The Axe (European Classics)

Rating:
Summary: Bitter assault on collectivism.
Review: This novel gives a harsh and cynical picture of a population under a collectivist rule: struggle with bureaucracy, incompetence, use of front men, jesuitry and ultimately demoralization and alcoholism.
It is a state where people are only happy when they can steal something from the (their) state.
The main characters would like to revolt (symbol: the axe raised by the farmer against the civil servants), but they are paralyzed, overwhelmed by a too big power.
What is special for this novel is the unrelenting, dark and menacing atmosphere (one feels the disgust of the author in his own stomach).
It seems a miracle to me that this work could have been published in his Czech home country under the communist regime.
A book to recommend, although happily most of the collectivist states don't exist anymore.