[Metrujectiktus]

Closely Observed Trains is a novella by Czech writer Bohumil Hrabal, Bjorn has written up four of his other works which hopefully will get linked to this post.

Closely Observed Trains is the story of a young railway signalman working on a very small but strategically important railway station in the dog days of WW2. It's a comic novel in parts, often very funny, but mixed with the tragic and indeed the horrific throughout. It's not quite right to say it's a black comedy, some of the comedy is almost slapstick, but it is a mix of the comic and the very black indeed.

It's well written, and in the Abacus edition I read ably translated by Edith Pargeter, better known as Ellis Peters.

Our protagonist, Milo? Hrma, is concerned with losing his virginity, is dealing with the fallout from Dispatcher Hubicka's action using all the official stamps in the station on the backside of the telegraphist, is almost shot by the SS because a train nominated as being for close observation due to its importance got held up on the line and then shot up by partisans. As all this and more happens, we come across issues of collaboration, resistance and simply living ordinary life under military occupation.

The work is, despite its brevity, full of life, yet also with death constantly near. Milo? encounters a lot of death, of animals and men, but in the midst of it all there is humour and life, yet without falling into sentimentality.

I write it up in more considered form on my blog here, it's a very short work by an author not as well recognised as perhaps he should be, and I recommend it.