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A dreamlike tale of haunting melodies and visions of alternate worlds.

"The Music of Erich Zann." Howard Phillips Lovecraft (1890-1937) is a novelist famous for his horror stories, fantasy and science fiction. Although he was not famous during his lifetime, his work is now considered a classic of literature. Lovecraft's work has influenced many authors, including Stephen King, who considers him "the greatest craftsman of the classic horror story of the 20th century."

The Music of Erich Zann is a horror short story by American author H. P. Lovecraft. Written in December 1921, it was first published in National Amateur, March 1922. Due to lack of funds, a university student is forced to take up lodging in an almost empty apartment building on a street named "Rue d'Auseil". One of the few other tenants is an old German man named Erich Zann. The old man is mute and plays the viol[a] with a local theater orchestra. He lives alone on the top floor and at night he plays strange melodies the student has never heard before.

Due to lack of funds, a student studying metaphysics abroad is forced to take up lodging in a cheap apartment building on a street named the "Rue d'Auseil". The street is not far from his university and is bordered by a river, dark warehouses and a large wall, giving the street an appearance of being on a cliff. The student cannot see what lies on the other side of the wall, as only a single window on the top floor of his building looks over it. Along with the building's disabled landlord, Blandot, one of the few other tenants is an old German man named Erich Zann.

It has always been the prerogative of genius to batter on the portals of the Unknowable - and then thrust his soul into the crack, like the little Dutch boy, to keep the devil out. The satanic legends surrounding the unbelievable career of the great concertist Paganini leave little doubt that somewhere there is a window such as Erich Zann's, beyond which lies a world more terrible than imagination can grasp, where science dwindles to zero and incredible passions rage as winds in a vacuum.

Un hombre trata de encontrar sin éxito a lo largo de los años la Rue d'Auseil, una estrafalaria y peculiar calle en la que vivió durante un tiempo cuando era un joven estudiante de metafísica. Allí conoció a un anciano músico alemán mudo llamado Erich Zann, que por las noches interpretaba desde su buhardilla en el piso superior a la habitación del joven, unas melodías tan extrañas y sobrecogedoras, que el estudiante no pegaba ojo en toda la noche dejándose llevar por esta música, que jamás había escuchado antes.

Cuenta la historia de un joven estudiante que por falta de recursos se queda en una misteriosa casa de huéspedes. En este lugar, después de la media noche, empieza a escuchar una música de violín interpretada de una manera que nunca había escuchado: la misteriosa música de Erich Zann, un viejo violinista, mudo y con mucho que ocultar.