On Tangled Paths (Angel Classics)

Fontane reminds me of Chekhov in that he shows, on the surface, the indifferent passage of time, and also, resisting it, human wishes and desires trying to strike out on their own. Here, Botho, an impoverished young nobleman, is having an affair with Lene, a young working-class woman. So far, typical for the time depicted. The problem is that the two of them love each other, and it is this love, as it fights or adapts to the currents of their lives, that transforms them and the novel.