Fanny Essler

R. Gordon Moyles is professor emeritus of English at the University of
Alberta, co-author of Imperial Dreams and Colonial Realities: British
Views of Canada, 1880–1914, and author of The Salvation Army and the
Public.

Frederick Philip Grove has been read by and known to several generations of Canadians as one of this country’s finest writers — the author of such “Canadian” classics as Fruits of the Earth and Settlers of the Marsh. It came as a great surprise to most of them to learn, as the research of D.O. Spettigue revealed, that “Grove” was not the writer’s only name; he had, in fact, lived his early life in Germany, from 1879 to 1909, as Felix Paul Greve (a fact which Grove, for reasons only to be guessed at, tried hard to conceal). He had, moreover, prior to the assumption of his Canadian identity, achieved a considerable measure of success as a novelist, poet, and translator.

Much of Grove’s early work is now coming to light. Fanny Essler is the second of his novels to be translated into English and published by Oberon Press; The Master Mason’s House appeared in 1976. Being Grove’s (or Greve’s) first novel — and perhaps being autobiographical — it offers fascinating insights into Grove’s mind and method. It is, as the editors state, “very much a piece with all Grove’s work.” Its naturalistic philosophy (somewhat reminiscent of another German-North American, Theodore Dreiser), its daring subject matter, feminist view-point, and realistic style show what he was — a fine writer at 25 — and point to what he would become. Thus the publication of this book is, for Grove scholars, an important one.

It is difficult to imagine that any readers other than Grove scholars will be interested in the book’s publication. It is, after all, 468 pages long, is published in two parts and costs almost $56.00. But I would be the last to suggest that such ought to be the case. Fanny Essler is, on the whole, an eminently readable novel: expertly translated, it is not stilted, dated, or boring. The portrait of Fanny, seduced by her dream of romantic love, caught in a web of circumstances which ends in death, is poignant and meticulously drawn. Any reader who is willing to venture will find the effort rewarding: Fanny Essler, like all of Grove’s novels, is worth reading for its own sake.