Pushkin Press

A much celebrated jumping frog, the lack of literature in a gold-mining town, and castaways who eat their own shoes to survive are among the subjects treated by the stories contained in this volume. The Jumping Frog and Other Sketches captures the light and humorous spirit of Mark Twain's early work, inspired by his experiences in the mining districts of California and Nevada. These sketches became widely known in America, India, China and England and launched the solid foundation of the author's fame.

Depicting the evolution of a moral dilemma in dazzling stream-of-consciousness narrative, Arthur Schnitzler's Fräulein Else is a darkly witty exploration of Viennese social mores.
Fräulein Else is the story of a young woman who, while staying with her aunt at a fashionable spa, receives a telegram from her mother begging her to save her father from debtor's jail by approaching an elderly acquaintance in order to borrow money from him. Forced by the exigencies of her family into the reality of a world entirely at odds with her romantic imagination, we are brought unremittingly to the horrific consequences of Else's realisation that her world is one in which everything has a price and where the veneer of morality is as brittle and transparent as glass.
Translated from the German by F.H. Lyon, Arthur Schnitzler's modernist novella Fräulein Else is published by Pushkin Press.
Arthur Schnitzler (b.1862) was born in Vienna, the son of a prominent Jewish doctor, and studied medicine at the University of Vienna. In later years he devoted his life to writing and was successful as a novelist, dramatist and short story writer. Schnitzler's work shows a remarkable ability to create atmosphere and a profound understanding of human motives.

This novel from the great Austrian poet, dramatist, essayist and librettist, Hugo von Hoffmansthal Andreas is a fascinating insight into the work of this renowned author.
Andreas is an unfinished and posthumously-published novel of violence and naivety, pathos and melancholy. Set in the eighteenth century, it tells the story of a young Viennese aristocrat who intends to travel alone to Venice as the first stage of his 'Grand Tour';. On his journey, he acquires an unsavoury servant who unleashes a trail of destruction and violence, which taints and corrupts Andreas' first experience of love. Andreas' loss of innocence takes place in the misty alleyways and gloomy palaces of La Serenissima, whose masked inhabitants confuse and entice him, the women either madonnas or whores indistinguishable behind their masks.
Hugo von Hoffmansthal (1874–1929) was a writer of poems and plays from a young age. As a teenager, he met Stefan George, and had several poems published in his journal Blätter für die Kunst. He went on to study in Vienna, and along with Peter Altenberg and Arthur Schnitzler, was a member of the avant-garde group Young Vienna (Jung Wien). He went on to write the libretti for several operas composed by Richard Strauss, including Elektra and Der Rosenkavalier. During the First World War, the conservative Hoffmansthal wrote speeches and articles praising the war effort. He was devastated by the post-war dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, but continued with his work, founding the Salzburg Festival in 1925, along with Max Reinhardt. In 1939 his son committed suicide, and two days later Hoffmansthal died of a stroke.

A funny, wistful and utterly beguiling novel about a man whose life is falling apart, and how he learns to put it back together
JÓNAS FEELS LIKE HIS LIFE IS OVER.
His wife has left him, his mother is slipping deeper into dementia, and his daughter is no longer who he thought. So he comes up with a foolproof plan: to buy a one-way ticket to a chaotic, war-ravaged country and put an end to it all.
But on arriving at Hotel Silence, he finds his plans — and his anonymity — begin to dissolve under the foreign sun. Now there are other things that need his attention, like the crumbling hotel itself, the staff who run it, and his unusual fellow guests. And soon it becomes clear that Jónas must decide whether he really wants to leave it all behind; or give life a second chance, albeit down a must unexpected path…
Auður Ava Ólafsdóttir is an Icelandic prize-winning novelist, playwright and a poet. She is the author of five novels, a collection of poetry and four plays that have been performed at the National Theatre in Iceland and at the Reykjavik City Theatre. She also writes the lyrics for the Icelandic performance pop band Milkywhale. Auður Ava's novels have been translated into over 25 languages and among them are The Greenhouse and Butterflies in November. Her new novel, Hotel Silence, won the Icelandic Literary Prize 2016 and was chosen Best Icelandic Novel in 2016 by booksellers in Iceland. Auður Ava lives in Reykjavik.

