It was a very momentous day the day on which I was to be slaughtered. Bringing together tales of melancholy & madness nightmare & fantasy this is a new collection of the most haunting German stories from the past 200 years. Ranging from the Romantics of the early nineteenth century to works of contemporary fiction it
Includes:: Hoffmanns hallucinatory portrait of terror & insanity The Sandman"; Chamissos influential black masterpiece " Peter Schlemiel" where a man barters his own shadow; Kafkas chilling disturbing satire " In the Penal Colony"; the Dadaist surrealism of Kurt Schwitters " The Onion"; & Bachmanns modern fairy tale " The Secrets of the Princess of Kagran". Macabre dreamlike & expressing deep unconscious fears these stories are also spiked with unsettling humour showing stylistic daring as well as giving insight into the darkest recesses of the human condition. Peter Wortsmans powerful translations are accompanied by brief overviews of the lives of each author & an introduction discussing the notion of angst & the stories place in the context of German history. Translated selected & edited with an introduction by Peter Wortsman"