In 2016, Marc Estrin decided to publish Kafka’s Roach, the unedited version of the manuscript that a dozen years earlier Fred Ramey had acquired, edited, and published under the title Insect Dreams: The Half Life of Gregor Samsa. Estrin’s decision raises questions about the editor’s role in the life of a book, the trajectory of one author’s career, and whether a published novel is a stable thing anymore. All of that is worth a wide discussion, and so Ramey asked his erstwhile author to engage in a colloquy.
          The Insect Dialogues is the record of the email conversation that ensued.
 
Kafka’s Roach: The Life and Times of Gregor Samsa is available from Fomite Press.
 
All proceeds from the sale of The Insect Dialogues go to support future Leaping Man projects.