The Hare with Amber Eyes
Encyclopedia
The Hare with Amber Eyes (2010) is a family memoir by British ceramicist Edmund de Waal
. Waal tells the story of his family the Ephrussi
, who were once a very wealthy European Jewish banking dynasty centered in Odessa, Vienna and Paris, peers of the Rothschild family
. The Ephrussi lost almost everything in 1938 when their property was "Aryanized" by Nazis. After the war the family never recovered most of the their extensive property including priceless artwork, but an easily hidden collection of 250 Japanese netsuke
miniature sculptures was miraculously saved, tucked away inside the mattress of a loyal maid during the war years. The collection was passed down as inheritance through five generations providing a common thread to tell the story of the Ephrussi fortunes from 1871 to 2009.
Edmund de Waal
Edmund Arthur Lowndes de Waal OBE is a British ceramic artist, and author of The Hare with Amber Eyes . He has worked as a curator, lecturer, art critic and art historian and is a Professor of Ceramics at the University of Westminster. He has received several awards and honours for his...
. Waal tells the story of his family the Ephrussi
Ephrussi family
The Ephrussi family were a Jewish banking and oil dynasty who originated in Odessa, Ukraine. The family were elevated to the nobility by the Habsburg emperor. The family controlled large-scale oil resources in the Crimea and the Caucasus. They had made their initial fortune controlling grain...
, who were once a very wealthy European Jewish banking dynasty centered in Odessa, Vienna and Paris, peers of the Rothschild family
Rothschild family
The Rothschild family , known as The House of Rothschild, or more simply as the Rothschilds, is a Jewish-German family that established European banking and finance houses starting in the late 18th century...
. The Ephrussi lost almost everything in 1938 when their property was "Aryanized" by Nazis. After the war the family never recovered most of the their extensive property including priceless artwork, but an easily hidden collection of 250 Japanese netsuke
Netsuke
Netsuke are miniature sculptures that were invented in 17th-century Japan to serve a practical function...
miniature sculptures was miraculously saved, tucked away inside the mattress of a loyal maid during the war years. The collection was passed down as inheritance through five generations providing a common thread to tell the story of the Ephrussi fortunes from 1871 to 2009.
Awards and honours
- 2011 Ondaatje PrizeOndaatje PrizeThe Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje Prize is an annual literary award given by the Royal Society of Literature. The £10,000 award is given for a work of fiction, non-fiction or poetry which evokes the "spirit of a place", and which is written by someone who is a citizen of or who has been...
, winner. - 2011 JQ Wingate Prize, shortlist.
- 2011 ALA Notable Book.
- 2010 Costa Book AwardsCosta Book AwardsThe Costa Book Awards are a series of literary awards given to books by authors based in Great Britain and Ireland. They were known as the Whitbread Book Awards until 2005, after which Costa Coffee, a subsidiary of Whitbread, took over sponsorship....
, winner (Biography). - 2010 Galaxy National Book Award, New Writer of the Year
- 2010 Amazon.comAmazon.comAmazon.com, Inc. is a multinational electronic commerce company headquartered in Seattle, Washington, United States. It is the world's largest online retailer. Amazon has separate websites for the following countries: United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Japan, and...
, Best of the Month, September - 2010 The Economist, Books of the Year list
Editions
- First UK edition: The Hare with Amber Eyes: A Hidden Inheritance, Chatto & Windus, Great Britain, 2010.
- First US edition: The Hare with Amber Eyes: A Family's Century of Art and Loss, Farrar, Straus and GirouxFarrar, Straus and GirouxFarrar, Straus and Giroux is an American book publishing company, founded in 1946 by Roger W. Straus, Jr. and John C. Farrar. Known primarily as Farrar, Straus in its first decade of existence, the company was renamed several times, including Farrar, Straus and Young and Farrar, Straus and Cudahy...
, New York, 2010. ISBN 978-0-374-10597-6
Notable reviews
- Review by Michael DirdaMichael DirdaMichael Dirda , a Fulbright Fellowship recipient, is a Pulitzer Prize–winning book critic for the Washington Post.-Career:Having studied at Oberlin College for his undergraduate degree, Dirda took a Ph.D. from Cornell University in comparative literature. In 1978 Dirda started writing for the...
of The Washington PostThe Washington PostThe Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...
, September 2, 2010 - Review by Rachel Cooke of The GuardianThe GuardianThe Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
, 5 June 2010 - Review in The EconomistThe EconomistThe Economist is an English-language weekly news and international affairs publication owned by The Economist Newspaper Ltd. and edited in offices in the City of Westminster, London, England. Continuous publication began under founder James Wilson in September 1843...
, May 20, 2010
External links
- The Hare with Amber Eyes, author website.
- Edmund de Waal on YouTube, by Random Reads, June 29, 2010.