{"id":490,"date":"2018-11-13T15:00:04","date_gmt":"2018-11-13T15:00:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/?p=490"},"modified":"2018-11-13T15:00:04","modified_gmt":"2018-11-13T15:00:04","slug":"yoko-tawada-memoirs-of-a-polar-bear","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2018\/11\/13\/yoko-tawada-memoirs-of-a-polar-bear\/","title":{"rendered":"Life through a furry lens: Yoko Tawada, Memoirs of a Polar Bear"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2>Translated from the German by Susan Bernofsky (Portobello Books, 2016)<\/h2>\n<p>Three generations of polar bears talk about their lives in this offbeat gem, winner of\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/warwick.ac.uk\/newsandevents\/pressreleases\/warwick_announces_the\/\">the inaugural Warwick Prize for Women in Translation in 2017<\/a>. At first I was a bit nonplussed when I was given this book as a gift: animal narrators are one of those quirks that usually make a novel fall into the \u201cnot my thing\u201d category (although, as I mentioned in <a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2018\/10\/10\/warwick-prize-for-women-in-translation-2018\/\">a previous post<\/a>, I am trying to challenge my own perceptions about what is or is not \u201cmy thing\u201d). Irrational dismissal of articulate polar bears aside, it\u2019s hard to argue with the multiple positive reviews on the jacket cover:\u00a0\u201cenchanting\u201d, \u201cprofound\u201d, \u201cbeautiful\u201d, \u201cmagnificent\u201d, \u201cexquisite\u201d and \u201cbeguiling\u201d are just some of the accolades bestowed on\u00a0<em>Memoirs of a Polar Bear<\/em>, and I can&#8217;t say it doesn&#8217;t merit this proliferation of appreciative adjectives. From the self-reflective memoirist grandmother who narrates the first part, on to her dancing circus performer daughter whose life is chronicled by her trainer in the second section, and finally to the baby polar bear whose first months are recounted in the final part, Yoko Tawada steps outside human narration to better observe human nature.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_491\" style=\"width: 230px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-491\" class=\"wp-image-491 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/601\/2018\/11\/9781846276323.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"230\" height=\"353\" srcset=\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/601\/2018\/11\/9781846276323.jpg 230w, https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/601\/2018\/11\/9781846276323-195x300.jpg 195w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 230px) 100vw, 230px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-491\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Image from portobellobooks.com<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Though Tawada is a prestigious writer in both Japan and Germany (she was born in Tokyo but moved to Germany in her twenties, and writes in both Japanese and German), <em>Memoirs of a Polar Bear <\/em>was the first of her novels to be published in the United Kingdom (she has since\u00a0 published\u00a0<em>Last Children of Tokyo<\/em>, translated from the Japanese by Margaret Mitsutani). Tawada\u2019s translator from German, Susan Bernofsky, was also the translator of Jenny Erpenbeck\u2019s <em>The End of Days <\/em>(another Portobello Books jewel), and if you read my <a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2018\/06\/04\/jenny-erpenbeck-the-end-of-days\/\">review<\/a> of that then you\u2019ll know how much I admire Bernofsky. I have not yet read a single Portobello book that I haven\u2019t enjoyed, and I hope that when <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thebookseller.com\/news\/granta-shutters-portobello-imprint-865286\">Granta Books shutters the Portobello imprint<\/a> next year, the magnificent women in translation catalogue continues to grow. Neither Portobello nor Bernofsky disappoint here; Bernofksy\u2019s prose in her translation of <em>Memoirs of a Polar Bear<\/em> is just beautiful. There were sections that I read over and over, so that their beauty could sink in fully (\u201cSuddenly a thought struck me like a stone: I can never see him again. Of course it was perfectly possible that I\u2019d never have been able to see him again even if he\u2019d remained alive. But I would have gone on thinking now and then: Maybe I\u2019ll see him again after all. This \u2018maybe\u2019 is what human beings call hope. My \u2018maybe\u2019 was dead.\u201d) There is no unnecessary flourish or embellishment: the prose is lyrical but not florid, poetic but not melodramatic. In a novel of 250 pages, there were only two words that struck me as imperfect; it is truly a remarkable feat to translate so much with such beauty.<\/p>\n<p>The polar bear protagonists are shown in all their humanity, while never losing the characteristics that make them bears.