My first wife
By: Jakob Wassermann ; translated by Michael Hofmann
Publisher: Penguin Classics
Published: 2012
Place of publication: London, England
Language: eng
Number of pages: 275
ISBN-13: 9780141389356; 9780141389363
Subjects: Marriage; Fiction
Work titles: Ganna
Description: Alexander Herzog, a young writer, goes to Vienna to escape his debts and a failed love affair. There he is pursued by book-loving Ganna: giddy, girlish, clumsy, eccentric and wild. Dazzled and unnerved by her devotion to him, and attracted to the large dowry offered by her wealthy father, he thinks he can mould Ganna into what he wants. But no-one can control her troubling passions. As their marriage starts to self-destruct, Herzog will discover that Ganna has resources and determination of which he had no idea - and that he can never escape her.
Notes: This fictionalized account of Wasserman's first marriage to Julie Speyer of Vienna appeared as a novel within the novel Joseph Kerkhovens dritte Existenz, attributed to the character Alexander Herzog, and entitled Ganna oder die Wahnwelt.

Includes bibliographical references.

Translated from the German.