Apocryphal Tales Read online

  Other Books by and about Karel apek

  from Catbird Press

  Toward the Radical Center: A Karel apek Reader

  edited by Peter Kussi, foreword by Arthur Miller

  War with the Newts translated by Ewald Osers

  Cross Roads translated by Norma Comrada

  Three Novels translated by M. & R. Weatherall

  Tales from Two Pockets translated by Norma Comrada

  Talks with T. G. Masaryk translated by Michael Henry Heim

  Karel apek – Life and Work by Ivan Klíma

  translated by Norma Comrada

  Translation and Introduction © 1997 Norma Comrada

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  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  apek, Karel, 1890-1938

  [Kniha apokryf. English]

  Apocryphal tales / by Karel apek ; translated from the Czech and with an introduction

  by Norma Comrada

  “A Garrigue book.”

  ISBN 0-945774-34-6 (trade pbk. : alk. paper)

  1. Short stories, Czech--Translations into English. I. Comrada, Norma. II. Title

  PG5038.C3K613 1997

  891.8’6352--dc21 96-54505 CIP

  Table of Contents

  Also by

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Introduction

  Acknowledgments

  The Moving Business

  APOCRYPHAL TALES

  WOULD-BE TALES

  Other Books by Karel apek

  Introduction

  During his relatively short lifetime (1890-1938), the Czech writer Karel apek became internationally known for his plays, novels, and stories, most notably for his 1920 drama R.U.R.: Rossum’s Universal Robots, which introduced the word “robot” to the world. His astonishing output also included essays, literary criticism, children’s books, books on pets and gardening and travel and getting out a daily newspaper, and numerous other works on a wide range of topics, in a variety of styles. Many of these first appeared in Lidové noviny, the principal newspaper for which apek wrote, and were published afterwards in book form. This is true of the Apocryphal Tales as well, except that, in this case, the book did not appear until 1945, seven years after apek had died.

  The primary reason for the delay was the Nazi occupation of Czechoslovakia shortly after apek’s death, and the immediate ban on all his work. It also appears that apek had not thought of his Apocryphal Tales as a discrete collection until late in life: they had been written intermittently over an eighteen-year period, in no particular order, and many were responses to internal and external political issues of the moment. When World War II ended, apek’s editor and bibliographer Miroslav Halík, explaining that he had found the Apocryphal Tales in a separate envelope among apek’s posthumous papers, selected and arranged twenty-nine of them in the order of when the tales occur rather than when they were written. Despite official disapproval of apek under the country’s subsequent communist regime, the Tales were republished whenever circumstances permitted and continue to be printed today.

  The Apocryphal Tales can be read in several ways: as parable, as allegory, and as apek’s imaginative, innovative use of these literary devices to raise ethical questions and to address social and political concerns. There is more than a hint of apek as “myth-tamer,” reworking the past for precise purposes: broadly, to enlarge our understanding of our own and others’ perceptions and interpretations of the world around us; more narrowly, to help forge the young First Republic of Czechoslovakia into a sustainable, participatory democratic society. At the same time, in a good many of the Tales apek is playing with our “of course” assumptions about familiar historical personalities and events, and turning them upside down.

  When read in the order in which they were written (see the list at the back of the book), the Apocryphal Tales also become a window through which to view apek’s personal and literary development over the years. Taken in any order, the Tales remain characteristically apek: probing the nature of truth, justice, and human experience, all the while providing a good read.

  This new translation of the Apocryphal Tales differs from the previous version (Apocryphal Stories, translated by Dora Round (London: Allen & Unwin; New York: Macmillan, 1949) in its use of updated language, in its corrections of errors, and in its entire approach to the Tales and to apek’s narrative voice. Also, I have added to the collection other stories which appeared first in apek’s newspaper and have never before appeared in English translation. These are the “Fables” and the “Would-Be Tales.”

  Fables. This sampling of apek’s original use of the aphorism represents no more than a small portion of the whole. apek occasionally devoted his weekly newspaper column to these terse satirical observations, sometimes on life and times in general, sometimes as commentary on some specific issue or event. The single criterion for inclusion here is direct affinity with the Apocryphal Tales.

  Would-Be Tales. The stories rounding out this book are taken from yet another category of apek’s literary journalism. In Czech they share the same volume as the Fables, being too few in number to constitute an entity of their own. Unconnected thematically to the Apocryphal Tales, these short narratives nonetheless exhibit certain threads woven throughout all of apek’s writing: his deep concern for human life, his humanistic outlook, and his fascination with human psychology, motivation, and reaction. apek scholar B. R. Bradbrook, who helped with the stories’ selection, also came up with the perfect translation, used herein, for podpovídky, the word apek invented for these short narratives.

  Like the Apocryphal Tales, some of the Would-Be Tales are in response to personal and political events of the time. “The Anonymous Letter,” for instance, was written in the turbulent and despairing days following the Munich Agreement, when apek himself was receiving hate mail blaming him for the turmoil into which the nation had been plunged.

