The Zookeepers' War
An Incredible True Story from the Cold War
New York : Simon & Schuster, 2019.
Format: Book
Edition: First Simon & Schuster hardcover edition.
Description: 261 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm
The unbelievable true story of the Cold War's strangest proxy war , fought between the zoos on either side of the Berlin Wall.
"The liveliness of Mohnhaupt's storytelling and the wonderful eccentricity of his subject matter make this book well worth a read." -- Star Tribune (Minneapolis)
Living in West Berlin in the 1960s often felt like living in a zoo, everyone packed together behind a wall, with the world always watching. On the other side of the Iron Curtain, East Berlin and its zoo were spacious and lush, socialist utopias where everything was perfectly planned... and then rarely completed.
Berlin's two zoos in East and West quickly became symbols of the divided city's two halves. And so no one was terribly surprised when the head zookeepers on either side started an animal arms race: rather than stockpiling nuclear warheads, they competed to have the most pandas and hippos. Soon, state funds were being diverted toward giving these new animals lavish welcomes worthy of visiting dignitaries. West German presidential candidates were talking about zoo policy on the campaign trail. And eventually politicians on both side of the Wall became convinced that if their zoo were proved to be inferior, then that would mean their country's whole ideology was too.
A quirky piece of Cold War history unlike anything you've heard before, The Zookeepers' War is an epic tale of desperate rivalries, human follies, and an animal-mad city in which zookeeping became a way of continuing politics by other means.
"The liveliness of Mohnhaupt's storytelling and the wonderful eccentricity of his subject matter make this book well worth a read." -- Star Tribune (Minneapolis)
Living in West Berlin in the 1960s often felt like living in a zoo, everyone packed together behind a wall, with the world always watching. On the other side of the Iron Curtain, East Berlin and its zoo were spacious and lush, socialist utopias where everything was perfectly planned... and then rarely completed.
Berlin's two zoos in East and West quickly became symbols of the divided city's two halves. And so no one was terribly surprised when the head zookeepers on either side started an animal arms race: rather than stockpiling nuclear warheads, they competed to have the most pandas and hippos. Soon, state funds were being diverted toward giving these new animals lavish welcomes worthy of visiting dignitaries. West German presidential candidates were talking about zoo policy on the campaign trail. And eventually politicians on both side of the Wall became convinced that if their zoo were proved to be inferior, then that would mean their country's whole ideology was too.
A quirky piece of Cold War history unlike anything you've heard before, The Zookeepers' War is an epic tale of desperate rivalries, human follies, and an animal-mad city in which zookeeping became a way of continuing politics by other means.
Contents:
War and crocodile tail soup -- The zoo on the other side -- The fourth man -- Pandas and prestige -- The zoo of the future -- Big plans, little fish -- Golden times in the golden cage -- The gray giant comes tumbling down.
Subjects:
Zoologischer Garten (Berlin, Germany) -- History -- 20th century.
Tierpark Berlin -- History -- 20th century.
Zoos -- Political aspects -- Germany -- Berlin -- History -- 20th century.
Cold War.
Berlin (Germany) -- Politics and government -- 1945-1990.
Zoologischer Garten (Berlin, Germany) -- History -- 20th century.
Tierpark Berlin -- History -- 20th century.
Zoos -- Political aspects -- Germany -- Berlin -- History -- 20th century.
Cold War.
Berlin (Germany) -- Politics and government -- 1945-1990.
ISBN:
9781501188497 (hardcover : alk. paper)
Availability | |||
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Call Number | Location | Shelf Location | Status |
HISTORY Europe Germany Moh | Wheatley (Shandon) | Nonfiction | In |
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"Originally published in 2017 in Germany as Der Zoo der Anderen by Carl Hanser Verlag."
Includes bibliographical references (pages 235-248) and index.
Includes bibliographical references (pages 235-248) and index.