Back Cover:

When she was only twenty-three her first novel, The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter, created a literary sensation. She is very special, one of Americas superlative writers who conjures up a vision of existence as terrible as it is real, who takes us on shattering voyages into the depths of the spiritual isolation that underlies the human condition.

A grotesque human triangle in a primitive Southern town. . . A young boy learning the difficult lessons of manhood. . . A fateful encounter with his native land and former love. . . These are parts of the world of Carson McCullers -- a world of the lost, the injured, the eternal strangers at lifes feast. Here are brilliant revelations of love and longing, bitter heartbreak and occasional happiness -- tales that probe the very heart of our lives.

CARSON McCULLERS (1917-1967)

When she was only twenty-three, Carson McCullers first novel, The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter, became a literary sensation. Since that time, her reputation has grown with every successive work.

Such novels as Reflections In a Golden Eye, The Member of the Wedding and Clock Without Hands have won her comparison with such diverse masters as Melville, Flaubert and Faulkner -- which is to say: no critic has succeeded in easily capsulizing the full dimensions of her talent.

Perhaps none of her works more brilliantly represents the variety and richness of her art than The Ballad of the Sad Café. In the already classic novella of the title, and in the tales which accompany it, the genius of Carson McCullers shines forth vividly -- and unforgettably.

Contents

The Ballad of the Sad Café

Wunderkind

The Jockey

Madame Zilensky and the King of Finland

The Sojourner

A Domestic Dilemma

A Tree, a Rock, a Cloud