Written by Galician[1]
Austrian-Jew Joseph Roth, the Radetzky
March is a dynastic novel about a young Austrian dynasty, the Trottas.
The Radetzky March spans three
generations of the newly ennobled Trotta dynasty from the decisive loss of the
Austrian army at the Battle of Solferino in 1859 to the first years of the
Great War as the last scion of the Trotta dynasty, Carl Joseph, lives through
the premature westward exodus of ravens from the Russian Empire into the Austro-Hungarian
border province of Galicia as if he were Ramses the XI. watching the sun
setting on the western banks of the river Nile, on the Pharaohs tombs in the
Valley of the Kings.
After Infantry Lieutenant Joseph
Trotta saves the Austrian Emperor, Franz Joseph I., at the Battle of Solferino
he is ennobled and awarded the Order of Maria Theresa. Thus, the Slovenian
soldier with peasant roots from the village of Sipolje has become “Joseph von
Trotta und Sipolje”, a member of Austrian nobility. Although he considers his
elevation an insult and does not change his way of life, his family view him as
a changed man – nobility . He visits his father for the last time at his estate
and has a last drink of rakia[2],
and thus a new dynasty is born. Joseph Trotta resents the aristocratic culture
and his own legend as the “Hero of Solferino”, yet cultural intricacies make
way for their haunting presence in the lives of his son and grandson. Joseph
does not allow his son, Franz, to fulfil his military ambitions and instead
destines him to become a government official. However Franz decides his son,
Carl Joseph, should become the soldier he could not. And although Carl Joseph
does become a soldier, he is a terrible soldier, and is not only haunted by the
ethos of his grandfather, Joseph von Trotta und Sipolje, but also depression,
Death and his Slavic peasant forebears. He constantly finds himself reminiscing
the peasant past that he never lived. As he reflects: “Does the plough belong in my hand and not the sword?”
The novel deals not only with
the lives of the dynasty members but also the various bureaucratic, political
and social structures in Austrian society. The novel, for example, shows how
the Austrian media handled Slavic nationalism when the narrator comments on the
wording of the media in regard to a Sokol gymnast’s slet[3] in Bohemia(modern-day Czech Republic) in
which representatives from “Slavic nations” were present (the Austro-Hungarians
were highly suspicious of Slavs). It also gives insight into Austrian
German culture and virtues through the relations between the family members,
with the father-son relationship especially explored. The often decadent officer’s milieu,
too, is scrutinised as Carl Joseph is stationed in Galicia with accounts of
gambling, women and brothels, drinking, and amassing debts to dubious Jews.
The tale of the Trotta dynasty’s rise and
fall parallels that of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the Habsburgs. The
narrator often follows the perspective of the Emperor in the timespan of
the novel, Franz Joseph I, who interacts with each of the generations of
Trottas and is a haunting presence in all of their minds. We follow his well-meaning endeavours to help the Trottas from his
temerarious nature at the Battle of Solferino to his senility and death.
It is hard to miss the irony of the fact that the very same battle that caused the ennoblement of the Trottas is the battle that is often cited as the beginning of the end for the Austrian Empire and the Habsburgs. It was the point at which the age of multi-national European empires had ceased and instead the age of nation states ushered in: “The Kaiser was an old man. He was the oldest emperor in the world. All around him Death was circling, circling and mowing. The entire field was already cleared, and only the Kaiser, like a forgotten silver stalk, was still standing and waiting.”
It is hard to miss the irony of the fact that the very same battle that caused the ennoblement of the Trottas is the battle that is often cited as the beginning of the end for the Austrian Empire and the Habsburgs. It was the point at which the age of multi-national European empires had ceased and instead the age of nation states ushered in: “The Kaiser was an old man. He was the oldest emperor in the world. All around him Death was circling, circling and mowing. The entire field was already cleared, and only the Kaiser, like a forgotten silver stalk, was still standing and waiting.”
This is all done in the most
elegant way possible. The novel, which is frequently called the best political
novel ever written and is canonized in German literature, is written with
language so beautifully descriptive yet implicit that it becomes a pleasure to
read it not only for the immersion offered but also for the political
references and the intricacies of the characters that you become so familiar
with. It brilliantly tells the story of Trotta dynasty while also delving into
the social, political and bureaucratic issues of the charmingly backward
Austria-Hungary. It serves as an idolisation of a time perceived to be “simpler”
and “less decadent” by many in the years after the Great War.
[1] Eastern European
Galicia, modern Western Ukraine
[2] Symbolic of Balkan
culture; especially the southern Slavic culture which provided the Austrians
many grievances
[3] Influential
gymnast’s organisation throughout Slavic nations, often political and
nationalistic lobbying for pan-Slavism and Slavic independence. A slet was a gymnastics festival and gathering of
Sokols
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