Karel Čapek

Rossum's Universal Robots (R.U.R.): A Collective Drama in Three Acts with a Comedy Prelude by Karel Čapek ; translated by David Short ; forward by Arthur Miller Drawing huge international attention following its original production in 1921, 'Rossum's Universal Robots' was a strikingly prescient meditation on the themes of humanity and subjugation that were to dominate the twentieth century. Seen as a precursor to works including Huxley's 'Brave New world', it is a true classic of the dystopian genre, and remains all too resonant today.

Believe in People: The Essential Karel Čapek : Previously Untranslated Journalism and Letters by Karel Čapek ; selected and translated with an introduction by Šárka Tobrmanová-Kühnová ; preface by John Carey

The Absolute at Large by Karel Čapek; introduction by Stephen Baxter In this satirical classic, a brilliant scientist invents the Karburator, a reactor that can create abundant and practically free energy. However, the machine works by completely annihilating matter and in so doing releases the Absolute, the spiritual essence held within all matter, into the world. Infected by the pure Absolute, the world's population becomes consumed with religious and national fervor, the effects of which ultimately cause a devastating global war.

Cross Roads by Karel Čapek ; translated from the Czech and introduction by Norma Comrada ; illustrated by Paul Hoffman Written during and right after World War I, this volume pairs two collections of short stories. The first collection, "Wayside Crosses," presents an agonized and unsuccessful search for God and truth. These metaphysical tales explore man's limitations, his terror and helplessness, and place value on the ongoing search. The second collection, "Painful Tales," contains realistic stories of characters being forced to make choices in which one good conflicts with another.

Apocryphal Tales: With a Selection of Fables and Would-Be Tales by Karel Čapek ; translated from the Czech and with an introduction by Norma Comrada A grand collection of tales and fables from one of Czechoslovakia's most respected writers that approach great events and figures of history, myth and literature in startling ways. Jesus's loaves and fishes miracle is described from the viewpoint of a baker. Townspeople argue about who's to blame for the approaching hordes of Attila the Hun. Humorous, thought-provoking, and sometimes frightening, they show Čapek at his very best.

Tales from Two Pockets by Karel Čapek ; translated from the Czech and with an introduction by Norma Comrada A collection of philosophical crime stories. Typical is The Last Judgment in which God refuses to pass judgment on a man accused of murder, preferring to leave the verdict to a court of men. The reason? Because God knows everything there is to know, he cannot be an impartial judge.

Three Novels: Hordubal; Meteor; An Ordinary Life by Karel Čapek ; translated from the Czech by M. and R. Weatherall ; introduction by William Harkins The novels in this unusual philosophical trilogy share neither characters nor events, Instead, they provide different answers to the question of how we know other people. Detectives faced with a murder reconstruct the crime, but not the character of the victim. Three people tell stories about a dying pilot they know almost nothing about; each story is as full of truth as it is devoid of facts. And one man looks back on his life and discovers all the people he might have been.

Toward the Radical Center: A Karel Čapek Reader by Karel Čapek; edited and with an introduction by Peter Kussi ; foreword by Arthur Miller ; translated by Norma Comrada [and others] Capek's best plays, stories, and columns take us from the social contributions of clumsy people to dramatic meditations on mortality and commitment. The Reader includes a new and complete English translation of R.U.R., the play that introduced the literary robot.

The Gardener's Year by Karel Čapek; illustrated by Josef Čapek Karel Čapek's satiric gifts take a different turn in this impishly comic book, which recounts the trials, labors, joys, and meditations of the amateur gardener. Rather than a how-to book, Čapek's volume offers a lighthearted mock-treatise on the pains and rewards of tending a small and resistant garden plot. The drawings are delightful.

Lost in the Shadow of the Word: Space, Time and Freedom in Interwar Eastern Europe by Benjamin Paloff "Scholars of modernism have long addressed how literature, painting, and music reflected the radical reconceptualization of space and time in the early twentieth century—a veritable revolution in both physics and philosophy that has been characterized as precipitating an “epistemic trauma” around the world. In this wide-ranging study, Benjamin Paloff contends that writers in Central and Eastern Europe felt this impact quite distinctly from their counterparts in Western Europe. For the latter, the destabilization of traditional notions of space and time inspired works that saw in it a new kind of freedom. However, for many Central and Eastern European authors, who were writing from within public discourses about how to construct new social realities, the need for escape met the realization that there was both nowhere to escape to and no stable delineation of what to escape from. In reading the prose and poetry of Czech, Polish, and Russian writers, Paloff imbues the term “Kafkaesque” with a complexity so far missing from our understanding of this moment in literary history."

