What's Inside
This collection gathers several pieces of prose, led by a supernatural visitor who wanders into a sixteenth-century Austrian village. The titular story follows three boys as they befriend a celestial being who possesses total knowledge and no patience for human conventions. He regularly transports them to witness historical tragedies and distant lands, using the trips to deride the morality of the human race. The volume also includes shorter satirical sketches, such as a fable about an artist and his mirror-viewing cat. It is a work of jagged, unfinished narratives that emphasize the gap between divine capability and human, earthly suffering. Readers often encounter these texts as disparate experiments in irony and disillusionment.
Works & figures
- Satan
An entity possessing absolute knowledge who mocks human frailties. (in “The Mysterious Stranger”)
- Theodor Fischer
A boy who narrates his encounters with the supernatural visitor. (in “The Mysterious Stranger”)
- Father Peter
A village priest who gains unexpected wealth, prompting local gossip and a sudden resurgence of old acquaintances.
- Seppi Wohlmeyer
An innkeeper's son and companion to the narrator and Nikolaus. (in “The Mysterious Stranger”)
- Nikolaus Bauman
A judge's son who travels with the group of village boys. (in “The Mysterious Stranger”)
What it's really about
- Moral Sense
- A human disease that causes cruelty and suffering.
- Divine Detachment
- Godlike power applied without any human sympathy.
Why it's memorable
- A celestial being manifesting in a small Austrian village without warning.
- An artist placing a painting before a mirror to admire his own work.
Where to start
Begin with the titular work, as it sets the primary tone of cynical observation found throughout the rest of the collection.
For your book club
- The text was unfinished by the author, leaving its final structure ambiguous.
- The stories frequently contrast the infinite reach of the visitor with village provincialism.