Their Pavel
by Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach
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Description
Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach (1830-1916) is Austria's most important nineteenth-century woman writer, but her works have remained largely unknown to English speakers, even her most important, the compelling Their Pavel, first published serially in 1887. Based on a true incident, Their Pavel investigates the troubled social relations of a Moravian village that is endowed with the right of local governance but steeped in the habits of its feudal relationship to the local barony. The novel show more explores the parallel fates of the children of a hanged murderer and thief. Milada, the appealing and alert daughter, is adopted on a whim by the aging baroness, while Pavel, the awkward and taciturn son, is thrown upon the uncertain mercy of the village, but both suffer the stigma of their father's crime. In her sometimes grimly humorous picture of village life, the author spares neither the Catholic Church nor the landed aristocracy nor the villagers themselves. show lessTags
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Member Reviews
Das Gemeindekind is Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach‘s most famous novel. Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach was a Czech-Austrian writer in the late 19th century.
Plot:
After robbing a church and killing a priest, Pavel’s father is sentenced to death, his mother who was forced by her husband to help with the crime is sentenced to ten years in prison. Pavel and his sister Milada are now the responsibility of the borough. Milada, who is pretty and cute, gets taken in by the local countess but Pavel (who is around 12 at the time) has to stay with an abusive foster family and endure the community’s shunning of him, since everybody assumes that he’s going to turn out like his parents.
Ebner-Eschenbach’s writing style is, of course, a little show more outdated. Her book is not. She writes sensitively and sensibly about the life of the poor at the end of the 19th century (and it seems pretty realistic to me), even though she herself was noble and pretty rich. And in Pavel, she examines the relationship between individual choice and biological determinism, which is a still unanswered and interesting question.
Read more about it on my blog: http://kalafudra.wordpress.com/2010/04/22/das-gemeindekind-the-municipal-child-m... show less
Plot:
After robbing a church and killing a priest, Pavel’s father is sentenced to death, his mother who was forced by her husband to help with the crime is sentenced to ten years in prison. Pavel and his sister Milada are now the responsibility of the borough. Milada, who is pretty and cute, gets taken in by the local countess but Pavel (who is around 12 at the time) has to stay with an abusive foster family and endure the community’s shunning of him, since everybody assumes that he’s going to turn out like his parents.
Ebner-Eschenbach’s writing style is, of course, a little show more outdated. Her book is not. She writes sensitively and sensibly about the life of the poor at the end of the 19th century (and it seems pretty realistic to me), even though she herself was noble and pretty rich. And in Pavel, she examines the relationship between individual choice and biological determinism, which is a still unanswered and interesting question.
Read more about it on my blog: http://kalafudra.wordpress.com/2010/04/22/das-gemeindekind-the-municipal-child-m... show less
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Common Knowledge
- Canonical title
- Their Pavel
- Original title
- Das Gemeindekind
- Alternate titles
- The Child of the Parish
- Original publication date
- 1887
- People/Characters
- Martin Holub; Barbara Holub; Pavel Holub; Milada Holub; Virgil (shepherd and alcoholic); Virgilova (herb witch)
- Important places
- Kunovice, Mähren, Austro-Hungarian Empire
Classifications
- Genres
- Fiction and Literature, General Fiction, Historical Fiction
- DDC/MDS
- 833.8 — Literature & rhetoric German & related literatures German fiction 1856–1899
- LCC
- PT1853 .G3813 — Language and Literature German, Dutch and Scandinavian literatures German literature Individual authors or works 1700-ca. 1860/70
- BISAC
Statistics
- Members
- 59
- Popularity
- 523,583
- Reviews
- 1
- Rating
- (3.79)
- Languages
- Dutch, English, German, Turkish
- Media
- Paper, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 11
- ASINs
- 5
