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Closely Watched Trains

By Bohumil Hrabal
Series: Penguin Archive
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Brief Description
90 classic titles celebrating 90 years of Penguin Books Closely Watched Trains tells the story of Milos Hrma, a young railroad apprentice coming of age in wartime Czechoslovakia. Milos is overwhelmed with worries—about his virginity, his love for the conductor, and ongoing scandals in the stationmaster's... Read More
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90 classic titles celebrating 90 years of Penguin Books

Closely Watched Trains tells the story of Milos Hrma, a young railroad apprentice coming of age in wartime Czechoslovakia. Milos is overwhelmed with worries—about his virginity, his love for the conductor, and ongoing scandals in the stationmaster's office—besides which the idea of fighting the Germans seems a simple affair.

Poignant, humorous, and the inspiration behind the 1966 Academy Award-winning film, this is a small masterpiece from one of the best Czech writers of the twentieth century.

Series: Penguin Archive

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Book Details

INFORMATION

ISBN: 9780241752142

Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd

Format: Paperback / softback

Date Published: 17 April 2025

Country: United Kingdom

Imprint: Penguin Classics

Contributors:

  • Translated by Edith Pargeter

Audience: General / adult

DIMENSIONS

Spine width: 6.0mm

Width: 110.0mm

Height: 180.0mm

Weight: 73g

Pages: 112

Collections

Bohumil Hrabal Fiction General Fiction Literary Fiction Penguin Books Penguin Classics Series: Penguin Archive

About the Author

Bohumil Hrabal was one of the most important and admired Czech writers of the twentieth century. He was born and raised in Brno in what was then the Austro-Hungarian Empire in 1914. After working as a railway labourer, insurance agent, travelling salesman, manual labourer, paper-packer and stagehand, he published a collection of poetry that was quickly withdrawn by the communist regime. His best-known books include I Served the King of England, Closely Watched Trains (made into an Academy Award-winning film directed by Jiri Menzel) and Too Loud a Solitude. In 1997, he fell to his death from the fifth floor of a Prague hospital, apparently trying to feed the pigeons.

Also by Bohumil Hrabal

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    Closely Watched Trains
    A classic of postwar literature, a small masterpiece of humour, humanity and heroism from one of the best Czech writers. For gauche young apprentice Milos Hrma, life at the small but strategic railway station in Bohemia in 1945 is full of complex preoccupations. There is the exacting business of dispatching German troop trains to and from the toppling Eastern front;...
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    All My Cats
    A gem of a book about the aggravations and great joys of cats from a literary master. In the autumn of 1965, flush with the unexpected success of his first published books, the Czech writer Bohumil Hrabal bought a weekend cottage in Kersko, about an hour's drive east of Prague. From then until his death in 1997, he divided his...
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  • Why I Write?
    “Glimmers in anticipation of Hrabal’s later virtuosity.” —New Yorker “A collection of formative fiction from a writer whose work has earned comparison with Joyce and Beckett. . . . Early work from a writer who merits a larger readership.” —Kirkus Reviews This collection of the earliest prose by one of literature’s greatest stylists captures, as scholar Arnault Maréchal put it,...
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    A whirlwind of comic genius and moving poignancy following the rise and fall of one small, outrageous man, from the Czech Republic's master storyteller. 'Our very best writer today' Milan Kundera Ditie is a pint-sized hotel waiter with big dreams. Between pocketing stolen change from unsuspecting customers and reminiscing on nights spent at the local brothel, he fantasises about his...
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