Hermine: An Animal Life / Edition 1

by Maria Beig, Jaimy Gordon

Overview

Fiction. Translation. "Marie Beig's HERMINE is a heartbreaking bestiary, a human life told in sixty-four animals. The book's design is apt, since its protagonist elicits less regard from her farm family than its animals do. Imagine a world in which your first memories are of your 'father's bad-tempered scowl and the angry faces of sisters and brothers who were struck and struck back.' A world in which tenderness is 'always turning away again to someone else' — -Jim Shepard. Translated from the German by Jaimy Gordon.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781930974487
Publisher:	New Issues Poetry and Prose
Publication date:	01/01/2005
Series:	New Issues Poetry & Prose Series
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	186
Product dimensions:	5.00(w) x 8.00(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

MARIA BEIG was born in rural Upper Swabia, in the south of Germany, in 1920. Author of eight novels and four short story collections, she won the Alemannischer Literaturpreis in 1983, the Literaturpreis of the City of Stuttgart in 1997, and the Hebbel-Preis in 2004.

What People are Saying About This

Jim Shepard

“Maria Beig's Hermine is a heartbreaking bestiary, a life told in sixty-four animals. The book’s design is apt, since its protagonist elicits less regard from her farm family than its animals do. Imagine a world in which your first memories are of your ‘father’s bad-tempered scowl and the angry faces of sisters and brothers who were struck and struck back.’ . . . Maria Beig is the preeminent tour guide to the stunningly stark emotional and spiritual deprivations that afflicted German farm folk in the early twentieth century.”

Editorial Reviews

It’s not just a dog’s life—it’s a pig-cow-rat’s life. In this deftly executed allegorical novel, Beig (Lost Weddings) gives an episodic, animal-centered account of the life of a young woman in rural Germany between the two world wars. Brief chapters—"Horse," "Cat," "Pig," etc.—recount the protagonist’s less-than-idyllic encounters with the natural world. At birth, Hermine resembles a mutant horse; at school, she finds herself unable to write the assigned essay "Hurray, We’re Slaughtering!" As a young teacher, she inadvertently causes the injury of a pupil during a spirited game based on a bear hunt, and she maims a badger with her motorbike. Disowned by her family for killing their pet goose, she is even scolded by her husband: "No one can have an animal with you around." Granted, "some days Hermine liked well enough," but most days she loses her battle with the bestiary. . . .This earthy, unsentimental novel is the perfect holiday gift for nihilists with a sense of humor.”—Publishers Weekly

From the Publisher