Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611

  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Background for Love

Background for Love

Wolff, Helen
Detjen, Marion
Wolff, Tristram

Paperback

Series: Pushkin Press Classics

General Fiction

Currently unavailable to order

ISBN10: 1805330748
ISBN13: 9781805330745
Publisher: Pushkin Press Classics
Published: May 6 2025
Pages: 256
Weight: 0.45
Height: 1.10 Width: 5.00 Depth: 7.70
Language: English
A lush autobiographical story of young love, 1930s Côte d'Azur, and rising fascism in Nazi Germany -- by the famed publisher of Calvino, Pasternak, and Gunter Grass

In a giddy rush, a young woman and her older lover leave 1930s Berlin for a summer vacation on the Côte d'Azur. As they drive along stunning bays, linger over sumptuous meals and steal kisses on the street, they seem marvelously in sync, each enchanted by the other. But as she observes her lover's wandering eye and rigid world-view, the woman decides to leave in search of a cottage of her own near Saint-Tropez. There, amid the vineyards and lemon trees, she will forge startling new connections and pass an unforgettable summer of independence and freedom.

Background for Love is an irresistible autobiographical novel by the great publisher Helen Wolff, who together with her husband, Kurt Wolff, Kafka's first publisher, set up Pantheon Books in America after fleeing Nazi Germany. In the fascinating companion essay, historian Marion Detjen, the author's great-niece, delves into Helen's path to writing and the autobiographical context of the novel in her early life with Kurt. Helen is remembered as a great publisher, a multilingual reader who brought authors such as Italo Calvino and Georges Simenon to English-speaking readers - only now is her own reputation as a writer coming to the fore.

Recently recovered from the archive and translated for the 1st time by Tristram Wolff, the author's grandson, this is a a fast-paced, highly intense, and emotionally gripping novel of passion and self-discovery.

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