The collected stories of Joseph Roth / translated with an introduction by Michael Hofmann.

The honors student -- Barbara -- Career -- The place I want to tell you about... -- Sick people -- Rare and ever rarer in this world of empirical facts... -- The cartel -- April, the story of a love affair -- The blind mirror -- The grand house opposite -- Strawberries -- This morning, a letter arrived... -- Youth -- Stationmaster Fallmerayer -- The triumph of a beauty, a novella -- The bust of the Emperor, a novella -- The Leviathan, a novella.

Roth's novellas and short stories will rank with Chekhov's and Kafka's as among the greatest of modern literature. These seventeen novellas and stories echo the intensity and achievement of his greatest novel, The Radetzky March. Spanning the entire range of Roth's brief life (1894-1939) and including many stories just recently discovered, the book showcases the stunning "Strawberries" (1929), which comprises the first few chapters of a novel Roth would never complete. Here, clearly at the height of his literary prowess, Roth depicts his native town of Brody, a mad little Jewish village given over to mild criminality, yet oddly still ticking along. Similarly breathtaking, indeed reminiscent of Chekhov, are the novellas "Stationmaster Fallmerayer" (1933) and "The Bust of the Emperor" (1935). These short works, each a stunning example of Roth's legendary explorations of character, reflect an enduring and tragic sensibility that stands alone in the annals of twentieth-century fiction.