  A final note: The Would-Be Tale “The Moving Business” was chosen to open this edition because of its reference to several historical eras featured in individual Apocryphal Tales, and also for its affirmation of the unchanging human, social, and political realities found in any age. The title in translation scores a rare point of advantage for English: the Czech word used for “moving” refers solely to packing up and moving out; for us, the word has another, entirely different connotation as well — a “moving business” it is, in both senses.

  Acknowledgments

  Outsiders who attempt to translate another culture’s literature for consumption back home are well advised to check their efforts out — Czech them out, in this instance — with an insider. This outsider gratefully acknowledges the invaluable counsel of insider Peter Kussi, equally and cheerfully at home in both Czech and English. Thanks as well to publisher, editor, and apek fan Rob Wechsler for his usual good advice and encouragement. Zdenka Pospíšilová Tripp graciously clarified some of the more enigmatic idioms in some of the Would-Be Tales. Remaining incongruities of whatever kind are the translator’s own.

  The Moving Business

  (A Would-Be Tale)

  — — true, I still don’t know, technically, how to make a go of it, but technical solutions can always be found when a good idea promises a decent profit. And my idea, friend, will make a fabulous amount of money — just as soon as somebody can help me figure out some of the practical details to get it up and running. Like I say, frien
d, it’s flawless; work out a few of the kinks, and it’ll almost run itself.

  Let’s see if I can give you a practical example — Look: maybe you don’t like the street you’re living on; maybe it stinks to high heaven from a chocolate factory, or there’s so much racket you can’t sleep at night, or some vulgar, disgusting element’s taken over, I don’t know. Anyway, one day you tell yourself that this street’s no longer for you. Now what, in a situation like this, do you do? You pick out a place to live on some other street, you phone for a moving van, and you move to your new apartment, right? Simple as pie. Fundamentally, my friend, every good idea is amazingly simple.

  Now let’s say you tell yourself that this century’s not for you. There are people who prefer peace and quiet; there are people who get sick to their stomachs when they read in the paper about what’s going on these days, that there is or will be war, that people are being executed somewhere or other, or that somewhere else a few hundred or a few thousand people are killing each other off. That sort of thing can get on your nerves, friend, and some people can’t take it. Some people don’t like it when every day there’s violence breaking out someplace in the world, and they think: why should I have to stand by and watch it happening? Here I am, a civilized, temperate family man, and I don’t want my children growing up in such a strange and disord — . . . I could even say, a deranged and dangerous world, right? Well, there are lots of people who think that way, friend, and once you start traveling down that road, you have to admit we can’t really be certain about anything these days: not about life or position or finances, no, not even about family. No question about it, there used to be a lot more certainty in this world. Anyway, there are plenty of good, decent people who don’t like these times at all, and some of them are downright unhappy if not disgusted at having to live on a street that’s so blighted and brutal they don’t even poke their noses outside. There’s nothing they can do about it; but if this is life, they want out.

  And that’s where I come in, my friend. I’ll hand them one of these brochures for my business:

  Don’t like the twentieth century? Then turn to me! I’ll move you to any past age you like in my specially-equipped moving vans! Not an excursion, but permanent relocation! Choose the century in which life will be best for you, and my efficient, qualified movers will get you, your family, and other household goods there quickly, cheaply, and safely! My vans can move you anywhere within a range of three hundred years, and we’re in the process now of designing vans with a range of two to three thousand years that’ll work like a breeze. For each year traveled, haulage fees per kilogram increase by x number of crowns —

  Actually, I’m not sure what the cost will be; I mean, I don’t yet have the vans to do the time-travel. But there’s no problem that doesn’t have a solution; all I need to do is sit down with a pencil and figure out how much it will take to make a profit. Except for those stupid rigs to do the moving, I’ve got the whole thing thought out beautifully.

  Let’s say some gentleman comes to me who wants to move somewhere out of this damned century; he’s had it up to the eyeballs, he says, right up to the eyeballs with wars, the arms race, bolsheviks, fascism and, for that matter, progress in general. I let him go on cussing, and then I say: Please be so good, sir, as to select some other era; here are some brochures for several different centuries. Perhaps this one, if you like: the nineteenth century. A cultured age, with only moderate oppression and properly conducted wars of rather smaller scope; remarkable flourishing of the sciences, ample opportunity to take advantage of economic swings. We recommend mid-century Austria-Hungary in particular, for its profound tranquility, thanks to the somewhat authoritarian Minister of the Interior, and for its tolerably humane treatment of people. Or the eighteenth century, especially suitable for those concerned with intellectual values and freedom of thought; it’s recommended for so-called free-thinkers and eggheads. Or, if you please, take a look at the sixth century A.D.; of course, the Huns were raising hell at the time, but it was quite possible to hide out deep in the forests: an idyllic life, plenty of fresh air, fishing and other outdoor sports. Or what’s called the era of the persecution of Christians, a very civilized age, comparatively: cozy catacombs, with substantial religious and other kinds of tolerance otherwise, no labor camps or the like . . .

