In Praise of Karel Capek

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.

“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.”

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://web2.mlp.cz/koweb/00/04/37/75/99/povidani_o_pejskovi... (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

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

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karel_Čapek#Etymology_of_robot

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

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Makropulos_Affair_(opera...