Effi Briest

by Theodor Fontane

Book Overview

Telling the tragic tale of a socially advantageous but emotionally ruinous match, Theodor Fontane's Effi Briest is translated from the German by Hugh Rorrison with an introduction by Helen Chambers in Penguin Classics.

Unworldly young Effi Briest is married off to Baron von Innstetten, an austere and ambitious civil servant twice her age, who has little time for his new wife. Isolated and bored, Effi finds comfort and distraction...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0140447660
• ISBN13: 9780140447668
• Release Date: July 2001
• Publisher: Penguin Group
• Length: 256 Pages
• Weight: 0.46 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.0" x 7.7"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

Masterpiece

A masterpiece for the mature reader. It's strange that Fontane is not better-known in the English-speaking world, but this seems to be the case with German language literature in general. Ask the typical student of European literature for names, and they'll soon peter out after Goethe & Schiller. In fact there are many wonderful German writers (Spanish ones too) but usually we hear only of the English, French and Russian writers. Lessing (G E von, not Doris!) is another wonderful German writer. This book (which I read in the Parmee translation, not the one referenced here) is not for youngsters looking for graphic sex, violence or suchlike "thrills." In particular, I would recommend against its being assigned in college classes. That audience is not ready for Effi Briest. It's an ADULT BOOK :). For those who liked Effi Briest, several other Fontane novels have been translated and were issued by Ungar some years ago. Effi is the best I've read, but others of interest are A Man of Honor (Schach von Wuthenow) and Jenny Treibel. Both show the same interest in and sympathy for women characters.

Sensitive, nuanced tragedy

Theodor Fontane's novel Effi Briest is one of the finest that I have read. The most famous example of German realism, the novel tells the story of Effi, a teenage girl who is still acting like a child when she is married off to Baron von Innstetten, a man nearly twice her age and a former suitor of her mother's. Effi moves off to the Baltic coast to live with Innstetten, and there faces fear, loneliness, and finally adultery. What I like about Effi Briest is that Fontane avoids the usual pitfalls of this kind of story: lionizing the young woman's lover, placing the blame at the feet of the cuckolded spouse, etc. Innstetten really is a good man, and Crampas, Effi's lover, is a manipulative lady's man who Effi, despite their affair, is uncomfortable around. Effi is simply too young and immature to have made good decisions, and so the fault, sadly, is her own. In the end, her decisions come back to haunt her years after the fact, changing the lives of all involved. It's dark, it's depressing in places, but it's a great novel. The characters are all well-drawn and psychologically deep, and this is true not only of the three primary characters but also of the numerous supporting ones. Each of them bring vigor and flavor to what could have been just another closet drama. This translation from Penguin Classics is very good, the best way to read it if you have to read it in English. The translation is very faithful to the German, conveying all the nuance and subtlety that was the hallmark of Fontane's writing. All in all, a very good book. Highly recommended.

Pleasantly Complex

"Effie Briest" is an 1895 German novel that is a fine example of artful thinking and worth reading if one can appreciate leisurely detail. Like all good stories, it not only presents an interesting set of events, but comments on life and thrills the reader a little with the mystery of things. The main character is a pleasure-loving and secretive girl who is briefly unfaithful to her gentle but neglectful husband with sad consequences for everyone around her. The entire course of her marriage is described, from her acceptance of the marriage proposal to the misery of her separation from her child and death, but sensational moments (such as her liaison with her lover) are skipped over and attention is given instead to psychological matters that explain the events. The author had read Shakespeare and, like him, presents a theme that keeps appearing in a variety of forms, which makes the thought pleasantly complex.

A Melancholy and Beautiful Novel

Theodor Fontane's 1895 novel, "Effi Briest," is the moving and melancholy story of Effi, a sprightly teenage girl whose limited interactions with society and the moral bearings of that society are brought into direct and terrible conflict. Fontane gives an all too realistic portrayal of late 19th century Victorian morality and the lives of minor German aristocrats. The novel relates Effi's struggle to negotiate the constraints of society as an extremely young woman who in many ways rejects them all."Effi Briest" begins as Effi, a fifteen year old girl, enjoys the privileges of wealth and beauty in the small town of Hohen-Cremmen. She plays with the other young girls of her neighbourhood, Herta, Berta, and Hulda. They play childish games and indulge each other in romantic stories and juvenile ambitions. One day, while telling the story of an unrealized love affair between her own mother and a military officer, Geert von Innstetten, Effi is informed that Innstetten, now upwards of forty years old, has come to visit, and has proposed marriage to Effi. Effi cannot but comply. Relocated to the port town of Kessin, Effi finds herself in a commercial center, without the kind of genteel society she is accustomed to, nor the variety or the spontaneity in her lifestyle that she had always enjoyed. Innstetten's workaholism and emotionally detached bearing make life nearly insufferable for her. She is relieved by two men, Gieshubler, a kindly old hunchbacked chemist; and Major Crampas, a 'reformed' libertine whose marriage is unsatisfying. Gieshubler offers Effi a haven of conversation and empathy; Crampas offers her a seductive, liberatory companion. As Innstetten's job absorbs most of his time, he permits and even encourages Effi to spend time with Crampas. A secret correspondence between Effi and Crampas sets the scene for the rest of the novel."Effi Briest" is really an extraordinary work. Fontane examines throughout the novel the effect of national and international politics, cultural mobility, and trade on the individual. Fontane's presentation of the port town of Kessin, in particular, is fascinating. Here, Effi is truly taken out of the sheltered life of Hohen-Cremmen and exposed to a mobile and commercial society, where people from different cultures and epistemologies flit in and out of her life, like the seemingly liberated woman, Maria Trippelli, in whom Effi takes an intense interest, and Roswitha, a lapsed Catholic nursemaid. In Kessin, she is also encounters a story that haunts the entire novel, the highly evocative and ambiguous story of the Chinaman. Ambiguity is a hallmark of "Effi Briest" and is a major part of the appeal of Fontane's novel. Fontane refrains from making authorial pronouncements or assessments on his characters' actions and situations. To what extent, for example, does Innstetten's political ambition justify the lack of time he devotes to his young wife? Is Effi an agent in her own life, or is she a reac

Classic tale of adultery

"Effi Briest" is not just a German version of Emma Bovary or Anna Karenina - it is quite unique in its depiction of a not untypical 19th century marriage. At the age of 17 the impetuous Effi Briest is married to a man 21 years her senior. He is decent enough in his treatment of her, but for Effi being married is a horrible experience, mostly because her husband's job forced her to move to the small town of Kessin where hardly anybody is fit to become her friend. What always strikes me about Fontane is the fairness and the understandig he shows towards his characters. "Effi Briest" is Fontane's psychological insight at his best. None of characters is gloryfied, none vilified. You can identify with Effi and understand what drives her into the arms of another man; but you can also see that her husband simply doesn't understand what he is doing to Effi; actually he's doing his best to make her happy. When the attractive, ageing womanizer Major Crampas moves into town, Effi pities him at first. Later, her attitude changes, but Fontane does not give any details of what's going on between the two. He shows what made it happen - and how Effi and her husband will deal with it. - It is a very entertaining read, not least because of Fontane's excellent low-key sense of humour.