Reviews for German Handy Dictionary

The average rating for German Handy Dictionary based on 2 reviews is 3 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2016-09-10 00:00:00 Devin Patterson Jacques Cazotte’s novella The Devil in Love (1772) is a story about Alvaro, a cocky and curious youth who brazenly invokes Satan during a capriccio gone awry. Satan is taken aback by Alvaro’s seeming confidence and falls in love with him on the spot, entering his service as a womanly pageboy. Cazotte alternately describes Satan as a male or female, depending on Alvaro’s interpretation at the time – what he wants her/him to be. Satan wants sex, which s/he finally achieves after pages of painstaking trial and error. Alvaro senses that his virginity is in peril and he begins a long journey back to his mother, who is the only protective force to guard him from a night of hot passion. On his way back toward the womb, Alvaro is deflowered in a fallen coach by the side of the road. Like any stalker, Satan loses interest in her conquest once she receives Alvaro’s seed. He returns to his mother a mere carcass of the calla lily he used to be. Cazotte’s tale got me thinking about gender and the devil in literature. I am currently on a devil-reading spree to find out: 1. What affect has gender had on Western civilization’s conception of evil? 2. Was Satan punished – in fictional imagination – only due to his “masculine” aspirations? Or might we find instances in which his seemingly male desires are relayed in feminine terms? In other words, is Satan’s sin femininity?

Review # 2 was written on 2020-02-26 00:00:00 Angela Williams The author did not mean it this way, but as it is, it's a beguiling love story. Very original. Very appropriate for reading in autumn (not scary, but with supernatural occurences). A brief manual on seduction, too :) Quote: 'Then he gave me a short, insistent formula for the calling up of spirits, mingled with a few words I shall never forget'. *** This Dedalus edition has a nice concise explanatory article.