ASYLUM PIECE by Anna Kavan

Rare and collectible 212-page hardcover in acceptable condition, published by Peter Owen in 1972.

This collection of mostly interlinked and largely autobiographical stories charts the narrator’s descent from the onset of neurosis to incarceration in a Swiss clinic. Its unnamed sense of persecution evokes Kafka’s The Trial, although Kavan’s restrained, deeply personal style has no true model. Recurring figures include the protagonist’s unhelpful adviser, the friend and lover who abandons her at the clinic, and an assortment of deluded companions.