It's a beautiful paradox: precisely those novels that take us far back in time sometimes bring us most clearly into the present. Das Mädchen aus den Träumen is the first volume of the Rhineland Saga by Günter Krieger – and although it begins in medieval Rhineland, it tells of questions that burn no less fiercely today than they did in 1278.
What makes this medieval novel so contemporary is not an anachronistic "message," but the consistency with which it reveals mechanisms: how violence arises in groups, how a community judges, how rumors take hold, how power relations are inscribed in bodies – and how difficult it is not only to name responsibility, but to bear it. The 13th century here doesn't seem "alien," but like a mirror in which we recognize our own patterns, only more sharply contoured.
When Rumors Kill: Public Opinion Without the Internet
Today, we talk a lot about shitstorms, about digital pillories, about outrage that destroys people's careers. "The Girl from the Dreams" shows how old this principle is – and how effective it has always been. After the violence Eva experiences, the social order collapses. Not because new laws are enacted, but because the city looks at things differently. The "Lion" is shunned. Whispers, interpretations, and accusations abound. Eva becomes an object, not a subject. This form of social violence is terrifyingly modern: a person is not only hurt, but also written out of the community.
The contemporary relevance lies not in obvious parallels, but in the feeling we all know: How quickly can a life tip over when others hold the interpretive authority? And what is left for a person when their own narrative no longer counts? Precisely because the novel, as a historical novel from the Rhineland, works so meticulously, this question doesn't feel "forced," but compelling.
Guilt, Responsibility, and the Longing for Simple Morality
Our time loves clear lines. Perpetrator here, victim there. And yes: the novel leaves no doubt that guilt exists and has consequences. But it also shows how complicated the "aftermath" is. Martin Chorus is not a hero who "falls" only to be redeemed later. He is a man who has to live with his deed – and precisely this life becomes an imposition. Who is Martin after the crime? What is remorse worth if it cannot undo anything? And is it permissible to feel pity without relativizing?
This ambivalence is uncomfortable, but it is necessary. Because that is precisely how we experience moral reality: rarely neat, often contradictory. In this respect, "Das Mädchen aus den Träumen" is not just a tragic love story, but a novel about guilt and atonement – and about the question of whether responsibility is a feeling or an action. Those who wish to emotionally deepen this core will find a suitable perspective in the article on broken love and scars of life.
Female Self-Assertion: Not a Manifesto, but Reality
Perhaps the novel's strongest contemporary relevance lies in Eva. She is not relabeled as a "modern" figure, but she is a woman who refuses to disappear into the role assigned to her. She must leave because she is not allowed to stay. She must start anew because society deprives her of her old existence. And she must do so with the means of her time: work, tenacity, clever adaptation, sometimes even silent endurance. This is not a manifesto, but a very real portrayal of how women throughout centuries had to navigate between structure and self-assertion.
In the author's interview with the publisher, a sentence emerges that acts like a silent compass: "But it is important to me to show that the Middle Ages was no pony farm." This is more than just a tone. It is the decision not to aestheticize suffering – and at the same time not to claim that there is only darkness for Eva. For the novel also shows: Amidst the hardship, bonds, solidarity, and sometimes even hope arise. Not as a comfort, but as a form of survival.
Why a Medieval Novel Comforts Us Today – Precisely by Disturbing Us
It sounds paradoxical, but it is an ancient reader's need: we seek not only distraction in a novel, but also orientation. Not answers, but an experience. Krieger mentions in the interview that for some readers, it can be "soothing or even therapeutic" to see that people have "always" carried scars. This is precisely the quiet comfort of this book: not that everything will be fine – but that one is not alone with what marks them.
And that is why the first volume of the Rhineland Saga does not end with a final conclusion, but with a feeling that the author himself explicitly desires. In the interview, he calls it: unease. This unease is present in the best sense. For it forces us to think further – about violence, about community, about responsibility, about the way we judge people. It turns a medieval novel into a novel that continues to work in the present day, long after it has been closed.
Perhaps that is the true contemporary relevance of "Das Mädchen aus den Träumen": It shows that societal patterns do not disappear just because centuries pass. They change their clothes, their media, their language – but they remain recognizable. And in the midst of it all stands a character like Eva, who despite everything keeps going, and a novel that does not release us until we have asked ourselves how we would act. That such a book comes from the Rhineland and remains so consistent is no coincidence – it is the signature of Günter Krieger.
The book is available in German as a printed, i.e., hardcover edition (ISBN 978-3-910347-83-0) and as an EPUB (ISBN 978-3-910347-84-7) in bookstores or here in the publisher's shop.
