A stern and upright master builder, his devoted daughters, and the young men who love them stand at the heart of Master Johannes Wacht, E. T. A. Hoffmann's tender final tale of craft, conscience, and family.
Written in 1822, in the last year of the author's life, this is one of Hoffmann's quieter works – a warm, closely observed portrait of an artisan household in old Bamberg, where pride, faith, and the rivalry of two apprentices shape a family's fortunes. Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffmann (1776 – 1822), the Königsberg-born jurist, composer, and giant of German Romanticism, is best remembered for his fantastical stories, yet here he turns to the everyday world with rare gentleness and feeling.