An Inventory of Losses - Judith Schalansky

An Inventory of Losses by Judith Schalansky / ISBN 9780811231411 / a 250-page paperback from New Directions *** A dazzling book about memory and extinction from the author of Atlas of Remote Islands / Winner of the Warwick Prize / Winner of the Helen & Kurt Wolff Translator's Prize / Longlisted for the International Booker Prize Each disparate object described in this book―a Caspar David Friedrich painting, a species of tiger, a villa in Rome, a Greek love poem, an island in the Pacific―shares a common fate: it no longer exists, except as the dead end of a paper trail. Recalling the works of W. G. Sebald, Bruce Chatwin, or Rebecca Solnit, An Inventory of Losses is a beautiful evocation of twelve specific treasures that have been lost to the world forever, and, taken as a whole, opens mesmerizing new vistas of how we can think about extinction and loss. With meticulous research and a vivid awareness of why we should care about these losses, Judith Schalansky, the acclaimed author