Lilly and Her Slave

Hans Fallada

Aug 2023 · Tantor Media Inc · Narrated by Christine Rendel

Audiobook

8 hr 5 min

Unabridged

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About this audiobook

It was the turning point before he became a bestselling author: Hans Fallada handed himself in to the police in September 1925, following repeated cases of embezzlement to finance his alcohol and morphine addiction. At the time, a court-appointed doctor was assigned to assess the extent to which Fallada could be made accountable. This expert opinion, thought to have been lost, was only recently rediscovered. It is an extraordinary find, because it includes unpublished and rewritten stories by Fallada that focus on hitherto taboo topics such as abortion. The title character, Lilly, sets out to "play" with a young man, but ends up losing control of the situation. Barely able to hide her questionable actions, she ends up in a sanatorium, where she engages in a bizarre duel of reciprocal manipulation with another patient. Marie and Thilde, the protagonists of two other stories, are strong women who rebel against the pre-established patterns imposed on them by society, while two male outsiders, Pogg and Robinson, seek refuge and hope in a prison cell. These stories reveal to a new generation Fallada's immense gifts and his intense battles with the dynamics of human relationships.

About the author

Hans Fallada (1893-1947) was the pen name of German author Rudolf Ditzen, whose books were international bestsellers. During World War II, he was cast into a Nazi insane asylum, where he secretly wrote The Drinker. Immediately after the war he wrote his last two novels, Nightmare in Berlin and Alone in Berlin.

Christine Rendel is a British-born audiobook narrator living in New York. Drawing on a strong stage and musical theater background, and a lifelong love of books, she has narrated nearly 100 fiction and nonfiction audiobooks for major publishers as well as small independent houses.

Alexandra Roesch is a bicultural, bilingual freelance translator based in Frankfurt, Germany. An experienced translator of fiction and nonfiction, she has an MA in translation from the University of Bristol and was longlisted for the 2018 Helen & Kurt Wolff Translator's Prize.

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