Now translated in full from the French for the first time, The Manuscript Found in Saragossa is a great literary, as well as a great bibliographical, curiosity. Its author, Count Jan Potocki, who was born in 1761, belonged to one of the small handful of landowning families - the Potockis, Radziwills, Branickis, Czartoryskis and Sapiehas - who for centuries ran Poland. Frequently intermarrying, they cornered all the hereditary offices of state and accumulated fortunes larger than those of the Crown itself. Jan's cousin Felix ruled over a hundred and fifty thousand serfs and commanded his own private army.

LRB 26 January 1995 | PDF Download