In the Penal Colony is a short story by Franz Kafka written in German in October 1914, revised in November 1918, and first published in October 1919. The story is set in an unnamed penal colony. Internal clues and the setting on an island suggest Octave Mirbeau's The Torture Garden as an influence. As in some of Kafka's other writings, the narrator in this story seems detached from, or perhaps numbed by, events that one would normally expect to be registered with horror. "In the Penal Colony" describes the last use of an elaborate torture and execution device that carves the sentence of the condemned prisoner on his skin before letting him die, all in the course of twelve hours. As the plot unfolds, the reader learns more and more about the machine, including its origin and original justification. The story focuses on the Explorer, who is encountering the brutal machine for the first time. Everything about the machine and its purpose is told to him by the Officer. The Soldier and the Condemned (who is unaware that he has been sentenced to die) placidly watch from nearby. The Officer tells of the religious epiphany the executed experience in their last six hours in the machine. Eventually, it becomes clear that the use of the machine and its associated process of justice – the accused is always instantly found guilty, and the law he has broken is inscribed on his body as he slowly dies over a period of 12 hours – has fallen out of favor with the current Commandant. The Officer is nostalgic regarding the torture machine and the values that were initially associated with it. As the last proponent of the machine, he strongly believes in its form of justice and the infallibility of the previous Commandant, who designed and built the device. In fact, the Officer carries its blueprints with him and is the only person who can properly decipher them; no one else is allowed to handle these documents.

Sentenced for a murder he did not commit, Anthony John Routledge is sent to Sert, a penal island off the Cornish coast, where he must forget the rules of civilized life in order to survive

A revelatory account of what is really happening to China's Uyghurs 'Intimate, sombre, and damning... compelling.' Financial Times 'Chilling... Horrifying.' Spectator 'Invaluable.' Telegraph In China's vast northwestern region, more than a million and a half Muslims have vanished into internment camps and associated factories. Based on hours of interviews with camp survivors and workers, thousands of government documents, and over a decade of research, Darren Byler, one of the leading experts on Uyghur society uncovers their plight. Revealing a sprawling network of surveillance technology supplied by firms in both China and the West, Byler shows how the country has created an unprecedented system of Orwellian control. A definitive account of one of the world's gravest human rights violations, In the Camps is also a potent warning against the misuse of technology and big data.

"Jennifer Wynn has been going in for seven years. She entered first as a journalist, volunteered as a writing teacher, and then served as director of a unique rehabilitation program known as Fresh Start."--BOOK JACKET.

Including his most widely recognized short works, as well as two new stories, this translation of Franz Kafka’s writings illuminate one of the century’s most controversial writers. Translated by PEN translation award-winner Joachim Neugroschel, The Metamorphosis, In the Penal Colony, and Other Stories has garnered critical acclaim and is widely recognized as the preeminent English-language anthology of Kafka's stories. Neugroschel’s translation of Kafka's work has made this controversial and monumental writing accessible to a whole new generation. This classic collection of forty-one great short works—including such timeless pieces of modern fiction as "The Judgment" and "The Stoker"—now includes two new stories, "First Sorrow" and "The Hunger Artist."

'Russia's Penal Colony in the Far East: A Translation of Vlas Doroshevich's "Sakhalin"' is the first English language translation of the Russian journalist Vlas Doroshevich's 1903 account of his visit to tsarist Russia's largest penal colony, Sakhalin, in the north Pacific. Despite the publication of Anton Chekhov's account of his visit to Sakhalin in 1890, many Russians remained unaware of the brutality and savagery of the 'devil island'. In 1897 Doroshevich, Russia's most popular journalist, travelled to Sakhalin and spent three months touring the island, interviewing numerous prisoners and officials, and recording his impressions. The feuilletons he wired back to his publishers were eventually collected and published in book form in 1903, under the title 'Sakhalin' (Katorga). Doroshevich's book was enormously popular when it first appeared, and it continues to be published in Russia, as a historical record of the striking barbarity of late nineteenth century penal practices. Despite this popularity, it has never before been translated into English, and Doroshevich remains largely unknown outside Russia. This translation introduces English-language readers to an important writer and original stylist who defined journalistic practice during the years leading up to the 1917 Revolution, by way of a book which helps explain the causes for that revolution.