A new edition of the seminal novel by a literary master, to celebrate the 40th anniversary of its first publication. 'One is torn between profound pleasure in the novel's execution and wonder at the pain that inspired it.' Ian McEwan 'A masterpiece.' Salman Rushdie This book is a novel in the form of variations. The various parts follow each other like the various stages of a voyage, leading into the interior of a theme, the interior of a thought, the interior of a single, unique situation the understanding of which recedes from my sight into the distance. It is a book about laughter and forgetting, about forgetting and about Prague, about Prague and about the angels.