How long does it take to read Gertrude?
Gertrude by Hermann Hesse takes about 4 hours 21 minutes to read at 250 words a minute.
About 4 hours 21 minutes
A weekend read
First published 1910. 237 pages, about 65,175 words.
9 days at 30 minutes a day
Estimate based on 275 words per page.
At other speeds
| Slow, 150 words a minute | 7 hours 15 minutes |
| Average, 250 words a minute | 4 hours 21 minutes |
| Fast, 400 words a minute | 2 hours 43 minutes |
The page count is the median across 30 editions, so your copy may differ. How we calculate.
About the book
In this fictional memoir, the renowned composer Kuhn recounts his tangled relationships with two artists--his friend Heinrich Muoth, a brooding, self-destructive opera singer, and the gentle, self-assured Gertrude Imthor. Kuhn is drawn to Gertrude upon their first meeting, but Gertrude falls in love with Heinrich, to whom she is introduced when Kuhn auditions them for the leads in his new opera. Hopelessly ill-matched, Gertrude and Heinrich have a disastrous marriage that leaves them both ruined. Yet this tragic affair also becomes the inspiration for Kuhn's opera, the most important success of his artistic life.
Subjects: Fiction, Composers, People with disabilities, Opera, Man-woman relationships, Fiction, general
