Name: The Last Days of Mankind: A Tragedy in Five Acts
Price: 515.00 ZAR
Availability: InStock
Author: Karl Kraus
ISBN: 9789492027030

portada The Last Days of Mankind: A Tragedy in Five Acts

The Last Days of Mankind: A Tragedy in Five Acts

Type

Physical Book

Author

Karl Kraus

Translated by

Patrick Healy

Publisher

November Editions

Language

English

Pages

658

Format

Paperback

Dimensions

23.4 x 15.6 x 3.7 cm

Weight

1.00 kg.

ISBN13

9789492027030

Synopsis "The Last Days of Mankind: A Tragedy in Five Acts "

NOW THE SUBJECT OF A MAJOR STAGE PRODUCTION FEATURING THE TIGER LILLIES! WORLD PREMIERE IN EDINBURGH'S LEITH THEATRE ON 11-11-2018.Intended 'for a theatre on Mars', with a cast of nearly 500 and running to over 200 scenes, Karl Kraus's apocalyptic tragedy 'The Last Days of Mankind' is the longest play ever written. It is also a bitingly satirical commentary on the outbreak and subsequent horrors of World War I. Kraus (1874-1936) ranks as one of the greatest twentieth-century satirists. In 1899 he established his own journal, 'Die Fackel' (The Torch), to 'drain the marsh of empty phrase-making.' His work comprises essays, short stories, poetry and aphorisms, and culminated in the five-act play presented here.First published in 1920, 'The Last Days' employs a collage of modernist techniques to evoke a despairing and darkly comical vision of the Great War from the perspective of the author's hometown, Vienna. At its centre, Kraus places a cabal of war-mongering press barons and self-serving hacks, whose strategies of mass manipulation he holds responsible for the very atrocities they report.With this translation of the play in its entirety, Patrick Healy completes the work begun in 2014 when he published the first ever English-language version of the Prologue and Act I in 'In These Great Times', a selected anthology of Kraus' work. The present edition features an introduction and a glossary of relevant names and terms.About the translator: Patrick Healy is a philosopher, writer and senior lecturer at the Technical University Delft. He lives in Amsterdam. His earlier translations include Karl Kraus, 'In These Great Times: Selected Writings' and Carl Einstein's 'Bebuquin' and 'Negro Sculpture'. In the spring of 2016 his translation of Max Raphael's early critical writings appeared as 'The Invention of Expressionism'. For more information, visit www.patrick-healy.com

Karl Kraus

(Author)

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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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