The Black Mirror and Other Stories
Author: Franz Rottensteiner
Publisher: Wesleyan University Press
Published: 2008-12-31
Total Pages: 428
ISBN-13: 9780819568311
DOWNLOAD EBOOKHandsomely equipped with a comprehensive introductory historical essay, editor's notes and selected bibliography, this distinguished anthology is a model of genre research. These previously untranslated stories, published from 1871 onward, offer reading virtually unknown to most American (and many German) readers. Some authors combine scientific and philosophical issues, like Kurd Lasswitz in his witty tale "To the Absolute Zero of Existence: A Story from 2371, " while others, as in Erik Simon's 1983 title story, pose psychological puzzles involving alien phenomena. Though the earlier stories in particular demand painstaking reading, all of them repay it with rewarding insights into German and Austrian culture and the many possible uses and misuses of science.