La leyenda del santo bebedor

A tale of peculiar charm and tinged with the posthumous aura that comes from being the last written by Joseph Roth (1894-1939) shortly before he died as a consequence, precisely, of his alcoholism, "The legend of the holy drinker" was the song of the swan of a writer who has reached the category of undisputed classic of the 20th century. Mythomaniac, impostor, comedian, Roth provided in these pages that give account of the adventures of the homeless Andreas in search of the return of a loan to Saint Therese of Lisieux, a fable without morals, of bacchic and jovial tone, in which I would say I wanted to conjure destiny and, at the same time, exorcise the cruelty of the world through humor and piety. The epilogue illuminator that accompanies the text provides a magnificent and synthetic portrait of the author, as well as some of the essential keys to understand his recurring themes and the lines of force of his work.