When the new Egyptian Pharaoh decrees that he does not want a pyramid built in his honour his advisers are aghast. It is their firm belief that peace and prosperity only make the people more difficult to control - they must be kept under the whip. So the Pharaoh agrees to the construction of a pyramid colossal beyond imagining, an edifice that crushes dozens of people as each block is added and which inexorably drains the lifeblood from the country. As Egypt builds its monument to death, its neighbours plot and gloat...

Vorwort
Kadare's classic parable of life under a communist dictatorship

Autorentext
Ismail Kadare (19362024) is Albania's best-known novelist and poet. Translations of his novels have appeared in more than forty countries. He was awarded the inaugural Man Booker International Prize in 2005, the Jerusalem Prize in 2015, the Park Kyong-ni Prize in 2019 and the Neustadt Prize in 2020.