Eisenvogel

Eisenvogel
German language cover
Author Yangzom Brauen
Country Switzerland
Language German
Subject Tibetan diaspora, Tibet, refugees, Switzerland
Genre Biography, Novel
Publisher Random House
Publication date
 9 November 2010 (paperback)[1]
Media type book, paperback, eBook, audiobook
Pages 416 as German-language paperback
ISBN 978-3-453-64526-4 (paperback)

Eisenvogel is a Swiss book published by the Swiss-Tibetan writer, filmdirector (Who Killed Johnny) and actress Yangzom Brauen. The full title of the biography "Eisenvogel: Drei Frauen aus Tibet. Die Geschichte meiner Familie", literally means Iron bird, three women from Tibet, the history of my family. First published in 2009, the illustrated book is also distributed as paperback, eBook and audiobook in German language.[1]

Plot summary

Yangzom Brauen is of Tibetan origin and raised in the cantons of Thurgau and Bern, Switzerland, where she graduated, and migrated to Los Angeles, starring in some movies. She comes from a cosmopolitan family: Her father, a Bernese ethnologist, also moved to the USA, and lives along with her mother, the Tibetan artist Sonam Dolma Brauen, in New York. Her grandmother lives in a student apartment in Bern. There are worlds between the world in which the grandmother grew up, and that the young actress. Her grandmother was a Bhikkhuni in eastern Tibet from where she moved when the 14th Dalai Lama refuged in 1959 to Dharamshala in northern India. Yangzom's mother was at the age of six when they crossed the Himalayas on foot, but Sonams father and little sister died. How the grandmother with all these strokes of fate handled, in so foreign worlds such as India, Switzerland and the USA, is the central focus in Eisenvogel.

Title of the book

After the annexation of Tibet, the dark prophecy of a monk from the eighth century fulfilled: «When the iron bird flies and horses on wheels rolling, then Tibetans will have to leave their homes like ants.» The title of the book refers to that prophecy.[2]

Critical response

The medial response in newspaper, radio and television is widely positive,[2][3] and the book was listed on the bestselling lists in Switzerland and other German-speaking countries.[4]

The life stories of grandmother, daughter and granddaughter put an oppressed country in a new light.[5]

— Heike Vowinkel, Die Welt

In 2009 the book became a best seller in the German-language area with over 100,000 copies sold.[6]

International publishing

Eisenvogel was also published in English in 2011:[7]

  • Across Many Mountains: Three Daughters of Tibet. London: Harvill Secker. 2011. ISBN 978-1-84655-344-8.
  • Across Many Mountains: A Tibetan Family's Epic Journey from Oppression to Freedom. New York: St. Martins Press. 2011. ISBN 0312600135.

Film, television and theatrical adaptations

A film was announced in 2012, but is as of November 2014 not released respectively Yangzom Brauen starred as Tibetan woman in the 2012 film Escape from Tibet.[4]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 "Eisenvogel" (in German). Random House. Retrieved 2014-11-19.
  2. 1 2 Brigitta Niederhauser (2009-10-12). ""Eisenvogel": Vom Tibet in die Diaspora" (in German). Der Bund. Retrieved 2014-11-19.
  3. ↑ ""Eisenvogel" – Yangzom Brauens Familienchronik über die verlorene Heimat Tibet" (in German). SRF 1, Kulturplatz. 2009-10-21. Retrieved 2014-11-19.
  4. 1 2 Brigitta Niederhauser (2014-07-18). "Im eigenen Film" (in German). Tages-Anzeiger. Retrieved 2014-11-19.
  5. ↑ Heike Vowinkel (2009-09-27). "Drei Generationen Tibet" (in German). Die Welt. Retrieved 2014-11-19.
  6. ↑ "Swiss made in Hollywood" (in German). Der Landbote's review of Who Killed Johnny. 2013-07-03. Retrieved 2014-11-19.
  7. ↑ di Giovanni, Janine (2011-03-07). "Across Many Mountains: Escape from Tibet". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 2014-11-22.
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