Along the way, Karel Capek satirizes science, runaway capitalism, fascism, journalism, militarism, even Hollywood. Man discovers a species of giant, intelligent newts and learns to exploit them so successfully that the newts gain skills and arms enough to challenge man's place at the top of the animal kingdom. At its heart, this joyously funny satire is a plea for decency and tolerance towards others, as relevant now as when it was first written in the 1930s.Įnsemble. When humanity encounters another race of intelligent bipeds sharing the Earth, what choice is there but to exploit it? When the existence of a group of speaking newts comes to the attention of the ruthless GH Bondy and his Salamander Syndicate, they find themselves turned into a commodity as the nations fight over them.

The newts are discovered living in the ocean, are exploited by the human race but then rebel, threatening the future of Earth. Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability.A satire that marries science fiction with political comment. Karel Capek War with the Newts Paperback Maby Karel Capek (Author) 330 ratings See all formats and editions Kindle 3.99 Read with Our Free App Hardcover 25.95 Other new and used from 25.95 Paperback 7.95 Other new and used from 7.95 Mass Market Paperback 3.50 Other used from 3. Capek sardonically details all the reactions of the civilized world - from horror to skepticism, from intellectual fascination to mercantile opportunism - and the ultimate destruction from which it (and the newts) might not escape.

Working in the 'fantastic' satiric tradition of Wells, Orwell, and Vonnegut, Capek chronicles the discovery of a colony of highly intelligent giant salamanders off the coast of an Indonesian island. Originally written in 1936, two years before Capek' s death and three years before the Nazi invasion of Czechoslovakia, War with the Newts is considered by many to be Capek' s greatest book. Man discovers a species of giant, intelligent newts and learns to exploit them so successfully that the newts gain skills and arms enough to challenge man' s place at the top of the animal kingdom. One of the great anti-utopian satires of the twentieth century, an inspiration to writers from Orwell to Vonnegut, at last in a modern translation.

War with the Newts by Karel Čapek