Kriterien der Partnerwahl in Fontanes Frau Jenny Treibel

Criticism to date labels the protagonist in Frau Jenny Treibel (1892), Fontane's last Berlin novel, as a social climber and a typical member of the bourgeoisie, and declares the novel as open-ended. The purpose of this study is to show that this is not the case and to demonstrate how the poem--Fontane uses its last line "Wo sich Herz zum Herzen find't" (Where heart finds heart) as subtitle--already adumbrates the basic pattern for all relationships in the novel, good or bad.

The author stresses that in good relationships the different criteria, for instance love or education, have to complement each other; he also shows this is not the case in the unsuccessful ones.

Fontane believes that love is the ideal prerequisite for a happy marriage. In the absence of love he advocates marriages based on very similar interests and goals, which are automatically present when the partners belong to the same group within a limited social stratum.