The Bohemian Flats

A Novel

Fiction & Literature, Cultural Heritage, Literary
Cover of the book The Bohemian Flats by Mary Relindes Ellis, University of Minnesota Press
View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart
Author: Mary Relindes Ellis ISBN: 9781452942100
Publisher: University of Minnesota Press Publication: April 15, 2014
Imprint: Univ Of Minnesota Press Language: English
Author: Mary Relindes Ellis
ISBN: 9781452942100
Publisher: University of Minnesota Press
Publication: April 15, 2014
Imprint: Univ Of Minnesota Press
Language: English

In The Bohemian Flats, Mary Relindes Ellis’s rich, imaginative gift carries us from the bourgeois world of fin de siècle Germany to a vibrant immigrant enclave in the heart of the Midwest and to the killing fields of World War I.

Shell shock, as it was called, lands Raimund Kaufmann in a London hospital, a victim of the war but also of his own, and his brother’s, efforts to get out of Germany and build a new life in America. While his recovery eludes him, his memory returns us to Minneapolis, to the Flats, a milling community on the Mississippi River, where Raimund and his brother Albert have sought respite from the oppressive hand of their older brother, now the master of the family farm and brewery. In Minnesota the brothers confront different forms of prejudice, but they also find a chance to remake their lives according to their own principles and wishes—until the war makes their German roots inescapable.

Following these lives, The Bohemian Flats conjures both the sweep of irresistible history and the intimate reality of a man, and a family, caught up in it. From a nineteenth-century German farm to the thriving, wildly diverse immigrant village below Minneapolis on the Mississippi to the European front in World War I, and returning to twentieth-century America—this is a story that takes a reader to the far reaches of human experience and the depths of the human heart.

In The Bohemian Flats, Mary Relindes Ellis’s rich, imaginative gift carries us from the bourgeois world of fin de siècle Germany to a vibrant immigrant enclave in the heart of the Midwest and to the killing fields of World War I.

Shell shock, as it was called, lands Raimund Kaufmann in a London hospital, a victim of the war but also of his own, and his brother’s, efforts to get out of Germany and build a new life in America. While his recovery eludes him, his memory returns us to Minneapolis, to the Flats, a milling community on the Mississippi River, where Raimund and his brother Albert have sought respite from the oppressive hand of their older brother, now the master of the family farm and brewery. In Minnesota the brothers confront different forms of prejudice, but they also find a chance to remake their lives according to their own principles and wishes—until the war makes their German roots inescapable.

Following these lives, The Bohemian Flats conjures both the sweep of irresistible history and the intimate reality of a man, and a family, caught up in it. From a nineteenth-century German farm to the thriving, wildly diverse immigrant village below Minneapolis on the Mississippi to the European front in World War I, and returning to twentieth-century America—this is a story that takes a reader to the far reaches of human experience and the depths of the human heart.

More books from University of Minnesota Press

Cover of the book The Intelligence of a Machine by Mary Relindes Ellis
Cover of the book Answer the Call by Mary Relindes Ellis
Cover of the book Games of Empire by Mary Relindes Ellis
Cover of the book Universes without Us by Mary Relindes Ellis
Cover of the book Little White Houses by Mary Relindes Ellis
Cover of the book Homemade by Mary Relindes Ellis
Cover of the book Lost Minnesota by Mary Relindes Ellis
Cover of the book Inter/Nationalism by Mary Relindes Ellis
Cover of the book Hawk Ridge by Mary Relindes Ellis
Cover of the book Mechademia 10 by Mary Relindes Ellis
Cover of the book Cyberwar and Revolution by Mary Relindes Ellis
Cover of the book Quotational Practices by Mary Relindes Ellis
Cover of the book Gunflint Burning by Mary Relindes Ellis
Cover of the book Measuring Manhood by Mary Relindes Ellis
Cover of the book Predator Empire by Mary Relindes Ellis
We use our own "cookies" and third party cookies to improve services and to see statistical information. By using this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy