“The forger’s life is a shadow cast by the original—always present, yet never truly seen.” Chapter 1: The Discovery The story begins with the narrator, a writer, stumbling […]
German literature
Tauben im Gras (Pigeons on the Grass)
“The pigeons on the grass alas.” – Gertrude Stein (Epigraph referenced in the novel) Chapter 1: A Post-War City in Fragments The novel opens in an unnamed German […]
French literature
Memoirs of Hadrian
“I have reached the age when life, for every man, is a defeat accepted.” Memoirs of Hadrian is a fictional autobiography of the Roman Emperor Hadrian, written as […]
American literature
The Catcher in the Rye
“I’m quite illiterate, but I read a lot.” — Holden Caulfield Chapters 1–4: Holden’s Expulsion and Departure Holden Caulfield, a disaffected 16-year-old, narrates from a mental facility. He […]