Book description
From behind the closed door, the man shouts, 'Be on your way - you
have no business here!'
'Open up, I am the messenger of Death'.
As spring arrives in the Albanian mountain town of B, some strange
things are emerging in the thaw. Bank robbers strike the National
Bank. Old terrors are dredged up from the shipwreck of history. And
ultra-explosive state secrets are threatening to flood the entire
nation. Mark, an artist, finds the peaceful rhythms of his life turned
upside down by ancient love and modern barbarism and by the particular
brutality of a country surprised and divided by its new freedom.
Ismail Kadare, born in 1936 in the mountain town of Gjirokaster, near
the Greek border, is Albania's best-known poet and novelist. Since the
appearance of
The General of the Dead Army
in 1965, Kadare has published scores of stories and novels that make up
a panorama of Albanian history linked by a constant meditation on the
nature and human consequences of dictatorship. His works brought him
into frequent conflict with the authorities from 1945 to 1985. In 1990
he sought political asylum in France, and now divides his time between
Paris and Tirana. He is the winner of the first ever Man Booker
International Prize.
