Resumen
Resumen de Andanzas
Para quién es
Readers who enjoy light comedy, railway and steamboat journeys, spa towns and cheerful muddles, and anyone who has ever been told they look just like somebody else.
De qué trata este libro
Wanderings is a comic novel by Friedrich Gerstäcker, a German writer who died in 1872. It follows Fritz Wessel, a portrait painter of twenty-eight, who owns a face that every stranger seems to know. His father sends him to the Rhine to see the world and perhaps find a wife. What he finds instead is a string of mix-ups, slaps, searches and suspicions.
The book is built from short scenes full of talk, and it plays with one simple idea. What happens to a man who looks like everyone? Along the way you meet a young Russian beauty on a train, a mad captain in a house of strange locks, and a family whose daughters Fritz has never really met. You also get a lively picture of travel in the days of new railways, steamboats and spa towns, with their crowded carriages, grand hotels and gambling rooms. Let us begin where the trouble begins, at a breakfast table in the town of Hassburg.
En este resumen
- 1A father decides his son must travelFree
- 2A charming stranger on the train
- 3A madhouse in Mainz and a gambling hall in Ems
- 4Cologne, a wrong family and a girl in trouble
- 5A wrong accusation and a poor major
- 6Faces, names and what we assume
Idea clave 1 de 6
A father decides his son must travel
The story opens in the house of Councilor Wessel, a senior town official in Hassburg. His son Fritz sits at breakfast with coffee, a cigar and a newspaper, quite happy with life. Fritz is a popular portrait painter, especially of children, and he has never worried about anything. His father paces the room with a long pipe and finally speaks. A night watchman has been beaten and the glass face of the town hall clock has been shot to pieces, and two watchmen swear that Fritz did it.
Fritz denies everything and offers his own explanation. He has such an ordinary face that strangers take him for other people all the time. Ushers wave him into theaters, and a man in Berlin even asked him to pay a bill that belonged to somebody else. His father half believes him, but he has made up his mind anyway. Fritz is lazy by nature, he says, and needs to learn about the seriousness of life. The cure is travel, and in time perhaps a wife.
Fritz agrees, mostly so that nobody can call him weak. He plans to go up the Rhine with his sketchbook and drift from town to town without a plan. His father is pleased, and he insists on a passport. At the police office Fritz is annoyed to read that his build is average, and he does not like that word one bit.
On the street he meets his old schoolmate Klaus Beldorf, who has found a fiancée on the Rhine. She is Rosa, the elder daughter of Dr. Raspe of Mainz, and she has a younger sister called Viola. Klaus first offers a letter and then takes it back, afraid his friend will start some prank. Then Fritz's father gives him four letters of introduction, and one of them is for Dr. Raspe. Two roads seem to lead to the same door.
That’s 1 of 6 key points.
The rest of the summary, written and spoken, and the whole book: free to start.
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Questions about Andanzas
What is Wanderings by Friedrich Gerstäcker about?
It is a comic novel about Fritz Wessel, a painter whose father sends him up the Rhine to find a wife. His ordinary face makes strangers mistake him for others, and he lands in trouble at every stop.
Who is Fritz Wessel in Wanderings?
Fritz is a portrait painter of twenty-eight from Hassburg, known for his pictures of children. He is kind, easygoing and a little lazy, and he is always being taken for somebody else because of his ordinary face.
Why does everyone mistake Fritz for someone else?
Fritz says he has such an ordinary face that it suits any disguise. Strangers greet him by other names, the police suspect him, and a thief using his name adds to the confusion. The mix-ups drive the whole story.
Is Wanderings a true story and when was it written?
It is fiction by the German author Friedrich Gerstäcker, set in the age of new railways and steamboats along the Rhine, with real places such as Mainz, Ems, Koblenz and Cologne.
Is Wanderings easy to read?
Yes, the chapters are short and full of conversation, with plain language and lively scenes. The jokes come quickly, and the main storyline of a young man travelling and getting into scrapes is simple to follow.