Anneliese's House (Women and Gender in German Studies, 6)

Anneliese's House (Women and Gender in German Studies, 6) by Andreas-Salomé, Lou. hardcover edition. ISBN: 9781640141018.

The first English translation of a presciently modern portrayal of emerging feminist sensibilities in a nineteenth-century family, by one of Germanys leading pre-First World War writers. Best known now for her involvement with Nietzsche, Rilke, and Freud, Lou Andreas-Salomé (1861-1937) first became famous for fiction and criticism that engaged provocatively with "the woman question." In recent years, the authors literary treatment of the challenges facing women in a patriarchal society has awakened renewed interest. Annelieses House is the first English translation of her last and most masterful work of fiction, the 1921 Das Haus: Familiengeschichte vom Ende vorigen Jahrhunderts (The House: A Family Story from the End of the Nineteenth Century). Anneliese Branhardt, the books protagonist, long ago renounced a career as a pianist to raise a family with her physician husband, Frank. She worries about her son Balduin - an aspiring poet modeled on Rilke - and about her equally free-spirited daughter Gitta. She is haunted by memories of a daughter who died in childhood and anxious about a risky, late pregnancy. With her domestic harmony threatened by her own stirrings of autonomy and her childrens growing independence, Anneliese finds the future both frightening and promising. The edition is fully annotated, with a critical introduction and bibliography.