Conrad Ferdinand Meyer

Conrad Ferdinand Meyer was a Swiss poet and novelist associated with nineteenth-century literary realism and especially admired for historical novellas. Writing in German after years of uncertainty between German and French, he developed tightly composed narratives set amid religious and political conflict. Gustav Adolfs Page Von Conrad Ferdinand Meyer is the supplied catalogue title for his 1882 novella Gustav Adolfs Page. Set during the Thirty Years’ War, it imagines a young woman disguised as a male page in the service of the Swedish king Gustavus Adolphus. The story joins personal concealment to the demands of court, military loyalty, and approaching battle. Meyer’s other historical fiction includes The Saint, The Shot from the Pulpit, The Amulet, and Jürg Jenatsch. The novella’s compressed action and tragic direction are characteristic of his method, which places invented private lives beside recognizable historical figures. Gustav Adolfs Page Von Conrad Ferdinand Meyer also became the basis for later stage and screen interpretations, extending the work beyond its original literary setting.