The Elephant

(Paperback)

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Description

The Elephant (1957) is Slawomir Mrozek's award-winning collection of hilarious and unnerving short stories, satirising life in Poland under a totalitarian regime. The family of a wealthy lawyer keep a 'tamed progressive' as a pet; a zoo saves money for the workers by fashioning their elephant from rubber; a swan is dismissed from the municipal park for public drunkenness; and under the Writers' Association, literary critics are banished to the salt mines. In these tales of bureaucrats, officials and artists, Mrozek conjures perfectly a life of imagined crimes and absurd authority.

Reviews

Extraordinary . . . Mrozek's brief fables are something like Kafka's stories, but they're funnier * Spectator *
The satiric intent is unambiguous, and offers hope to the oppressed mind...so deft and so piercing -- Nicholas Lezard * Guardian *
[The series] sheds remarkable light on the literature, culture and politics of the region...anyone coming fresh to the field will be captivated by the richness, variety, humour and pathos of a classic literature that, through a shared historical experience, transcends national and linguistic boundaries. -- CJ Schler * Independent on Sunday *
This [series] is a wonderful idea ... They are absurdist parables, by turns hilarious, unsettling and enigmatic. -- Nicholas Lezard * Guardian *
I urge you to go and read them. -- Adam Thirlwell * New Statesman *
This new series of Central European Classics is important well beyond simply providing 'good reads'. -- Stephen Vizinczey * Daily Telegraph *

Author Bio

Slawomir Mrozek (born in 1930) is now principally known as Poland's master of Absurd Theatre, in plays such as Striptease, Repeat Performance and Vatzlav. He began his career though with the timeless story collection The Elephant with its extraordinary illustrations by Daniel Mroz.