A hilarious,tragic novel about a would-be movie star in 1920s Berlin,from the author of Child of All Nations Doris is going to be a big star. Wearing a stolen fur coat and recently fired from her office job,she takes an all-night train to Berlin to make it in the movies. But what she encounters in the city is not fame and fortune,but gnawing hunger,seedy bars,and exploitative men - and as Doris sinks ever lower,she resorts to desperate measures to survive. Very funny and intensely moving,this is a dazzling portrait of roaring Berlin in the 1920s,and a poignant exploration of the doomed pursuit of fame and glamour.The Artificial Silk Girl was a huge bestseller in Weimar Germany before the Nazis banned it,and is today Keun's best-loved book in Germany. Funny,fresh and radical in its dissection of the limited options available to working women,it is a novel that speaks to our times.
Publisher: Penguin Books LtdISBN: 9780241382967Number of pages: 160Weight: 123 gDimensions: 198 x 129 x 9 mm
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Just now I want to tell everyone about Irmgard Keun...A great writerKeun has few rivals - I can think of none - as a chronicler of the ambience or the consequences of the rise of NazismThe Artificial Silk Girl follows Doris into the underbelly of a city that had once seemed all glamour and promise...Kathie von Ankum's English translation will bring this masterwork to the foreground once more,giving a new generation the chance to discover Keun for themselvesDamned by the Nazis,hailed by the feminists...a truly charming window into a young woman's life in the early 1930sA young girl navigates interwar German society and the expectations - or lack thereof - placed upon women,in this poignant,melancholy novel...This heartbreaking story of dashed hopes is one that still has the power to affect and inspire
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