London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1956. First edition. 217pp. Small 8vo. Yellow textured paper over boards; dust jacket. Spotting/offsetting to boards (perhaps adhesive related), light bumping to spine ends. Price-clipped jacket with toning to spine, light rubbing and wear.
First UK edition of this 1954 novel by German writer Wolfgang Koeppen (1906-1996), the final volume in his Trilogy of Failure and his first book translated into English (by Mervyn Savill); a late-modernist examination of the lives of former Nazis and their victims in post-war Germany, and a rebuke of the mannered literary aesthetics of writers like Thomas Mann in addressing the lingering horrors of World War 2. Jacket design by Eduardo Paolozzi. The American edition of Savill's translation was published by the Vanguard Press in 1961. Uncommon.
