"A word, a word so easily spoken; it is not spoken."I am developing a minor obsession with the literature of the 19th and early 20th century Hapsburg Empire, and I can't quite put my finger on why, or how it started, unless it was when I read about Robert Musil in Philip Ball's amazing Critical Mass: How One Thing Leads to Another. Ball's interest was in Musil's unfinished two-volume novel, The Man Without Qualities, and its depiction of a mathematician's dispassion for the world, which doesn't sound terribly promising on the face of it, does it? But it's quite an engaging read nonetheless, and one that I look forward to re-reading again soon; I'm a Robert Musil fan (see also my look last year at Musil's first novel, The Confusions of Young Torless, from last year), loving his way of examining moral and social paralysis and its consequences, as well as how his German prose becomes English.The (delightfully!) occasionally ornithological Radetzky March* both does and not partake these qualities (or, I guess, lack of qualities) as it details the misadventures of three generations of the Trotta family: a grandfather ennobled as a reward for sort of blunderingly saving Austrian Emperor Franz Joseph's life in battle, a son whom the new Baron forces into a civil service instead of a military career**, and a grandson who takes up the family's military mantle again, only to very nearly disgrace it.But this makes it sound like The Radetzky March is a book in which things happen, and really, it's not. It's more a book in which things are felt and perceived, and what is perceived is mostly that the Empire is in a period of stasis and stagnation, a period in which the gloss of civilization is polished to a blinding brightness, the better to conceal the turmoil it hides, the turmoil of an empire that purports to bind a staggering variety of cultures, religions and ethnicities into one people*** but really hasn't, except in that all those different peoples are temporarily too busy buffing and polishing (under some duress) to get on with the business of being themselves and hating each other. But don't worry, they'll get around to it. Boy, will they get around to it.But even that makes it sound like stuff is happening. Which is erroneous. I mean, these people don't even eat:"The baron had a bizarre relationship with food. He ate the most important morsels with his eyes, so to speak; his sense of beauty consumed above all the essence of the food -- its soul, as it were; the vapid remainders that then reached mouth and palate were boring and had to be wolfed down without delay."And:"He was sorry that Trotta had missed the schnitzel. He would have gladly chewed a second one for the lieutenant -- or at least watched it being eaten with gusto."Nor do they ever really seem to talk to each other, especially not the Trottas. Especially not the youngest Trotta, who is constantly struggling over whether or not to utter even the most banal pleasantry: "Carl Joseph almost replied reverently 'Good evening, Herr Doctor!' But all he said was 'May I?' and sat down."And things get worse when young Lieutenant Carl Joseph Trotta (the grandson), posted to a border village whose chief employer is a bristle factory, suddenly faces his duty as a soldier to put down an insurrection at said factory. He insists to a colleague that he "simply won't order the men to shoot!" because he now realizes that the factory workers are "poor devils" but another tells him "You'll do what you have to, you know you will." And what he has to do right away is get drunk... And do things improve from there?"Immense files swelled around the Trotta case, and the files grew, and every department in every agency splattered a little more ink on them, the way one waters flowers, to make them grow."So, uh, not so much, then.And then there's the dreary love affair and whatnot (in general, women are not well-regarded in Radetzky March, but what are you gonna do? This is a story about a young man raised motherless by, apparently, a motherless son of a military hero, said son spending most of the novel either in military school or in the military. Sausage fests everywhere). Sigh.But so then why bother to read this stuff at all, you might ask? Because it's good. As a masterful evocation of the spiritual paralysis of an entire society, as a look at the consequences of too much civilization as something that does not require robot butlers and flying cars to happen, as a vivid portrait of the twilight years of Emperor Franz Joseph (who had "lived long enough to know that it is foolish to tell the truth.") and the Hapsburg Empire just before the outbreak of World War I****, and, yes, as an exquisite piece of writing for its own sake -- as all of these things, The Radetzky March is a very, very good book.*The book's title comes from a piece of music by Johann Strauss, Sr., which a military band plays outside of the grandfather's house every Sunday to salute their local hero.As for my characterization of Radetzky March as occasionally ornithological, dude, it is loaded with references to birds, from a servant's caged canary to the different birds singing outdoors in every season in Austria and the empire -- a very charming touch. Seriously. More birds than anything I've read this year that wasn't by Michael Chabon. Birds signal changes in scene and setting and sometimes provide the strongest of dramatic counterpoints (hello, wild geese and Russian ravens!). This is wonderful!