The Good Soldier Svejk

The Good Soldier Švejk, written shortly after the First World War, is one of the great antiwar satires - and one of the funniest books of the 20th (or any) century. In creating his eponymous hero, Jaroslav Hašek produced an unforgettable character who charms and infuriates and bamboozles his way through the conflagration that tore through the heart of Europe, upending empires and changing social history.  It is the closing period of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The assassination at Sarajevo has just occurred, and armies are on the march.  Švejk, a seller of dogs of dubious provenance, ends up in gaol (the first of a number of such occasions) and then in a Czech battalion in the Austrian army. He becomes batman to a chaplain (who likes the bottle) and batman to Lieutenant Lukas, who is swiftly driven to despair; he causes havoc wherever he goes (inexplicably ending up being sentenced to death while wearing a Russian uniform), yet never losing an opportunity tell a story, an an