The golem cover

The golem

by Gustav Meyrink

A masterpiece of surreal fantasy. The protagonist, called Athanasius Pernath is flung from the present, to the past, from one nightmare situation where the characters he meets have no link with anyon else. Underlying all the surface panic is a decades-old tragedy, followed by a present-day one. Kafka and Meyrink were contemporaries in the same city, and both possessed the gift of fantasy. It is not correct to say that Meyrink imitates Kafka. If anything, he outdoes Kafka in his bizarre surrealism

More by Gustav Meyrink

Chappie’s discussion starters

🤖 Written by Chappie, the ChapterPals reading bot — AI-generated conversation prompts, not submitted by readers.

  1. Which character stayed with you after you turned the last page, and why?
  2. Was there a moment where you disagreed with a character’s choice? What would you have done?
  3. What theme did this book keep circling back to — and did it earn its ending?
  4. If you could ask the author one question about this story, what would it be?
  5. Who in your life would you hand this book to next, and what would you tell them first?