Shmuel Yosef Agnon Twenty-One Stories-二十一个故事

作者：Shmuel Yosef Agnon

书名：Twenty-One Stories《二十一个故事》

简介："Twenty-one Stories" by S. Y. Agnon is a remarkable anthology of Kafkaesque fables about the eternal struggle of the Jew to enter the Kingdom of God that absolutely no one should read unless he or she knows the difference between "Midrash" and "Mishnah" in addition to having a strong understanding of the Jewish liturgical calendar. 
individually between 1919 and 1963 possesses great historical scope. The first tales are set in shtetls in Imperial Russia. The second group take place in the early Jewish settlements in the Ottoman Empire before WWI from which the modern state of Israel will be formed. Next the scene shifts to Hamburg after which it moves to the British Palestine before concluding in the modern state of Israel.
"Twenty-one Stories" is a very dense book with dazzling literary qualities. It does however require extensive background knowledge that few North American or European readers are likely to possess.