{"product_id":"memoirs-of-a-polar-bear-9780811225786","title":"Memoirs of a Polar Bear","description":"\u003cp\u003e \u003cem\u003eThe Memoirs of a Polar Bear\u003c\/em\u003e has in spades what Rivka Galchen hailed in the \u003cem\u003eNew Yorker\u003c\/em\u003e as \"Yoko Tawada's magnificent strangeness\"--Tawada is an author like no other. Three generations (grandmother, mother, son) of polar bears are famous as both circus performers and writers in East Germany: they are polar bears who move in human society, stars of the ring and of the literary world. In chapter one, the grandmother matriarch in the Soviet Union accidentally writes a bestselling autobiography. In chapter two, Tosca, her daughter (born in Canada, where her mother had emigrated) moves to the DDR and takes a job in the circus. Her son--the last of their line--is Knut, born in chapter three in a Leipzig zoo but raised by a human keeper in relatively happy circumstances in the Berlin zoo, until his keeper, Matthias, is taken away...\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eHappy or sad, each bear writes a story, enjoying both celebrity and \"the intimacy of being alone with my pen.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eTawada, Yoko:\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e - Yoko Tawada was born in Tokyo in 1960, moved to Hamburg when she was twenty-two, and then moved again to Berlin in 2006. She writes in both Japanese and German, and has received the Akutagawa Prize, the Adelbert von Chamisso Prize, the Tanizaki Prize, and the Goethe Medal.\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eBernofsky, Susan:\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e - The translator of Yoko Tawada, Franz Kafka, and Robert Walser, among others, \u003cstrong\u003eSusan Bernofsky\u003c\/strong\u003e is currently working on a biography of Walser.\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eTawada, Yoko:\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e - \u003cstrong\u003eYoko Tawada\u003c\/strong\u003e was born in Tokyo in 1960, moved to Hamburg when she was twenty-two, and then to Berlin in 2006. She writes in both Japanese and German and has received the Akutagawa, Lessing, Kleist, Noma, Adelbert von Chamisso and Tanizaki prizes as well as the Goethe Medal. In 2018 her novel \u003cem\u003eThe Emissary\u003c\/em\u003e won the National Book Award.","brand":"New Directions Publishing Corporation","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":50623115034898,"sku":"9780811225786","price":12.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_59d5b610-350a-4686-859c-8ad601c67421.jpg?v=1732592298","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/memoirs-of-a-polar-bear-9780811225786","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}