Titles from the venerable Penguin Classics imprint are usually books one knows one should have read even if one hasn’t (yet): known unknowns, as the famous saying goes. Behind the Painting by Thai author Siburapha is, even for the well-read anglophone consumer of literature, likely to qualify as an unknown unknown. First published 1937, this slim novel is one of Thailand’s best-known modern classics, has been adapted to film twice (as well as three stage musicals), and is a common set text in Thai secondary schools. Yet it is surely largely unknown outside Thailand.