Art and Life in Modernist Prague: Karel Čapek and his Generation by Thomas Ort In most contemporary historical writing the picture of modern life in Habsburg Central Europe is a gloomy story of the failure of rationalism and the rise of protofascist movements. This book tells a different story, focusing on the Czech writers and artists distinguished by their optimistic view of the world in the years before WWI. Available in print only.

The Bohemian Body: Gender and Sexuality in Modern Czech Culture by Alfred Thomas The Bohemian Body examines the modernist forces within nineteenth- and twentieth-century Europe that helped shape both Czech nationalism and artistic interaction among ethnic and social groups--Czechs and Germans, men and women, gays and straights. The author re-examines the work of key Czech writers and poets from the National Revival to the Velvet Revolution. The result is a seemingly paradoxical yet nuanced understanding of Czech culture (including literature, opera, and film), long overlooked or misunderstood by Western scholars.

Critical Survey of Long Fiction, v. 1 by Carl Rollyson and Frank N. Magill (Editors) This series contains in-depth analytical reference guides to 463 major writers of world literature. The series has an accessible style and format that allows readers to zero in on precise characteristics of an author's work. Essays are arranged alphabetically by author, and begin with dates and places of birth and death. The essays also include a list of the author's principal long fiction, a brief overview of other literary forms, the authors biography and achievements, and a comprehensive analysis of each work.

Science Fiction Writers: Critical Studies of the Major Authors from the Early Nineteenth Century to the Present Day by Richard Bleiler (Editor) The Scribner Writers Series has set the standard for literary reference for more than 25 years. In addition to addressing the lives and careers of important writers, the articles discuss the themes and styles of major works and place them in pertinent historical, social and political contexts for today's readers. Novelists, playwrights, essayists, poets, short story writers, and more recently, genre writers in science fiction and mystery, are all expertly discussed in the more than 16 sets comprising this series.Since the first edition was published in 1999, 20 new essays have been added on authors ranging from Gregory Benford and Katherine MacLean to Lucius Shepard and Gene Wolfe. In addition, 19 essays have been extensively revised. Pictures of most of the 96 authors have been added, and the set has been reorganized in alphabetical order for ease of use.

Karel Čapek: In Pursuit of Truth, Tolerance, and Trust by Bohuslava Bradbrook KAREL CAPEK is the most important, most versatile, but also the most neglected Czech writer of the 20th century. His plays R.U.R. and From the Life of Insects created a sensation in London in the 1920's: his word robot was introduced into the Oxford English Dictionary while his other plays as well as novels, short stories, essays, travelogues and causeries followed in English translations in qiuick succession until cultural links were broken off by the war. Because of his liberal, anti-war views Capek's works were blacklisted by the Nazis occupying his homeland, as well as later by the communists. Presenting a study of all genres Capek used, Bradbrook's book pays the debt history owes to Capek. It is also the first original book on Capek published in the UK. Both as a writer an as a journalist, Capek sought the truth: in the epistemological sense, how we acquire knowledge; in the moral one, how we apply it to our behaviour. Recongizing great differences between individuals, Capek recommends torerance and mutual trust as the best way towards the improvement of democratic human relations. His philosophical trilogy - HODUBAL, METEOR and AN ORDINARY LIFE - is the best artistic expression of these ideas; as a journalist, he conveyed them explicitly. Capek's science fiction works show his admiration for the achievements of science and technology; he forecast the use of nuclear power, but also strongly warned against its abuse. His English readers particularly appreciated his common sense, wit and humor. Karel Capek was a man who taught through laughter.

The Narratives of Čapek and Čexov: A Typological Comparison of the Authors' World Views by Peter Z. Schubert "Comparing the affinities between the writers Capek and Cexov, the author provides us with a thorough study that is long overdue. The parallels between these two great Czech writers were first observed almost half a century ago, and commented on in passing by no less than seven scholars. The critics' allusions would suggest that similarity exists in the stories' quality, in the writers' artistic method, stylistic structure, and language as well as in the atmosphere, or mood, of the narratives. The affinity found in the similar treatment of analogous subjects has remained until now an entirely unexplored field. While Capek, the creator of The Good Soldier Schweik is relatively well known outside of Central Europe, Cexov remains an undiscovered country for most. This Professor Schubert has remedied by this timely and intriguing literary study."--BOOK JACKET. In print only.

On Karel Čapek: A Michigan Slavic Colloquium by Michael Makin and Jindrich Toman (Editors)

Narrative Modes in Czech Literature by Lubomír Doležel

Studie o dramatu by Pavel Janoušek Drama studies, with a focus on Karel Čapek.

Čapkovské variace: Eseje o Karlu Čapkovi a o literatuře by František Buriánek Čapek's Variations: Essays on Karel Čapek and on Literature