Calder Publications/Riverrrun Fiction. Translated from the French by Rupert Copeland Cuningham. Reprint. First published in 1914, this is perhaps Roussel's masterpiece. Based, like the earlier Impressions of Africa, on uniquely eccentric principles of composition, this book invites the reader to enter a world which in its innocence and extravagance is unlike anything in the literature of the twentieth century. Roussel was one of the founding fathers of the modern novel and was a principal influence on the surrealists. This accurate yet colloquial translation by Rupert Copeland Cuningham perfectly captures the unique eccentricity of the original.