This selection of three of Storm's most impressive narratives, two of them appearing in English for the first time, represents three stages in the development of a German writer whose best work ranks with that of Thomas Hardy.

Immensee (1850), a love-story whose powerful atmosphere is heightened by all-pervasive symbols and folksong-like verse, has long been a favourite of both the German- and English-speaking worlds. Journey to a Hallig (1871) is the free-roving story of a journey in more than one sense, both a magical evocation of the German North Sea coast in high summer and a layered account of an inner journey back into an old man's past. Hans and Heinz Kirch (1882), one of Storm's masterpieces, is a tragic tale of father-son conflict set among the Kleinburger mercantile community of the German Baltic Seaboard.

Denis Jackson's absorbing introduction and end notes, and maps to two of the stories, will enhance the reader's enjoyment of this poetic, eloquent fiction which is so strongly rooted in time and place.