The Green Face

Meyrink's second, and most mystical, novel from 1916. Published in Germany to critical and commercial acclaim, it is set in Amsterdam, used as a symbol of European decadence: the city is ultimately destroyed. The Green Face has classic Meyrink features: * a mystical wedding * a galaxy of grotesque characters * the haunting atmosphere of the ghetto In an Amsterdam that very much resembles the Prague of The Golem, a stranger, Hauberisser, enters by chance a magician's shop. The name on the shop, he believes, is Chidher Green; inside, among several strange customers, he hears an old man, who says his name is Green, explain that, like the Wandering Jew, he has been on earth ""ever since the moon has been circling the heaven."" When Hauberisser catches sight of the old man's face, it makes him sick with horror, haunting him. The rest of the novel chronicles Hauberisser's quest for the elusive and horrible old man.


Genre: Literary Fiction