Name: The Last Days of Mankind - the Last Night
Price: 18.98 EUR
Availability: InStock
Author: Karl Kraus
ISBN: 9780992905927

portada The Last Days of Mankind - the Last Night

The Last Days of Mankind - the Last Night

Type

Physical Book

Author

Karl Kraus

Translated by

Michael Russell

Publisher

Forgotten Cities Press

Year

1601

Language

English

Pages

126

Format

Paperback

Dimensions

20.3 x 12.7 x 0.8 cm

Weight

0.15 kg.

ISBN13

9780992905927

Synopsis "The Last Days of Mankind - the Last Night "

Until now, there has never been a full, accurate English translation of the epilogue to The Last Days of Mankind, German playwright Karl Kraus's early twentieth-century satirical play about the First World War. Yet the play's importance and influence is widely acknowledged and celebrated in Europe, for its uncompromising examination of human folly in the face of war and as a unique act of creativity and imagination, opening drama up to new challenges, techniques, and possibilities. This translation is of the play's verse epilogue, The Last Night, which is a standalone work, and in many ways a distillation of all the material preceding it. A general flees the battlefield, representing all generals and military leaders. War correspondents trying to interview and photograph a dying man represent all war correspondents. Everything that took place in the main work reappears in this epilogue's verse in a moving and compelling summation. This translation of The Last Night aims to introduce English-speaking readers to Kraus's great play for the first time in one hundred years, and to offer an annotated edition of the text for those who want to use it as a starting point for exploring Kraus's rich, disturbing, and profound world.

Karl Kraus

(Author)

View Author's Page

Karl Kraus (1874–1936) was an influential Austrian writer, journalist, and satirist, born in Jičín (Bohemia) and based in Vienna. He founded the magazine Die Fackel (The Torch) in 1899, which he directed and wrote almost alone for more than three decades, becoming a critical platform against the press, politics, and language corruption.

Among his most notable works are The Last Days of Mankind (1919), an extensive satirical tragedy about World War I; Words in Verse (1916–1930), a poetry collection; and The Third Walpurgis Night (1933), a critical essay on the rise of Nazism. His biting style and commitment to truth established him as one of the most incisive voices in 20th-century German-language literature.

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