卡雷尔·恰佩克

卡雷尔·恰佩克（捷克语：Karel Čapek，1890年1月9日—1938年12月25日），20世纪捷克最有影响力的作家之一。

他生于马奈·斯瓦托罗维采的乡村医生家庭。十四岁即开始发表作品。曾在布拉格、柏林和巴黎等地学习哲学。1917年起住在布拉格，任新闻记者，并从事文学创作。1907年至二十年代的许多作品都是同其兄约瑟夫·恰佩克合写的。1921年，卡雷尔出版了《罗梭的万能工人》（Rossum's Universal Robots），书中首次引入了“机器人（Robota，后演化为robot）”一词。卡雷尔称是其兄弟约瑟夫·恰佩克发明了该词。其他科学幻想作品有小说《专制工厂》（1922年）、《原子狂想》（1924年）、《大战蝾螈》等。还写有一些揭露和讽刺法西斯制度的作品。

卡雷尔和约瑟夫都是著名的反法西斯人士。2005年6月捷克票选“最伟大的捷克人”（Největší Čech）中，他排名第九。

Karel Čapek (Czech: [ˈkarɛl ˈtʃapɛk] ; 9 January 1890 – 25 December 1938) was a Czech writer, playwright, critic and journalist. He has become best known for his science fiction, including his novel War with the Newts (1936) and play R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots, 1920), which introduced the word robot. He also wrote many politically charged works dealing with the social turmoil of his time. Influenced by American pragmatic liberalism, he campaigned in favor of free expression and strongly opposed the rise of both fascism and communism in Europe.

Though nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature seven times, Čapek never received it. However, several awards commemorate his name, such as the Karel Čapek Prize, awarded every other year by the Czech PEN Club for literary work that contributes to reinforcing or maintaining democratic and humanist values in society. He also played a key role in establishing the Czechoslovak PEN Club as part of International PEN.

Čapek died on the brink of World War II as the result of a lifelong medical condition.

His legacy as a literary figure became well established after the war.

Life

Early life and education

Karel Čapek was born in 1890 in the village of Malé Svatoňovice in the Bohemian mountains. However, six months after his birth, the Čapek family moved to their own house in Úpice. Karel Čapek's father, Antonín Čapek, worked as a doctor at the local textile factory. Antonín was a very active person; apart from his work as a doctor, he also co-funded the local museum and was a member of the town council.

Despite opposing his father's materialist and positivist views, Karel Čapek loved and admired his father, later calling him "a good example ... of the generation of national awakeners". Karel's mother, Božena Čapková, was a homemaker. Unlike her husband, she did not like life in the country, and she suffered from long-term depression. Despite that, she assiduously collected and recorded local folklore, such as legends, songs and stories. Karel was the youngest of three siblings. He would maintain an especially close relationship with his brother Josef, a highly successful painter, living and working with him throughout his adult life. His sister, Helena, was a talented pianist who later become a writer and published several memoirs about Karel and Josef.

After finishing elementary school in Úpice, Karel moved with his grandmother to Hradec Králové, where he started attending high school. Two years later the school expelled him for taking part in an illegal students' club. Čapek later described the club as a "very non-murderous anarchist society".

After this incident he moved to Brno with his sister and attempted to finish high school there, but two years later he moved again, to Prague, where he finished high school at the Academic Grammar School in 1909. During his teenage years Čapek became enamored with the visual arts, especially Cubism, which influenced his later writing.

After graduating from high school, he studied philosophy and aesthetics in Prague at Charles University, but he also spent some time at the Friedrich Wilhelm University in Berlin and at the University of Paris. While still a university student he wrote some works on contemporary art and literature. He graduated with a doctorate in philosophy in 1915 from Charles University.