**The grandfather's insistence that the son have any career but military stems from a misunderstanding regarding a children's history book that presents a tarted up version of how the grandfather saved the Emperor's life, to which the grandfather takes great but ultimately ineffectual umbrage in one of the more bitterly humorous sections of the novel.***All in the service of allowing the Hapsburgs, once Holy Roman Emperors and lords over most of Europe in one form or another, to feel like they still had an Empire and were still a relevant power in world affairs, big terrifying inbred jaws and all (though yes, I'll admit to having been a little sad when they finally had to cut down the Sisipalm in 2008).Oh, and check out the people, as seen through the eyes of a somewhat minor character, Count Chojnicki:"The German Austrians were waltzers and boozy crooners, the Hungarians stank, the Czechs were born bootlickers, the Ruthenians were treacherous Russians in disguise, the Croats and Slovenes, whom he called Cravats and Slobbers, were brushmakers and chestnut roasters, and the Poles, of whom he himself was one after all, were skirt chasers, hairdressers and fashion photographers."So, the Austro-Hungarian Empire was basically the Golgafrincham B Ark, then?****Weirdly, it was only when the assassination of Franz Ferdinand was communicated (very dramatically) that it hit home for me that the events of this novel were taking place in the 20th century. The book otherwise feels so timeless, so universal, that a particular historical event's depiction, even second-hand as happens here, is really jarring, but not in a bad way. Just a wow way.
Joseph Roth was an Austrian novelist who was born in 1894 and died of chronic alcoholism in Paris in 1939.This novel begins on a decidedly ironic note when the Kaiser knights a young Austro-Hungarian soldier, Trotta, for allegedly saving the Kaiser’s life, thereby creating a vast gulf between the soldier and his family and friends by lifting him into an aristocracy for which he is not prepared. Moving rather quickly through two more generations, the story begins to linger on the figure of Carl Joseph, the grandson of the “hero.” Roth presents a picture of the Hapsburg Empire through the eyes and experiences of such particular figures, Carl being a young military officer who feels out of place with the culture and society around him. Everything in the novel is initially very emotionally restrained, regimented, traditional, very oriented to class and position. And the society is almost entirely male, the rare women who make an appearance being minor and peripheral. The ambiance conjured suggests a kind of Prussian militarism, although the story is occurring south of Prussia, and Prussia is the archenemy of Austria. The mood is heavy and somber. Indeed, as the narrative proceeds, there is an air of fatalism, of events being outside of anyone’s control, of missed opportunities and inevitable tragedies. None of the highlighted characters seems to “fit” into their assigned societal roles, each being and feeling different from those around them. Was this dis-ease the result of individual temperamental characteristics, or was it the result of a society and culture in decline, nearing its dissolution? How does this reflect upon our own times, our own culture and society? Is this sense of dislocation endemic, the result of a loss of faith in verities that used to hold society together? How does this novel speak to us today? Above all, I think, the reader is left with the senselessness and hopelessness of events that seem inexorable and inevitable.In a parenthetical aside, Roth asserts that before the First World War, people somehow mattered; if someone died, there was a gap, and people mourned and new there had been a loss. With the World War I, everything changed, and such deaths became meaningless data, empty places quickly filled and forgotten. Is this part of the picture the author is trying to paint?At the fringes of the Empire some prescient people were feeling that something was amiss, that the Empire was ripe for dissolution. More people closed their eyes and ears and chose to deny it. A rottenness existed in society, a softening, and old forms became increasingly ossified and invariable. Dissident groups began to flourish. In the very middle of the book, there is a long and unexpectedly touching chapter about the death of Carl Joseph’s father’s servant, Jacques; the mood is tender and caring, a marked contrast to all that has gone before.Feeling his world shifting beneath his feet, Carl Joseph’s father, the district captain, then sets out to visit Carl Joseph at the eastern edges of the Empire, finding that while there he cannot express his love to Carl Joseph or do anything to save the boy from his alcoholism. Even at this remote site, officials are sensing the end of the Empire, that nationalism and sectarianism of every stripe will rip the Empire apart when the Kaiser dies, which cannot be long in the future. Roth is masterful in creating the ambiance of a society, Empire, and culture in decline, a