Add this copy of The Tin Drum to cart. $2.29, good condition, Sold by ThriftBooks-Reno rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Reno, NV, UNITED STATES, published 1990 by Vintage.
Add this copy of The Tin Drum to cart. $2.29, good condition, Sold by ThriftBooks-Dallas rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Dallas, TX, UNITED STATES, published 1990 by Vintage.
Add this copy of The Tin Drum to cart. $4.93, Sold by Gene Sperry rated 2.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Quincy, MA, UNITED STATES, published 1990 by Vintage Books USA.
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Seller's Description:
Grass, Gunter; trans. by Ralph Manheim., Vintage International (Random House), 1990, c1989, later printing, illus. soft cover (trade size paperback), 592 pp with glossary, 8vo, ISBN: 067972575X, 'The greatest German novel written since the end of World War II', German Literary Fiction.
Add this copy of The Tin Drum to cart. $6.45, very good condition, Sold by Blind Squirrel Books rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Grand Rapids, MI, UNITED STATES, published 1990 by Vintage Books USA.
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Seller's Description:
Very good. Text in English, German. Trade paperback (US). Glued binding. 592 p. Audience: General/trade. VG+ Nice copy w/ light shelf wear. No markings.
Add this copy of The Tin Drum to cart. $7.98, very good condition, Sold by Books Revisited rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Saint Cloud, MN, UNITED STATES, published 1990 by Knopf.
Add this copy of The Tin Drum (Vintage International) to cart. $8.99, very good condition, Sold by Firefly Bookstore rated 5.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Kutztown, PA, UNITED STATES, published 1990 by Vintage.
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Used Very Good. Front and back covers have very light edge and corner wear. Spine intact with no creasing or warping. Binding is tight and intact, pages clean and unmarked. Firefly Bookstore sells items online and in our store front. We try to add images and descriptions when we can, but if you need additional information or photos of the books we list, please contact us.
Add this copy of The Tin Drum to cart. $9.00, very good condition, Sold by Powell's Books Chicago rated 5.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Chicago, IL, UNITED STATES, published 1990 by Vintage Books USA.
Add this copy of The Tin Drum to cart. $9.99, very good condition, Sold by Magers and Quinn Booksellers rated 5.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Minneapolis, MN, UNITED STATES, published 1990 by Vintage Books USA.
Add this copy of The Tin Drum to cart. $10.47, very good condition, Sold by Wonder Book - Member ABAA/ILAB rated 5.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Frederick, MD, UNITED STATES, published 1990 by Vintage Books USA.
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Seller's Description:
Very Good. Very Good condition. A copy that may have a few cosmetic defects. May also contain light spine creasing or a few markings such as an owner's name, short gifter's inscription or light stamp.
Add this copy of The Tin Drum to cart. $10.47, good condition, Sold by Wonder Book - Member ABAA/ILAB rated 5.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Frederick, MD, UNITED STATES, published 1990 by Vintage Books USA.
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Seller's Description:
Good. Good condition. A copy that has been read but remains intact. May contain markings such as bookplates, stamps, limited notes and highlighting, or a few light stains.
This novel deserves its reputation as a landmark work. It is innovative, amusing, haunting, musical and with an impressive storyline. There is a constant shift in the narration between the first- and third-person. In an essay Grass wrote, he says that sometimes Oskar wants to talk and sometimes not. Many readers seem to get carried away with the ?commentary on wartime Germany? but the real beauty lies within the prose and style. The initial setting is in an asylum and there one meets several important characters. The story is almost entirely a flashback, beginning with potato fields and the Polish region of Kashubia. The grandmother and her many skirts are memorable and some implied unusual sexual situations do keep the reader?s attention. The card game skat seems to constantly come up. Indeed, this is a connection between the characters in several parts, including one in which a post office is being bombed and one player?s life is ending. A scene with eels is at once revolting and arousing, with a woman accompanied by her husband, her lover and an eeler with a horsehead. Grass? skill with words is what sets the book apart. An entire chapter deals with a cat named Bismark and each paragraph begins by repeating the same phrase. This technique creates a rhythm that brings the reader sliding along. Rushdie?s Midnight?s Children makes use of this in chapters on snakes and ladders and saffron and green. Oskar?s musical talent affects many things and eventually leads to the formation of a jazz band. This turns up in the Dog Years. His relations with his sitter who becomes his father?s squeeze add another intriguing sexual aspect that is unexpected but extremely well expressed in terms of fizz powder and drum sticks. This type of thing happens often with Grass. The end returns to the asylum. The last few scenes of the novel are quite perplexing and still leave me wondering if I have followed Gunter completely. This is his first major book and later works seem to wrap up much better. This is an impressive work, in every way. One should continue with Cat and Mouse and the Dog Years. Apparently, there is more to be enjoyed when read in German, as the Kashubian dialect adds a wonderfully musical quality to the story. The translation is excellent, in my view and I would recommend this to any serious reader.
Ange1oBear
Apr 11, 2007
In The Tin Drum, Gunter Grass has written a slightly absurd, somewhat bizarre, and extremely engaging masterpiece. The autobiography of a mental patient born just before the Nazi's rise to power, The Tin Drum is a story of a willful outsider, one who simply refuses to grow any older, abhorring adults as he does.
One of the defining qualities of the book is the fact that it is told by the main character Oskar, a resident of a mental institution. It almost becomes a game, trying to figure out what really happened using only his account. To hear him tell it, he was fully mature intellectually from the moment he was born, and far superior to his "presumptive" fathers. He willfully decides to stunt his own growth - the fact that he fell down the stairs is a coincidence. Though he is a strange character of questionable mental stability, Oskar manages to make very perceptive statements about life and living it through the course of the book.
Grass's writing style is here very fitting. The narrative will often digress into a jazz-like fugue on a word or idea, mimicking Oskar's tin drum. My translation was by Ralph Manheim, and according to my German-speaking friend is faithful to the original. I think it is a wonderful translation, and only wish that I could read German, to capture the full effect of Grass's writing.