The Rider on the White Horse

“The Rider on the White Horse” begins as a ghost story. A\ntraveler along the coast of the North Sea is caught in dangerously\nrough weather. Offshore he glimpses a spectral rider rising and\nplunging in the wind and rain. Taking shelter at an inn, the\ntraveler mentions the apparition, and the local schoolmaster\nvolunteers a story.

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The story is both simple and subtle, and its peculiar power is\nto surprise us slowly. It is a story of determination, of a young\nman, Hauke Haien, living in a remote community (Storm depicts the\nvillage with the luminous precision of a Vermeer), who is out to\nmake a name for himself and to remake his world. It is a story of\ndevotion and disappointment, of pettiness and superstition, of\nspiritual pride and ultimate desolation, and of the beauty and\nindifference of the natural world. It is a story that opens up in\nthe end to uncover the foundation of savagery on which human\nsociety rests.

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Theodor Storm’s great novella, which will remind readers of the\nwork of Thomas Hardy, is one of the supreme masterpieces of German\nliterature. It is here limpidly translated by the American poet\nJames Wright, along with seven other shorter works, including the\nlyrical love story “Immensee.”

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