Racing with Utopia: Selected Speeches and Essays of Grass

Author: (German) Grass (Grass/G.) / Lin Jia et al
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-06-01
Features: Grass is one of Germany's most outstanding contemporary literary figures. His groundbreaking work The Tin Drum has been translated into dozens of languages and sold nearly 500,000 copies. The film adapted from it won the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival in 1979 and the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1980. His other novels, such as The Year of the Dog, Cat and Mouse, Meeting in Teplitz, The Rat Mother, and The Crab Walk, are widely acclaimed and celebrated worldwide. His accolades are as abundant as falling petals, including the prestigious Nobel Prize in Literature, as well as the Gruppe 47 Prize, the Bremer Literature Prize, the Medal of the Free Academy of Arts and Sciences of Hamburg, the Bavarian State Prize for Arts and Sciences, the Büchner Prize, the Fontane Prize, the Thomas Mann Prize, the German Book Peace Prize, the French Best Book Award, the Mondello International Prize for Literature in Italy, the Polish Gold Medal of the Alexander-Majkowski Foundation, the Antonello-Fettinelli International Novel Prize in Rome, the Hidalgo Prize in Spain, the Karel Capek Prize in the Czech Republic, and the Sonning Prize in Denmark, among dozens of other influential German and international awards. Grass is a versatile artist who not only writes novels but also creates poetry and plays; he is also a sculptor and etcher. In recognition of his contributions to literature and the arts, Germany awarded him the title of Member of the Berlin Academy of Sciences and Arts, while universities in the United States, Poland, and many other countries conferred upon him the honors of Doctor and Professor Emeritus.