Der Golem

by Gustav Meyrink

In the shadowy tenements of Prague's Jewish ghetto, gem-cutter Athanasius Pernath is drawn into a hallucinatory web of dreams, doubles, and ancient mysticism after a mysterious stranger delivers a cabbalistic book bearing his own name. As blackmail, murder, and unrequited love entangle him with the sinister junk dealer Aaron Wassertrum and the enigmatic archivist's daughter Mirjam, the legend of the Golem — an ancient man of clay said to stalk the ghetto's crooked alleys every sixty years — seems to awaken alongside Pernath's fractured identity. A landmark of Expressionist fiction for advanced learners drawn to the uncanny.