Monika Molander

Set mainly in Munich, this book features the story of a young music student from an upper middle-class family in Bonn, whose vulnerability leads her to be swept off her feet by her Professor. Returning to Bonn after her father's death, eventually she finds employment as an accompanist in a Zurich cabaret.

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Hilde Stieler's selected poems appeared in Volume 8 of "German Women Writers". The crucial "Monika Molander", first published in 1929, has been largely forgotten and become difficult to access. Set mainly in Munich, it is the story of a young music student from an upper middle-class family in Bonn, whose vulnerability leads her to be swept off her feet by her Professor. Returning to Bonn after her father's death, eventually she finds employment as an accompanist in a Zurich cabaret. Memories of life close to the theatre merge with grotesque scenes and uncertainties about life, with popular romantic views that come close to kitsch. The colloquialism, characterizations, often light-hearted style and happy ending produce a typically bittersweet account from the 1920s. The novel is republished here with an introduction narrating the writer's life, especially her exile in Sanary-sur-Mer; interpreting two further poems; and analyzing her novel as semi-autobiographical.