  Anyway, I’d be surprised if he or any other twentieth-century man didn’t pick another age, one where he could live more freely and humanely, and I’d be surprised if he didn’t say to me: Sir, if you can give me some sort of discount, I’d prefer to move at least as far back as the Stone Age. But I’d say: Sorry, our prices are fixed; furthermore, kindly take a look at our bookings for relocation to prehistoric times. As you can see, we’re moving our valued clients there wholesale — in fact, we’ve had to set a limit of twelve pounds of luggage per customer; otherwise, I’m afraid, we couldn’t accommodate the demand. The earliest opening we have on a shipment leaving for the Stone Age is the thirteenth of March, next year; if you wish, we can reserve a place for you now.

  So what I think, friend, is that it’s going to be a booming business. I could start it up at once, with maybe thirty vans plus half-a-dozen motor coaches for transporting large groups of people. The only thing missing now are vans that can travel through time, but somebody will come along and invent them — and I can tell you this: by today or tomorrow, if I say so myself, it’ll be one of the necessities of life in our civilized world!

  October 25, 1936

  APOCRYPHAL TALES

  The Punishment of Prometheus

  With much coughing and groaning, after lengthy evidentiary proceedings, the members of the Senate’s special tribunal withdrew to confer in the shade of a sacred olive grove.

  “Well, gentlemen,” Hypometheus, the Senate president, yawned, “that dragged on for a damnably long time! I hardly think I need offer a summation, but so as to preclude any formal objections — — — The defendant, Prometheus, citizen and resident, having been called before this tribunal on a charge of inventing fire and thereby, in one way or another — hhm, hhm — violating existing regulations, the defendant, then, has confessed that: firstly, he did indeed invent fire; further, that he is in a position to, whenever he pleases, undertake this very same activity which we know as striking stones together; thirdly, that he neither concealed this mystery — this shocking, unprecedented discovery — nor reported it to the appropriate authorities, but willfully divulged it, in fact handed it over for use by unauthorized persons, as was affirmed by the testimony of the individuals whom we have just now questioned. I think that this will suffice and that we can proceed at once to a vote on his guilt and his sentencing.”

  “With all due respect, Mr. President,” objected associate justice Apometheus, “I should think that, considering the grave importance of the matter before this special tribunal, it would surely be more fitting if we proceeded to pass sentence after thorough deliberation and — I would even say — debate.”

  “As you wish, gentlemen,” the easy-going Hypometheus pleasantly assented. “The case is perfectly clear, but if any of you wishes to comment, please do so.”

  “I would venture to point out,” assistant justice Ametheus spoke up, coughing primly, “that in my opinion one aspect in particular of this entire affair should be emphasized. What I have in mind, gentlemen, is the religious aspect. Be so kind as to tell me, what is this fire? What is this bringing forth of sparks? As Prometheus himself admits, it is nothing other than lightning, and lightning, as we all know, is a manifestation of the supreme power of Zeus the Thunderer. Be so kind as to explain to me, gentlemen, how such a one as Prometheus gained access to this divine fire? By what right did he take possession of it? Where, and how, precisely, did he come by it? Prometheus has tried to persuade us that he simply invented it; but that is a preposterous tale — if it were as innocent as all that, why would not one of us, for instance, have invented fire? It is my conviction, gentlemen, that Prometheus simply stole this fir
e from our gods. His denials and evasions do not deceive us. I would describe his offense as common theft, on the one hand, and as the crime of blasphemy and sacrilege, on the other. We are here to punish with the utmost severity this impious arrogance and to protect the sacred property of our nation’s gods. That is all I wished to say,” Ametheus concluded, and he blew his nose vigorously on the corner of his chlamys.

  “Well spoken,” offered Hypometheus. “Does anyone else wish to comment?”

  “I beg your indulgence,” said Apometheus, “but I cannot agree with the arguments of my esteemed colleague. I have seen how the said Prometheus sparked this fire; and I tell you frankly, gentlemen, that — between ourselves — there is absolutely nothing to it. To discover fire, why, any idler, layabout, or goatherd could do that; the only reason we didn’t stumble across it ourselves is that a respectable, sober-minded adult, needless to say, has neither the time nor the inclination to play around with striking little stones together. I can assure my colleague Ametheus that there are quite ordinary natural forces which it is beneath the dignity of a thinking man, much less a god, to concern himself with. In my opinion, fire is too trivial a phenomenon to have a bearing in any way upon matters which are sacred to us all. But the case has yet another aspect to which I must direct the attention of my worthy colleagues. It appears that fire is a very dangerous element, even injurious. You have heard a succession of witnesses testify that, in experimenting with Prometheus’s mischievous invention, they suffered serious burns and even, in some instances, I might add, property damage. Gentlemen, if by virtue of Prometheus’s offense the use of fire becomes widespread, which, unfortunately, it no longer seems possible to prevent, neither our lives nor indeed our property will be safe; and that, gentlemen, may well mean the end of all civilization. The slightest carelessness will suffice — and what is there to stop this disturbing element? Prometheus, gentlemen, has committed an act of criminal irresponsibility by ushering so harmful a thing into the world. I would classify his offense as grievous bodily harm and endangering public safety. In view of this, I call for life imprisonment with hard pallet and shackles. I have completed my say, Mr. President.”