In the Fire of the Forge: A Romance of Old Nuremberg — Volume 01
1895
In the Fire of the Forge: A Romance of Old Nuremberg — Volume 01
1895
Translated by Mary J. (Mary Joanna) Safford
Georg Ebers, the celebrated Egyptologist-turned-novelist, transports readers to medieval Nuremberg in 1281, where the clang of the forge mingles with the whisper of forbidden love. This is a world where honor is currency, family name is destiny, and the heart's desires are luxuries few can afford. Wolff Eysvogel, heir to a wealthy merchant house, faces a future as rigidly prescribed as the cobblestones beneath his feet, until he finds himself entangled not just with his betrothed Els Ortlieb, but with the dangerous pull of her sister Eva. Meanwhile, the knight Heinz Schorlin moves through these gilded cages like a blade, his bold devotion to Eva threatening to shatter her carefully constructed world of faith and devotion. Ebers paints Nuremberg as a living character itself: its narrow streets, its merchant dynasties, its political machinations, all serving as the forge in which these four souls are hammered, stretched, and tested. The romance here is not mere sentiment, it is a negotiation between duty and desire, between the self one is born into and the self one longs to become. For readers who savor historical fiction that earns its emotions through specificity and atmosphere, this remains a masterwork of the genre.
