This site offers famous German literary works, classics, translated into English, including some Austrian and Swiss-German books.
It is an indispensable source for anybody who would like to get to know the best German novels and novellas of the past centuries.
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A novella:
A Village Romeo and Juliet
by Gottfried Keller
104 pages; perfect bound.
8" x 5"
Love is necessarily an important element in all imaginative literature, but with Gottfried Keller it does not overshadow all other aspects of life. Great passion we do not find in his works.
In "A Village Romeo and Juliet," it is not ill-consuming love that makes the two young people seek death, but the bitter realization of life's law, as they understood it, which made it impossible for them ever to be united.
The story is a fine illustration of what a great artist may make out of his raw material. Keller had read in a newspaper a report of the suicide of two young people, the sort of tragedy that we may read almost daily in newspapers; he seized upon the possibilities of the situation and the result was this story, perhaps the best he ever wrote.
Gottfried Keller (1819-1890) was one of the foremost Swiss German novelists and one of the most original figures of German literature since Goethe, a master of style worthy to be classed with the great names of all ages. (John Albrecht Walz)
Authors and titles on this site: Bernhard Kellermann: "God's Beloved", E. T. A. Hoffmann: "The Sandman. The Elementary Spirit.", Franz Grillparzer: "The Poor Musician", Gottfried Keller: "A Village Romeo and Juliet", Gotthold Ephraim Lessing: "Minna von Barnhelm", Heinrich Heine: "The Rabbi of Bacharach", Heinrich von Kleist: "Michael Kohlhaas", Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach: "Krambambuli" and "The District Doctor", Theodor Fontane: "Trials and Tribulations. A Berlin Novel", Theodor Storm: "The Rider of the White Horse" ("The Dikegrave").