
In Praise of Karel Capek - chesterfield
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/16/books/in-praise-of-karel-capek.html
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piazz
"War with the Newts" is simply amazing.

I read this book as part of a University course in "Russian & Eastern European
Sci-Fi literature", and reading this book was just about the only time I
wasn't slightly bitter about having signed up for the course. Like the NYT
article states, it paints a vivid picture of how our very human, not-quite-
good-but-just-OK intentions frequently lead to utter catastrophe, despite
their seeming relatively innocuous at the onset.

It's a damn fun read, too.

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jacobolus
> reading [ _War With the Newts_ ] was just about the only time I wasn't
> slightly bitter about having signed up for the [Eastern European SF] course.

Really? _War With the Newts_ is great, but there’s a lot of other great
Russian / Eastern European science fiction. What else did you read in the
course?

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hprotagonist
"The Absolute at Large" is a delight.

 _“It’s nothing to do with poisonous gases,” Marek yelled at him. “It’s
something a thousand times worse. Listen carefully to what I tell you, Bondy,
this is something beyond human understanding, there’s not the slightest trick
or dishonesty about it. This carburator of mine can burn matter completely, it
burns it so perfectly that there’s not even a speck of dust left behind; or I
suppose you’d say it smashes matter, pulverises it, takes it apart electron by
electron, it consumes it, grinds it - I don’t know what to call it. In short,
it consumes it entirely. You’ve no idea just what enormous power there is in
atoms. With half a hundredweight of coal in its boiler a liner could sail all
the way round the world, keep the lights on in all of Prague, power a huge
factory, whatever you like; with a piece of coal the size of a walnut you
could heat and cook for a whole family. And it needn’t even be coal at all;
you can fuel my carburator with the first pebble or handful of dust you come
across by your front door. Every crumb of matter contains more energy within
it than the biggest steam boiler; it simply has to be digested! It simply has
to be burned entirely! Bondy, I can do it; my carburator can do it; you’ll be
forced to admit that twenty years of hard work were well spent.”_

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bd
His brother - Josef Čapek - was also a writer (and a painter):

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josef_Čapek](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josef_Čapek)

He wrote a wonderful illustrated children's book about cat and dog living
together:

[https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/19431013-all-about-
doggi...](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/19431013-all-about-doggie-and-
pussycat)

[https://web2.mlp.cz/koweb/00/04/37/75/99/povidani_o_pejskovi...](https://web2.mlp.cz/koweb/00/04/37/75/99/povidani_o_pejskovi_a_kocicce.pdf)
(originally published in 1929, so it's public domain, Czech version, but at
least you can check the illustrations)

Sometimes both brothers wrote together:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brothers_Čapek](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brothers_Čapek)

Josef was actually the one who came up with the word "robot":

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karel_Čapek#Etymology_of_robot](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karel_Čapek#Etymology_of_robot)

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pndy
While praising, author could use that háček over Čapek last name because that
diacritical mark does makes the difference when it comes to pronunciation.

~~~
java-man
indeed!

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jlarocco
Funny coincidence, I just read "War With the Newts" a couple weeks ago, and
I've been recommending it to everyone. It's a quick read and highly
entertaining.

I'm definitely going to check out more of Capek's work.

~~~
dejv
For something little bit different I recomend Tales from Two Pockets, which
contains 48 short stories each just few pages long. All of those are mystery
stories and each is unique.

~~~
jlarocco
Thanks! Short stories are my favorite, so I'll be sure to pick this up.

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ashildr
And if you’re into classical music you may enjoy the Makropoulos affair, an
opera by Leoš Janáček based on a play of Karel Čapek about the inhuman inhuman
concept of eternal life. Witty and beautiful.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Makropulos_Affair_(opera...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Makropulos_Affair_\(opera\))

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UncleSlacky
It is a great book, and the cover of mine is pretty cool, too:
[https://pictures.abebooks.com/isbn/9780048233080-uk.jpg](https://pictures.abebooks.com/isbn/9780048233080-uk.jpg)

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joemi
His "R.U.R." really blew me away, considering when it was written and how much
I could see its influence in a lot of more current scifi. I haven't read "War
With the Newts" yet, but it's now next on my list.

~~~
walshemj
Its worth it I sought out via a library loan after doing RUR at school - you
might also want to try We by Yevgeny Zamyatin you can definitely see its
influence in 1984 and other dystopian novels and some cyberpunk

