They tend to end on a positive note, with the hero's foolish mistakes and painful disappointments behind him and a life of usefulness ahead.
The first novelistic development of the theme, Goethe's Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship, remains a classic example of this form that grew out of folklore tales in which a dunce goes out into the world seeking adventure. They tend to end on a positive note, with the hero's foolish mistakes and painful disappointments behind him and a life of usefulness ahead. FTP, name these novels in German literature that deal with the formative years of the main character, roughly translating as "novel of growing up."
The first novelistic development of the theme, Goethe's Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship, remains a classic example of this form that grew out of folklore tales in which a dunce goes out into the world seeking adventure.
{Bildungsroman}