The Radetzky March: A Novel (Works of Joseph Roth)

So many interesting images are written into this tale of life at both end and edges of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Rigidities are cracking everywhere - the state, the military, young and old, crashing cultures under one ruler and at it's core; a family's rise and fall. The von Trotta's, a family dealing with the legacy of a heroic grandfather that neither son or grandson can live up to. Equally they are handicapped by the societal expectations on how they should act and what the relationship between a father and son should be. I listened to the Radetzky March on YouTube. It's catchy with a chorus that practically bayonets you to clap and stamp your feet. But the rest of the tune is more mellow and melodic and certainly not a classic marching tune. It ain't "The Battle Hymn of the Republic"!. I wondered about the title and the music. According to wikipedia Johann Strauss wrote the piece in dedication of Field Marshall Radetzky von Radetz. While nominally written to celebrate his success in battle it was really a thank you for sparing Stauss's son when Radetzky could have executed him (and I guess that's another story). So here is Joseph Roth constructing this wonderfully sublime story of a family in decline where the father is gradually collapsing from guilt, wounded pride for the potential dishonor of the family name and love for his very flawed and weak son currently a Lieutenant in the Austrian army. He's picked a title evoking both the great march music dedicated to the victories by the Austrian Empire which just happens to also be a plea by a father to help his son which is central to Roth's own story. It's so perfect. But none of that would matter if the story didn't work. What unravels is both tale of a flawed family trapped in the sclerotic web of a collapsing and aging empire and on the crash of cultures between a late 19th century low-level aristocrat and a rapidly changing Europe of the early 20th century. Roth's writing is so fresh. He captures the polyglot of cultures and peoples that are make up the region nominally under the control of the Emperor but quickly reverting to their needs for identity and asserting demands for independence. While Roth does not dwell on these points and stays largely focused on his central characters through their personal dissipation one is expected to see the empire that is no more. It's a unique book; capturing culture, human nature and the strong current of world events. The writing is relatively simple and spare but the themes and development of the characters build and keep a tension that maintains one's attention and ultimately a powerful ending. NOTE - I would skip Nadine Gordimer's forward and read it after. There are too many plot spoilers.

Bottom Line. Joseph Roth’s The Radetzky March is a book that belongs on more lists of the best books of the twentieth century. A historic novel by a man who lived through this period if not these same events. Roth produces some individual narrative passages that should change the mind of anyone thinking that Hemingway’s’ sparse language useful as more than an experiment. There are some problems with discontinuity and some major and unnecessary assumptions, but this is literature, not just writing. While I have reviewed a few classics, The Radetzky March may the first book I call a masterpiece. Joseph Roth as well known in his day as a journalist as he was known as a novelist, represents another and perhaps better voice of the post-World War I Lost Generation. Among the reasons why he may be little known in America is that he was not writing in English and was not well known among the America Ex Pats made famous by Hemingway among others. The story of the Radetzky March begins with a junior Officer serving the Army of the Austro-Hungarian Army. During the course of the Battle of Solferino, Lt. Joseph Trotta heroically saves the life of the then young Emperor Franz Joseph I. For this act he is ennobled, and promoted. Suddenly he is Captain Joseph Trotta Von Sipolje and wears this medal of the Order of Maria Theresa. Thus after one formal visit to the Capital and an pro forma ceremony of investiture, the young man is forever divided from his father, his fellow officers and left to function is a society that is alien to himself. Another man might have made this leap with grace and brought his father along. Joseph is not equal to any of these tasks. Instead he becomes a remote and fearsome family figure as well as father and grandfather to a new titled noble house. The book quickly shifts to the 2nd and 3rd generation of what becomes a titled but not particularly grand household. The son becomes a District Captain. A position of some standing, but only because his is a remote district and the grandson becomes an officer in the Army. Shortly before the founder of this dynasty leaves the narrative there is a brief meeting between the elevated hero and his retired constable sergeant father. The paragraphs that describe the shining, reflectively polished grand uniform of the son and the grubby but functional home of the father includes writing that stands besides anything in the recognized library of classic books. There are a number of passages like it. The bulk of Radestzky’s march is concerned with the Grandson and his father. They are strictly of the older generation of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, but quickly become aware that this older world is dying. Independently they seem to know in dying these two will be overtaken. As much as I like this book, this aspect was least convincing. My sense was that the Totta family was, in their DNA peasants. Absent the titles, they would have been simple hard working people and as such of little interest to a reader. Their lives are artificially enhanced such that they connot live as simple working people nor to they ever find a way to function as fully integrated members of their force adopted class. That the social structures they were supposed to move in are in early stage collapse is important to the time line of the story but it is not necessary that these two people should have this keen of an insight. Little indicates that they equal amounts of insights on any other topics . There were at least two instances in the novel where the flow of events shifts too abruptly. At one point the District Captain visits his officer son at the son’s remote border town post. This visit ends abruptly when the DC learns of a major threat of social unrest in his District. Shortly thereafter the young Lieutenant becomes involved in a strike by local workers from the bristly factory. This cannot be the unrest that sent the DC home and we never find out any details about it. More important than these small errors was the difficulty in maintaining sympathy for the three Trotta men. The grandfather is not part of the narrative for long enough to b be more than a remote and threatening figure. The Father begins as a boring bureaucrat and gains much in his appeal but the shift is not entirely credible. The son, is something of a miserable person. We are not intended to like him. It will become clear that he is not so much unsympathetic as miscast in the role that has been given him. Most analyze Radetzky March as being about the failure of social structures that have outlasted their era. Instead I suggest that the consistent theme is the alienation between people and their society when they people are expected to perform in roles not of their real nature. Further, for any in these 3 generations to assume the place wherein they would have most naturally performed, they would have had to accept major reductions in their financial and social standing. Most of the literature of the Western world is about promoting yourself or your family and not about the possible victory to be had by returning that promotion. Even where a protagonist achieves heroic status by rejecting promotion it is because the promotion is a bribe or a seduction, not because it makes more sense not have a title or station.

Really enjoyable novel set in the Austrian-Hungarian army prior to WW1

Remarkable book, but really difficult to describe: superficially, it is a deceptively simple tale about three generations of the Trotta family, over the years from 1859 to 1914. The story focuses on a few events in the lives of the characters (mostly the last Trotta), each of which is some sort of milestone in their lives. At the same time there is the creation of a underlying picture of a dark atmosphere of change (for the worse), often not overtly specified at all, but possibly in some gestalt picture of a detail here and another there, till the background becomes the picture itself. Reminded me of "All Quiet on the Western Front" which I read many years ago.

Great book about the decline of the Hapsberg empire. Well worth reading for the writing and if you are interested in this period of history. Not a good edition on Kindle. Pagination all over the place and font size varies between pages.

The author writes with merciless honesty about a world he misses yet knows could not survive its inner rot. What comes across most of all is how little choice the main characters--three generations of one family between 1859 and 1917—had in shaping their lives. All is determined by historical forces and traditional assumptions. While mostly about the inner lives of the characters (viewed from the third person) there are many beautiful descriptions of the varied landscapes of the Austro-Hungarian empire, ranging from Moravia to Bosnia to Galicia (now the western Ukraine). The tone is a unique mixture of the elegiac and the ironic.

This Kindle translation is poor quality - occasionally there are missing words and sometimes poor translation into English e.g. “what do you wanna do?” said the officers. I do not believe that in the 1930s Roth used words in this way, I think the issue is a poor translation. My recommendation - read it, but via another edition.