Bertha Garlan

In a quiet hillside town, Bertha Garlan seems to have settled into widowhood with dutiful calm, raising her little son Fritz, teaching music, and returning almost ritualistically to her husband's grave. But spring, memory, and music begin to unsettle the balance she has built. Beneath the routine lies the ache of a life narrowed by family pressure, lost artistic promise, and a marriage she accepted only after disappointment had worn down her resistance. As Bertha recalls her youth in Vienna, she remembers the ambitions for a musical career that were cut short, and the men who marked the path from hope to resignation: the steady Victor Mathias Garlan, who later became her husband, and Emil Lindbach, the gifted lover of her imagination and regret. Encounters with the cynical Herr Klingemann, the ailing Herr Rupius, and the respectable world around her sharpen her awareness of loneliness, desire, and the fragile disguises of domestic life. When the chance comes to travel to Vienna and meet Emil, Bertha is forced to confront the woman she was, the woman she has become, and the dangerous possibility of reclaiming passion at the cost of everything she has known. This edition has been fully restored with modern typesetting, custom cover design.