The Bear Woman

De: Karolina Ramqvist, Saskia Vogel - translator

Narrado por: Sophie Aldred

Feminist autofiction from one of Sweden’s blazing talents.

Blending autofiction and essay, The Bear Woman is a journey of feminism and literary detective work spanning centuries and continents. In the 1540s, a young French noblewoman, Marguerite de la Rocque, was abandoned on an island in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence with her maidservant and her lover. In present-day Stockholm, an author and mother become captivated by the image of Marguerite sheltered in a dark cave after her companions have died.

This image soon becomes an obsession. She must find out the real story of the woman she calls the Bear Woman. But so much in this history is written so as to gloss over male violence. And the maps and other sources she consults are at times undecipherable.

Karolina Ramqvist explores what it means to write history—and to live it.

©2022 Karolina Ramqvist (P)2022 Coach House Books

Reseñas de la Crítica

“Ramqvist skillfully blends a story of survival with an autofictional meditation on womanhood...It adds up to a careful study of a woman’s writing life.” — Publishers Weekly

“Karolina Ramqvist writes with frosty precision the kind of literature that is unforgettable. Her portraits of women hit deep into bone and marrow.” — Dorthe Nors

“Ramqvist’s acute rendering of embodied sensual experience combined with her evocation of her double character’s increasingly desperate circumstances create a story of high tension, startling insights, and lasting resonance.” — Siri Hustvedt

Unbelievably BORING

I don’t mind when I’m supposed to hate a main character or find the main character boring but the entire book was a waste of my time and even this opinion by listening to the main character drab on and on and on. It wasn’t a good use of descriptive language or storytelling.