situation that people perceive but can do nothing to prevent. As if holding back the dark, as if there was nothing else for the people of the Empire to hold onto, ritual and ceremony reigns, empty pageantry, the illusion of stability and pomp masking the deterioration everywhere underneath. The “glue” holding the Empire together was the old Kaiser Franz Joseph; Roth vividly conveys his importance to the populace, showing what a paternal figure he had become. His death, coinciding with the last of the Trotta family, was widely perceived as the sign that the Empire had come to an end. Indeed, the picture conveyed was less of an Empire conquered than of an Empire already dying and aware of it. Yet Roth is able to communicate the poignancy of it all, the yearning and dismay, the deep sense of unease and fear pervading all classes of society, those people aware of what is occurring and also those desperately choosing to deny or ignore it. Not only does nationalism tear at the fabric of the empire, but class unrest does so as well as workers begin to assert their rights and the army is called upon to fight them. How much of this picture can be applied to our own times? How much can we perceive about the internal dissolution of our own society, the tensions and strains that are beginning to tear it apart, the weakness and softness at its core that will lead it to implode eventually?Carl Joseph’s personal world seems to begin crumbling when he is involved in leading a slaughter of rebellious workers and when he thoughtlessly assumes responsibility for the gambling debts of a colleague who then kills himself. One central issue to which Roth draws attention is the concept of honor before and after the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, its formerly having been central to the lives and values especially of the military and civil service. This issue governs many of the actions of each character, generation after generation, and is both their glory and their undoing. Above all, it raises important considerations about the differences between the cultures of the late 18th century and our own.Across this vast canvas, Roth traced the declining fortunes of a doomed family, poignantly delineating the primary figure in each generation with tenderness, sympathy, and grace. He wrote beautifully and well deserves to be more widely read today.The Radtzky March, by the way, appears again and again throughout the novel as background music in different contexts, always representing the traditional way of doing things.; composed by Strauss, it had become a sort of official song of the Austrian military.
What do You think about The Radetzky March (2003)?
“That was how things were back then. Anything that grew took its time growing, and anything that perished took a long time to be forgotten. But everything that had once existed left its traces, and people lived on memories just as they now live on the ability to forget quickly and emphatically.” There are eras when time seems to stand still and the period before the beginning of World War I was one of those times for the Austro-Hungarian empire. The empire was in decline, but not yet aware that their way of life was about to end. There was a way that things were done and any deviation was stressful and possibly scandalous. Reviewers have mentioned the dream like qualities of this book and I believe that is achieved by not only superb writing, but the evocation of a quality of life that is foreign to the fast track environment that exists today. Joseph Roth was quoted as saying that he only really cared about writing one great sentence a day. This book shows the painstaking self-editing that I usually only associate with F. Scott Fitzgerald. The imagery he creates out of the most mundane moments reminds me of the Dostoevsky ability to write about the nuances of a character getting out of bed in the morning and keeping the reader fascinated. This is a book about three generations of Trottas beginning with the Battle of Solferino. The last battle in world history by the way that both armies were lead by their supreme Monarch. Kaiser Franz Joseph lead the Austrians and Emperor Napoleon III lead the French. In the midst of the battle Franz Joseph approaches the front lines. He raises a pair of field glasses to view the enemy and Lieutenant Trottas, knowing that snipers were looking for anything indicating an officer throws himself in from the Kaiser and takes a bullet in the back that was meant for his Supreme Leader. He becomes known as the Hero of Solferino. Later he is incensed when he discovers that his act of heroism has been greatly distorted by writers for childrens books putting him in a much more heroic role than the actual event. He resigns his commission and asks the Kaiser to expunge the act of heroism from future books. For us, this might seem like an over reaction, but Trottas did not desire platitudes that he did not deserve. He found the whole business unseemly. His son is not a military man, but does end up in a role of District Captain due to his position of a Baron, a designation that had been consigned upon the first Trotta by the Kaiser. His life is so consistently the same ever day that even the most minor deviation causes great trepidation. "One morning