphemous rebellion against religious hypocrisy, and the tragedy of an over-sized bureaucracy. Just about everything is made fun of.

It was a difficult read due to the brutality and cruelty portrayed in The Good Soldier Svjek. For sensitive readers the metatheatrical irreverence with which religion is handled might be experienced as bad-taste humor. However, the cheerful irony, and sharp satire pulled me through. I just realized how unique this book was.

n  Then an orderly arrived with a packet containing a communication to notify the Chaplain that on the next day the administration of extreme unction at the hospital would be attended by the "Society of Genteel Ladies for the Religious Training of Soldiers." This society consisted of hysterical old women and it supplied the soldiers in hospital with images of saints and tales about the Catholic warrior who dies for his Emperor. On the cover of the book containing these tales was a coloured picture, representing a battlefield. Corpses of men and horses, overturned munition wagons and cannon with the limber in the air, were scattered about on all sides. On the horizon a village was burning and shrapnel was bursting, while in the foreground lay a dying soldier, with his leg torn off, and above him an angel descended with a wreath bearing this inscription on a piece of ribbon: "This day thou shalt be with Me in paradise." And the dying soldier smiled blissfully, as if they were bringing him ice cream.n

It is certainly not a book for everyone, since it is also written in the literary idiom of the 1920s and requires patience to venture through. But it is one of those gems, like The Story of Ebenezer Le Page by G.B. Edwards, that demands a prominent position on the 'favorite' shelves for many readers.

There's no novel structure to the tale. It is more like a combination of anecdotes, or events, being tied together by a few continuous characters, while others disappeared along the way. The ending was blunt. However, the overall idea and message in this epoch is more important, and therefor no stars are lost.

RECOMMENDED.

“And somewhere from the dim ages of history the truth dawned upon Europe that the morrow would obliterate the plans of today.”

So more than twenty years after Czech-American Maria gave me a copy of this 1921 classic, I have finally read it and loved it. It’s a messy, episodic story of WWI; not a tale of the western front, but of the eastern front. Of course there is a long history of anti-war literature, but this story is the obvious precursor to other darkly satirical novels such as Joseph Heller’s Catch 22 and Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse Five, all farces indicting (especially) military and political leaders.

“Preparations for the slaughter of mankind have always been made in the name of God or some supposed higher being which men have devised and created in their own imagination.”

The Good Soldier Švejk is a rural naif, patriotic, quite simple, not questioning the military leadership that berates him regularly as an idiot--”Are you an idiot?!” “Yes, begging your pardon, sir. I am an idiot, I've been certified so!”

The humor is absurd and ultimately indicts military leadership as the true idiots, in the tradition of most war literature, but Švejk also is clearly some combination of clueless, too--he doesn’t know who Archduke Ferdinand is at all, and in the tradition of almost all of the poor folks we send to die in wars, he has no idea what the political situation is that has led to WWI--though he also on some occasions plays the fool to his benefit:

“Could you measure the diameter of the globe?"
"No, that I couldn't, sir," answered Švejk, "but now I'll ask you a riddle, gentlemen. There's a three-storied house with eight windows on each story. On the roof there are two gables and two chimneys. There are two tenants on each story. And now, gentlemen, I want you to tell me in what year the house porter's grandmother died?”

At one point a lieutenant tells Švejk to "attend to the needs" of a woman he is seeing:

“And so it came about that when the lieutenant returned from the barracks, the good soldier Švejk was able to inform him:
'Beg to report, sir, I carried out all the lady's wishes and treated her courteously, just as you instructed me.’
‘Thank you, Švejk,’ said the lieutenant. ‘And did she want many things done?’
‘About six,’ Švejk replied." (haha, good soldier, Švejk!)

At another point a sergeant suspects that Švejk may have deliberately given him a poisoned bottle of Schnapps, so he orders Švejk to drink it. And he does, as he always follows orders, this good soldier. The whole bottle!

Here’s another anecdote to help us understand his character:

Švejk's landlady tells him she is going to jump out the window, to which the good soldier replies: "If you want to jump out the window, go into the sitting room. I've opened the window for you. I wouldn't advise you to jump out of the kitchen window, because you'd fall on the rose bed in the garden, damage the bushes and have to pay for them. From the window in the sitting-room you'll fall beautifully on the pavement and if you're lucky you'll break your neck."

But this is the kind of humor you see early on; as Švejk gets closer to actual battle, the humor gets darker, more absurd (as is the case with Catch 22 and Slaughterhouse Five):

“The night spent in the detention barracks will always be one of Švejk's fondest memories. Next door to Number 16 was a cell for solitary confinement, a murky den from which issued, during that night, the wailing of a soldier who was locked up in it and whose ribs were being systematically broken for some disciplinary offence." (The presumption is that he is lucky not to be THAT guy).

"Švejk inspected the provost-marshal's office. The impression which it produced could scarcely be called a favorable one, especially with regard to the photographs on the walls. They were photographs of the various executions carried out by the army in Galicia and Serbia. Artistic photographs of cottages which had been burned down and of trees, the branches of which were burdened with hanging bodies. There was one particularly fine photograph from Serbia showing a whole family which had been hanged. A small boy with his father and mother. Two soldiers with bayonets were guarding the tree on which the execution had been carried out, and an officer was standing victoriously in the foreground smoking a cigarette.” (You begin to see how the humor gets darker, bleaker).

Švejk is constantly being sent to the wrong places and in the wrong direction throughout the tale, as he dutifully tries to get to the front, and is threatened with court martial for various offenses. It’s always military chaos, all the time. And as with Catch 22 and Slaughterhouse Five, it’s an ultimately devastatingly sad story, of course, considering millions were maimed and slaughtered. Oh, it's meandering, repetitive, messy, but it remains a classic satirical novel anyone would enjoy reading, as we experience yet another war (in Ukraine) “developed” by Our Esteemed and Unquestionably Wise Military, Political and Corporate “Leaders,” though perhaps military veterans would enjoy it most, nodding knowingly and sadly at the black humor.

کتاب مقدس سربازی.