Bengt Jangfeldt
Tales from the Kingdom of Lailonia and The Key to Heaven
Translated by Agnieszka Kolakowska and Salvator Attanasio
192 pages | 31 line drawings | 5.50 x 8.50 | © 1989
This volume contains two unusual and appealing satirical works by the well-known European philosopher Kolakowski. The first, Tales from the Kingdom of Lailonia, is set in a fictional land. Each story illustrates some aspect of human inability to come to terms with imperfection, infinitude, history, and nature. The second, The Key to Heaven, is a collection of seventeen biblical tales from the Old Testament told in such a way that the story and the moral play off each other to illustrate political, moral, or existential foibles and follies.
TALES FROM THE KINGDOM OF LAILONIA
Looking for Lailonia
A Tale about Children's Toys
How Gyom Became an Elderly Gentleman
The Famous One
How the Divine Maior Lost His Throne
The Red Patch
The War with Things
How the Problem of Longevity Was Solved
Outrageous Mints
The Story of the Greatest Quarrel
A Tale of Great Shame
THE KEY TO HEAVEN
God, or the Contradictions Between the Motives and the Consequences of Human Action
The People of Israel, or the Consequences of Unselfishness
Cain, or the Interpretation of the Principle "To Each According to His Merits"
Noah, or the Temptations of Solidarity
Lot's Wife, or the Appeal of the Past
Sarah, or the Conflict Between the General and the Personal in Morality
Abraham, or Lofty Grief
Esau, or the Relation of Philosophy to Trade
God, or the Relativism of Mercy
Balaam, or the Problem of Objective Guilt
King Saul, or Two Kinds of Consistency in Life
Rahab, or Real and Imagined Solitude
Job, or the Contradictions of Virtue
King Herod, or the Misery of the Moralist
Ruth, or the Dialogue Between Love and Bread
Jael, or Heroism Gone Astray
Solomon, or Men as Gods
Salome, or All Men Are Mortal
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