Novel
The Golem
Der Golem
Gustav Meyrink · 1915
Opening lines
Das Mondlicht fällt auf das Fußende meines Bettes und liegt dort wie ein großer, heller, flacher Stein.
The moonlight falls on the foot of my bed and lies there like a large, bright, flat stone.
Translation by Erostrate
Text quoted from zeno.org
Synopsis
One night, a narrator slips from half-sleep into the life of Athanasius Pernath, a gem cutter in the Prague ghetto, who searches in vain for his own identity. Around him the alleys close and open again, his neighbours, the junk dealer Aaron Wassertrum and others, weave their intrigues, and people speak of an apparition, the Golem, who is said to return to haunt the quarter every thirty-three years.
Context
The narrative first appeared in instalments, from December 1913 to August 1914, in the magazine Die Weißen Blätter; publishers refused the manuscript and only the young Kurt Wolff took it in book form, in 1915. The creature of the title never appears: the legend is assumed to be known and is not told. Alfred Kubin had undertaken to illustrate this book before it was finished; as the manuscript was delayed, he wrote and illustrated his own novel.
Who it is for
Three hundred pages that can be read without knowing anything about the Kabbalah, provided one accepts that nothing is explained. The ghetto described had been razed shortly before the book's publication.
Prizes and reception
One hundred and forty-five thousand copies in two years; it remained its author's greatest success.
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