Anton Hykisch

The freshly graduated engineer gradually sobers up from his student ideals and encounters a different reality than he had expected. Few people understand his resistance to the established conditions in a prosperous company, and the hero's personal conflicts with his superiors deepen. He recognises hypocrisy: people say something different from what they really think. He encounters sycophancy and calculation whether he stays in the country or moves to the big city.

The freshly graduated engineer gradually sobers up from his student ideals and encounters a different reality than he had expected. Few people understand his resistance to the established conditions in a prosperous company, and the hero's personal conflicts with his superiors deepen. He recognises hypocrisy: people say something different from what they really think. He encounters sycophancy and calculation whether he stays in the country or moves to the big city.