Frau Jenny Treibel

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Frau Jenny Treibel is a German novel published in 1892 by Theodor Fontane.

[edit] Plot

The primary subject of the novel revolves around two Berlin families. One is the upper-class Treibel family consisting of the Councillor of commerce and his wife, Frau Jenny, as well as their sons Otto and Leopold. The other family is that of Professor Wilibald Schmidt and his daughter Corinna. The families have a connexion that has already existed for decades. Many years ago, when Wilibald was still a student, he was also the secret admirer of Jenny, who at that time was the daughter of Willibald's landlord. The landlord was the proprietor of a small basement shop. Willibald even went so far as to write a poem to Jenny in which he pronounced his love for her, though he failed to achieve the desired affect. The poem itself was of modest literary achievement, but due to the young student's overwhelming sentimentality at the time, Jenny continues to bring up the poem in conversation quite often.

Willibald would like to see his daughter Corrina marry her cousin Marcell, a promising future archaeologist. Unfortunately, however, Marcell can not bring himself to propose to her. In any case, the intelligent and independent Corrina has other plans for herself. She wants to break out of the rather mediocre world of a secondary school teacher's household. She finds the social life with the wives of the other teachers to be quite boring and her father's correction of pupils schoolwork offers little variation. Thus Corrina sets herself to marrying Leopold Treibel. Social standing and material prosperity seem to her to be an adequate guarantee for a happy future. She thus uses any means possible on order to lure the kind but easily influenced Leopold into her trap. She uses all the charm and wit that she can manage and two dinner parties and an outing later she achieves her goal. They enter into a secret engagement.