Longlisted for this year’s Independent Foreign Fiction Prize, ‘The Giraffe’s Neck’ by Judith Schalansky and translated from the German by Shaun Whiteside tells the story of Inge Lohmark, a biology teacher approaching the end of her career at a high school in a former East German country backwater. She has a firm belief in Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution yet, somewhat ironically, she is highly resistant to adapting to change in her own life.
Tag Archives: Germany
The Giraffe’s Neck by Judith Schalansky
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Dominion by C. J. Sansom
‘Dominion’ by C. J. Sansom is an alternate history of what could have happened if Winston Churchill had failed to become Prime Minister in 1940 and Britain had signed a treaty with Germany ending the Second World War. In 1952, David Fitzgerald is a civil servant hiding his Jewish identity and secretly working for the British Resistance movement as a spy. His mission is to rescue his friend, Frank Muncaster, from a mental hospital before the Gestapo discover his terrible secret which could potentially change the balance of world power. Continue reading
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The Reader by Bernhard Schlink
‘The Reader’ by Bernhard Schlink tells the story of fifteen year old Michael Berg who has an intense affair with a much older woman, Hanna Schmitz. Years later, Michael discovers that Hanna, who was an SS guard at Auschwitz, is being prosecuted for war crimes after World War II. Michael, now a law student, watches her trial and tries to come to terms with the collective guilt surrounding Germany’s past. Continue reading
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