Jaroslav Hasek is a well-known Czech writer who became very popular after writing the novel The Adventures of the Good Soldier Schweik. What is interesting about his biography and personal life?
Hasek Biography
The future writer was born on April 30, 1883 in Prague. His parents were teachers in a private gymnasium. After reaching six years, Yaroslav went to elementary school. The child had an excellent memory, and it helped a lot in learning. After leaving school, the boy entered the gymnasium. From this moment in the life of Hasek, great changes began.
At first, his father could not cope with constant poverty and began to drink a lot. As a result, he became ill and died. Mom could not contain children alone. Therefore, the family began to move from one apartment to another. This had a very negative effect on the performance of Yaroslav in the gymnasium. In the fourth grade he was left in the second year.
Already then, the strong character of Hasek was laid. He stood on a par with other famous revolutionaries of those times. Yaroslav often participated in demonstrations against the current government. The whole Czech Republic was absorbed in the struggle against fascism. In 1898, Hasek dropped out of school. A young man settles as a student in a pharmacy. But the violent temper and desire for freedom prompt him, along with his comrades, to hike around the country, and he quits his job.
In 1899, Hasek entered to study at the Trade Academy of Prague and after three years successfully graduated from it. By acquaintance, he is arranged to work at Slavia Bank. But after a while he goes on a journey again, without warning anyone. For the first time, Yaroslav is forgiven, but then this is repeated. And Hasek is losing his prestigious job. But then he begins to closely engage in writing.
The first poems of Yaroslav come out in 1903. Readers immediately liked them. Hasek begins to write humorous stories, which he publishes in various newspapers and magazines. Its popularity is growing every day.
But Yaroslav is not serious about his craft. He spends a lot of time in drinking establishments of that time and does not hide that he writes only for the sake of money.
The next few years, Hasek is constantly changing his job. He manages to be an editor in the journal Animal World, a journalist in the newspaper Chesko Slovo, creator of the Dog Training Institute for Dogs, and so on. But nowhere does he linger for a long time. His cheerful and restless character constantly creates a lot of problems for the writer. So he caught mongrels on the street, repainted them in thoroughbred dogs and sold them. For such atrocities, Yaroslav was constantly tried and sentenced to pay a fine for deceit.
In 1911, Hasek came up with a character that brings him wildly popular. Several collections of short stories about the soldier Schweik are becoming classics of world literature.
During the First World War, Yaroslav enters the front and is captured by the Russians. He did this deliberately to see for himself how people live in this country. Stay in Russia during the revolution made a great impression on the writer. He returned to the Czech Republic only in 1920 and immediately wrote a novel about his main character, who later became a world bestseller.
The last years of his life, Yaroslav lived in the small town of Lipnitsy. Then he made many friends and acquaintances. Hasek wanted to write another landmark novel for those years, but the disease suddenly cut short his life. On January 3, 1923, a Czech writer passed away. He was buried on the outskirts of a local cemetery near the graves of suicides.
During his short life, Jaroslav Hasek wrote a huge number of humorous stories and feuilleton, and also became the most famous Czech writer of all time.
