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The Unhappiness of Being a Single Man

Essential Stories

Part of Pushkin Press Classics

Author Franz Kafka

Translated by Alexander Starritt

Ebook (EPUB)

Steerforth Press | Pushkin Press Classics

On sale Mar 05, 2019 | 192 Pages | 9781782274407

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Fiction > Literary Fiction
Fiction > Short Stories

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New translations of the best stories by the one of the twentieth century's greatest and most influential writers

Kafka, whose name has generated an adjective, is one of the best loved writers of the twentieth century. Known for his dark, enigmatic stories, for the absurd nightmares he depicts, his extraordinary imaginative depth is clear in stories from 'A Hunger Artist' to 'The Verdict'.
But Kafka also wrote fizzingly funny, fresh stories, and The Unhappiness of Being a Single Man contains all the aspects of this genius: the wit and the grit; the horror and the humour; the longing and the laughing. They range from bizarre, two-sentence stories about Don Quixote to the famous brutal depiction of violence and justice that is 'In the Penal Colony'.
In a nimble new translation by the acclaimed Alexander Starritt, this collection of Kafka's essential stories shows the genius at his very best.

Praise for The Unhappiness of Being a Single Man:

'A welcome distillation of Kafka's short fiction, essential indeed.' - Kirkus Reviews

'The Unhappiness of Being a Single Man nicely makes a case that readers should not forget Kafka's sly sense of humor and, of course, his humanity, when considering his impact on culture.' - Noah Cruickshank, Forefront, in Shelf Awareness

Praise for the work of Franz Kafka:

'The stories are dreamlike, allegorical, symbolic, parabolic, grotesque, ritualistic, nasty, lucent, extremely personal, ghoulishly detached, exquisitely comic, numinous, and prophetic.' - The New York Times

'The greatest German writer of our time. Such poets as Rilke or such novelists as Thomas Mann are dwarfs or plastic saints in comparison with him.' - Vladimir Nabokov

'A genius.' - The Guardian

'[Kafka] spoke for millions in their new unease; a century after his birth, he seems the last holy writer, and the supreme fabulist of modern man's cosmic predicament.' - John Updike

Franz Kafka (1883-1924) was born to Jewish parents in Prague, and wrote in German. Most of his work was published posthumously, but he is now considered one of the most influential authors of the twentieth century.

Franz Kafka View titles by Franz Kafka

Translator’s Preface
A Message from the Emperor
A Short Fable
The Unhappiness of Being a Single Man
Poseidon
The Verdict
The Truth About Sancho Panza
The Bridge
The Married Couple
Before the Law
A Hunger Artist
The Trees
The New Lawyer
An Old Journal
In the Penal Colony
The Next Village
A First Heartache
A Report for an Academy
Homecoming
Jackals and Arabs
The Silence of the Sirens
The Stoker
Give up!