A World Ends (Masterplots II: Short Story Series, Revised Edition)
At a glance:
- Author: Wolfgang Hildesheimer
- First Published: 1952
- Type of Plot: Fantasy
- Time of Work: Sometime in the twentieth century
- Setting: The artificial island of San Amerigo
- Principal Characters: Herr Sebald, The Marchesa Montetristo
- Genres: Short fiction, Fantasy
- Subjects: Surrealism, Art or artists, Parties, Fables
- Locales: Islands
The Story
The fabulistic nature of this very brief story is indicated initially by the detached tone of its narrator and by the absence of any social context in which its events take place. There is no plot as such; instead, the story very briefly recounts the narrator's experience at the Marchesa Montetristo's last evening party and the memorable nature of its “extraordinary conclusion,” in which the artificial island on which the Marchesa lives breaks up and sinks into the sea. Most of the story focuses on the narrator's recounting of the various important guests he meets...
[The entire page is 1498 words long]
