Animal Triste

Monika Maron was born in Berlin in 1941. Raised in the German Democratic Republic, she immigrated to West Germany in 1988. Brigitte Goldstein, a production editor at Rutgers University Press, has numerous translations to her credit, including Gertrud Kolmar's A Jewish Mother from Berlin and Susanna.

"Maron's exquisite language, highlighted at times by lyrical flourish, retains much of its splendor in English, thanks to the fine translation by Brigitte Goldstein. While it certainly ranks among the most interesting novels to have emerged from Germany since unification, Animal Triste has an allure that extends beyond its sociopolitical context. Maron's concerns revolve around the healing not only of a broken nation but also around that of a broken heart."-New York Times Book Review New York Times Book Review "An elegiac novel by contemporary German writer Monika Maron in which one great, late-life love affair possesses the mind and soul of the elderly narrator... Merging into one blurred obsessive dream, her memories take on a life of their own."-Publishers Weekly Publishers Weekly "[A] disturbing but erotic novel of remembrance... Examining the relationship between passion and our instinctive animal selves, Maron demonstrates how we can allow ourselves to be driven by love to defy both social rules and our own natural instinct for survival."-Booklist Booklist "The impact of the changed historical sphere on the writing subject is described with bittersweet self-irony but with full appreciation of a passionate life lived. Brigitte Goldstein ... offers the English reader a translation close to the original, thereby retaining the subtle ironic undertones. Describing the difficult relationship between West and East in terms of lovers unable to meet each other is not new, but the way the text leads the reader to the final showdown is remarkable."-Irena E. Furhoff, International Fiction Review -- Irena E. Furhoff International Fiction Review