A cabinet of curiosities, a time machine, a treasure trove — we love bookshops because they possess a unique kind of magic. In Browse Henry Hitchings asks fifteen writers from around the world to reveal their favourite bookshops, each conjuring a specific time and place.Ali Smith chronicles the secrets and personal stories hidden within the pages of secondhand books; Alaa Al Aswany tells of the Cairo bookshop where revolutionaries gathered during the 2011 uprisings; Elif Shafak evokes the bookstores of Istanbul, their chaos and diversity, their aroma of tobacco and coffee. Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor recalls the quandary of choosing just one book at a favourite childhood store in Nairobi, while Iain Sinclair shares his grief on witnessing a beloved old haunt close down. Others explore bookshops they have stumbled upon, adored and become addicted to, from Delhi to Bogotá.These inquisitive, enchanting pieces are a collective celebration of bookshops — for anyone who has ever fallen under their spell.Contributors include:Alaa Al Aswany (Egypt)Stefano Benni (Italy)Michael Dirda (USA)Daniel Kehlmann (Germany)Andrey Kurkov (Ukraine)Yiyun Li (China)Pankaj Mishra (India)Dorthe Nors (Denmark)Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor (Kenya)Elif Shafak (Turkey)Ian Sansom (UK)Iain Sinclair (UK)Ali Smith (UK)Saša Stanišic (Germany/Bosnia)Juan Gabriel Vásquez (Colombia)

Adalbert Stifter's Rock Crystal is a Christmas story and a story about the heart of the ice, the crystal.
The charm of this quasi-fairy tale is made even more poignant by the knowledge of the author's eventual suicide. This seemingly simple fable of two children lost in an icy landscape is eloquent in its innocence, but is implicit with an unremitting consciousness of the fragility of life and the inevitability of death. This is a wintry story of village life in the high mountains, but also a parable of belief and faith. The Rock Crystal of the title are shards of ice of the glacier that dominates the landscape that Adalbert Stifter describes.
Translated from the German by Elizabeth Mayer and Marianne Moore, Adalbert Stifter's Rock Crystal is published by Pushkin Press.
'A tale of almost unendurable suspense'— New York Review of Books
Adalbert Stifter (1805–1868) was an Austrian writer, painter and poet closely associated with the Biedermeier movement in European art. Following his studies at the University of Vienna, he was highly regarded as a tutor among aristocratic families. The success of his first story The Condor in 1840 inaugurated a steady writing career, culminating in Der Nachsommer, praised by Nietzsche as one of the two great novels of 19th century Germany. He was especially notable for the vivid natural landscapes depicted in his writing, and has long been popular in the German-speaking world, influencing writers such as Hermann Hesse, Thomas Mann and W.G. Sebald.

The great Dutch author Louis Couperus considered Psyche to be his symbolist masterpiece. It is published here along with its inspiration: the story of Psyche and Cupid from The Golden Ass Psyche is a modern, adult fairy tale, drenched in powerful imagery, and one of the most fascinating works to come from the pen of Louis Couperus, the Dutch Oscar Wilde and among the greatest writers ever to be born in The Netherlands.
'Couperus binds both irony and spiritual redemption. '
— The Daily Telegraph
'Couperus sympathy for the hybrid, the impure and the ambiguous gave him a peculiarly modern voice. It is extraordinary that this Dutch dandy, writing in the flowery language of fin-de-siecle decadence, should still sound so fresh.'
— Ian Buruma, The New York Times Review of BooksLouis Couperus (1863–1923), regarded as one of the foremost figures in Dutch literature, was a leading member of the Tachtigers movement. Born in the Hague, Couperus was taken by his family to the Dutch East Indies as a child, where he remained until his father's death. His other novels include Eline Vere (1889), Ecstasy (Extaze: Een boek van geluk, 1892), Inevitable (Langs lijnen van geleidelijkheid, 1900), and The Hidden Force (De Stille Kracht, 1900), all of which are available from Pushkin Press. A renowned wit, raconteur and commentator, Couperus continued to publish critically and commercially successful work until his death.

The nameless first person narrator travels from India to Europe on the ocean liner Oceania in 1912. One night, during a walk on deck, he meets a man who, disturbed and scared, avoids any social contact on the ship. The following night the narrator meets this man again. Although intimidated at first, the man soon begins to trust the narrator and tells him his story. When the first person narrator offers to help the doctor, the latter categorically turns down the offer, disappearing to be never heard of again. Only at the arrival in Naples, the narrator learns about a mysterious accident that happened while the cargo was being discharged: when the lead coffin with the woman's remains was being unloaded, the doctor threw himself onto the coffin that was fastened to ropes, thereby dragging both the coffin and him down to the bottom of the sea. Neither could the person running amok be saved nor could the coffin be recovered.

The Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan (1480–1521) is one of the most famous navigators in history-he was the first man to sail from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean, and led the first voyage to circumnavigate the globe, although he was killed en route in a battle in the Philippines. In this biography, Zweig brings to life the Age of Discovery by telling the tale of one of the era's most daring adventurers, whose astounding feats of navigation heralded the modern age.

The Signet Classic Shakespeare series contains the preeminent mass market books of the complete works of Shakespeare. This reissue features a new Overview by Sylvan Barnet, former chairman of the English Department at Tufts University, an updated Bibliography, suggested references, and stage and film history.

Set in the posh milieu that Wharton knew so intimately, The Glimpses of the Moon is a sweeping portrait of a couple caught up in the trappings of privilege — and driven by a reckless, all-consuming ambition….