\u00a0 The humans are observed close-up, their smells giving away their feelings and their body language belying their intentions: as it turns out, the polar bears are able to observe the human characters more accurately than any homo sapiens narrator could. It is through the eyes of animals that the complexity of human relationships and historical progress are brought to light: from the restrictions of the Communist regime to concerns about climate change, human history and characteristics are observed and questioned, without ever moralising or turning to propaganda. The three bears \u2013 the unnamed exiled memoirist of the first section, her daughter Tosca, and Tosca\u2019s son Knut \u2013 are as flawed and as fallible as the humans they seek to understand, but their characterisation and narration is close to divine.<\/p>\n<p>The most remarkable section of this book, in my opinion, was the final one (about a bear cub and his beloved zookeeper). As far as I can tell, this is where the writing process might have started: Knut is the real-life bear born in Berlin Zoo in 2006, whose progress was recorded in minute detail and who captured hearts worldwide while he was a cub. The relationship between Knut and his keeper Matthias moved me deeply and had me thinking about the story long after I had closed the book: the bond is described from Knut\u2019s point of view, and he understands Matthias to be a parent to him, a person who is Knut\u2019s whole universe and who protects him from any threats or danger. Reading this attachment through the child\u2019s eyes was a moving experience for me, and the pivotal moment when we realise that the third-person narrative voice was actually Knut\u2019s all along is one of great beauty. Knut\u2019s reaction when Matthias has to be kept from him for his own safety is heartbreaking; Tawada is\u00a0 skilled at observing seemingly small incidents and the magnitude of their impact on an individual (furred or not). The boundaries between human and animal, reality and fiction, love and ownership, individual and collective experience are all blurred, erased, moved, and re-drawn, and for a book I thought would be \u201cnot my thing\u201d, <em>Memoirs of a Polar Bear <\/em>was memorable for all the right reasons. I am glad and grateful to have had the opportunity to read it, and I can only urge you to do the same (if you haven\u2019t already).<\/p>\n<p>The second Warwick Prize for Women in Translation will be awarded TONIGHT, Tuesday 13th November, in a ceremony starting at 6.30pm BST. I\u2019m so sad that I can\u2019t be there, but shall be following it closely on social media \u2013 you can see the shortlist <a href=\"https:\/\/warwick.ac.uk\/newsandevents\/pressreleases\/2018_warwick_prize_for_women_in_translation_shortlist_announced1\/\">here<\/a>!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Translated from the German by Susan Bernofsky (Portobello Books, 2016) Three generations of polar bears talk about their lives in this offbeat gem, winner of\u00a0the inaugural Warwick Prize for Women in Translation in 2017. At first I was a bit nonplussed when I was given this book as a gift: animal narrators are one of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[755,879,999,1055,1065],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Life through a furry lens: Yoko Tawada, Memoirs of a Polar Bear - Translating Women<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2018\/11\/13\/yoko-tawada-memoirs-of-a-polar-bear\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Life through a furry lens: Yoko Tawada, Memoirs of a Polar Bear - Translating Women\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Translated from the German by Susan Bernofsky (Portobello Books, 2016) Three generations of polar bears talk about their lives in this offbeat gem, winner of\u00a0the inaugural Warwick Prize for Women in Translation in 2017. At first I was a bit nonplussed when I was given this book as a gift: animal narrators are one of [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2018\/11\/13\/yoko-tawada-memoirs-of-a-polar-bear\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Translating Women\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2018-11-13T15:00:04+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blogs.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/files\/2018\/11\/9781846276323.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Mark\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Mark\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"5 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2018\/11\/13\/yoko-tawada-memoirs-of-a-polar-bear\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2018\/11\/13\/yoko-tawada-memoirs-of-a-polar-bear\/\",\"name\":\"Life through a furry lens: Yoko Tawada, Memoirs of a Polar Bear - 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