Showing results for title "The Good Soldier Svejk", by author "Jaroslav Hasek" in Comedy & Humour

A soldier in the First World War who never actually sees any combat, Josef Svejk is the awkward protagonist - and none of the other characters can quite decide whether his bumbling efforts to get to the front are genuine or not. Often portrayed as one of the first anti-war novels, Hasek's classic satire is a tour-de-force of modernist writing, influencing later writers such as Hemingway, Faulkner and Joseph Heller.

This tale charts the exploits during the First World War of ‘European Forrest Gump’ Svejk, in his progress through the ranks of the Austro-Hungarian army. Good-natured and garrulous, Svejk becomes the Austrian army’s most loyal Czech soldier when he is called up on the outbreak of the First World War - although his bumbling attempts to get to the front serve only to prevent him from reaching it.