in May Herr von Trotta sat down at the table in the breakfast room. The egg, soft-boiled as usual, was in its silver cup. The honey shimmered golden, the fresh kaiser rolls smelled of fire and yeast, the butter shone yellow, embedded in a gigantic dark-green leaf, the coffee steamed in the gold-rimmed porcelain. Nothing was missing. Or at least it seemed to Herr von Trotta at first glance that nothing was missing. But then he promptly stood up, put down his napkin, and scrutinized the table again. The letters were missing from their usual place. For as long as the district captain could remember, no day had ever passed without official mail. First Herr von Trotta went to the open window as if to convince himself that the world still existed outside."As it turned out his man servant Jacques was very sick and could not perform his normal duties of fetching the mail. This was "highly annoying". Later we find out that Jacques is not his name, but the name conferred on him by the first von Trotta because the nobleman didn't want to have to remember a different name from the servant in that capacity before. The grandson of the hero of Solferino does join the military and steps into the ranks as a Lieutenant. He becomes mired in a series of affairs with married women. The last being with Frau Von Taussig who is married to a noble, but the mistress of a wealthy friend of Trotta and yet she has a hunger for young lieutenants. Trotta first meets her when he is assigned to escort her on a trip. "He doesn't have the nerve to ask who the woman is. Many faces of unknown women--blue, brown, black eyes, blond hair, black hair, hips, breasts, and legs, women he may once have brushed up against, as a boy, as an adolescent--they all sweep past him, all of them at once: a marvelous, tender storm of women. He smells the fragrance of these strangers; he feels the cool, hard tenderness of their knees; the sweet yoke of naked arms is already around his throat and the bolt of intertwined arms lies in back of his neck.There is a fear of voluptuousness that is itself voluptuous, just as a certain fear of death can itself be deadly. Lieutenant Trotta is now filled with the fear of voluptuousness."Okay I need to take a moment to fan myself. Is the room really warm suddenly or is it just me?Trotta becomes mired in gambling debt much the same way he became mired in the latest elicit affair, second hand. A friend and higher ranking officer asks him to sign for his debts, and Trotta with barely a consideration signs away his life. His friend becomes more and more in debt and eventually kills himself (An event that was in vogue in this era of Austrian history. In fact at the time Vienna had the highest suicide rate of any European city.) leaving Trotta with responsibility for the owed money. He eventually ends up having to ask his father for the money. The father goes to the Kaiser and the Kaiser remembering the service of the family (well after a few false starts.) grants amnesty to the young lieutenant and has the moneylender (a Jew) deported. Lieutenant Trotta disillusioned with his service quits the military, but then when war breaks out he of course rejoins. His father is feeling disillusioned as well, and some what embarrassed over the near scandal of gambling debts. "He was old and tired, and death was already lurking, but life would not yet let him go. Like a cruel host it held him fast at the table because he had not yet tasted all the bitterness that had been prepared for him."The book begins with an act of heroism and ends with an act of heroism. I will not reveal the final moments of our young Lieutenant in case there are those of you that will read this Austrian Masterpiece. A wonderful book, a book that captures a time precisely and leaves me with the continued belief that fiction is so important for our collective memory. Our desires, our thoughts, our way of speaking, and our history are recorded more accurately in fiction books than it is in nonfiction. Highly Recommended!!
—Jeffrey Keeten
"Si queremos que todo siga como está, necesitamos que todo cambie" decía el Príncipe de Salina en El Gatopardo. Pero mientras que este aceptaba con resignación el fin de una época, los Trotta no son capaces de superar la traumática desaparición del Imperio Austro-Hungaro. Una trágica historia narrada con cierto grado de ironía y no exenta de un patético humor, sobre todo en los personajes de Trotta padre y del Emperador Francisco José I.Un libro excelente. Deseando leer La Cripta de los Capuchinos la continuación de la saga Trotta. Bueno, deseando leer ese libro y cualquier libro de Joseph Roth que caiga en mis manos, claro.
—Luxor
This is a damn good book but make sure you read the Michael Hoffmann translation. I started reading a translation by some other dude at first (the yellowish one with horses on the cover and an intro by Nadine Gordimer) and I was like no way this is Joseph Roth's masterpiece, this is real clunky. But then I scored the Michael Hoffmann translation (the reddish one with an old-timey dude in uniform) and all was well -- this book's reputation seemed deserved. Really, anything translated by Michael Hoffmann can be trusted - maybe also searching for his work is a good way to discover new books from Germany and Austria?
—Lee
