I have drawn women, not as they are within themselves, but as they were significant in the life of a poet, how they became a poet's fate. Philipp Witkop, at that time a professor of modern German literature, describes the mothers, sisters, wives, and lovers of famous German writers such as Goethe, Heine, Keller, Kleist, Hölderlin, and a few others. With portraits and quotes from letters, it has become an entertaining book that offers private insights into the relationships between these individuals. For example, one learns that Goethe had a very special connection with his younger sister Cornelia and wrote at her wedding: "I lose much in her; she understands and tolerates my whims." This is a reprint of the original edition from 1922.