Volcano and Miracle: A Selection from The Journal Written at Night

This kaleidoscopic collection of more than 100 journal entries from one of Poland's greatest living writers includes semifictional tales, based on historical sources, that mirror the fragility of the human life. Here also are brilliant critical pieces on Soviet Communism and figures such as Kafka, Mann, Camus, and Dostoevsky.

The Polish writer Gustaw Herling, who resides in Naples and survived one of Stalin's labor camps to produce the superb memoir A World Apart, writes keen, striking essays and stories about his adopted homeland, Italy. Tackling topics from the eruption of Vesuvius to the annual liquefaction of San Gennaro's blood to the 1657 plague that ravaged Naples, Herling employs a beautiful command of language to present a vision of the transcendence of art and literature.