Summary of The Hare with Amber EyesÂ
“The Hare with Amber Eyes” traces the history of the Jewish Ephrussi family in the 19th and 20th centuries. It follows their rise as grain merchants in Odessa, their successes as bankers and art collectors in Paris and Vienna, and their downfall when the Nazis seized power in the 1930s, leading to their diaspora across England, the US, and Japan. A central thread in this family memoir is a collection of Japanese ‘netsuke‘ miniature sculptures, purchased by one of the Ephrussis in the 1870s and passed down through five generations, ultimately reaching the author of this book, Edmund de Waal.
Reasons to read The Hare with Amber Eyes
“The Hare with Amber Eyes” initially focuses on the French branch of the family in 19th-century Paris, highlighting their interactions with French Impressionist painters. It then shifts to the Viennese branch from 1900 to 1938, culminating in the Nazis’ confiscation of their property and the near-miraculous survival of the netsuke collection thanks to their maid. The third part of the book follows the author’s uncle, who moved to Tokyo and took the netsuke with him. The netsuke theme ties the family story together. The book is a must-read for those interested in art and history, particularly European history up to the Second World War. Even Joseph von Trotta, from Joseph Roth’s “The Radetzky March”, safeguarded his money at the Ephrussi Bank in Vienna. Readers might also try “The Exiles Return”, a novel by Elisabeth de Waal, the grandmother of Edmund, about Austrian exiles returning to Vienna in the 1950s.
Setting: Vienna (Austria), Paris (France), Tokyo (Japan)
Original title: The Hare with Amber Eyes
Year of publication: 2010
Nr of pages: 353
