<p>First published on the eve of the First World War, Keyserling's masterpiece offers a vivid portrait of a society on the verge of dissolution.<br>A group of German aristocrats gathers at a seaside village on the Baltic Sea for a summer holiday in the early years of the twentieth century. The characters represent a cross-section of the upper classes of imperial Germany: a philandering baron, his jealous wife, a gallant cavalry officer, the ...