Cross Roads

Cross Roads contains two short story collections by beloved Czech author Karel Capek (1890-1938). The former, the previously untranslated Wayside Crosses, is more metaphysical in tone: its tropes include a lone footprint in the snow and a single word etched onto the nightstand of a sick man. Characters utter lines like ""How external everything is!"" and two of the stranded travelers in ""The Lost Way"" sound like rejects from Beckett. The second collection, Painful Tales, is more satisfying in its excavation of its characters' inner lives a cuckolded husband, a grieving father and a frustrated governess. Even translator Norma Comrada admits that ""these are neither Capek's best nor his most enjoyable stories,"" but completists might show some interest.