Katrin. The Tale of a young writer. - About this book.

Katrin, the story of a teenage girl and writer, is presented as a book for children, but in many points it draws on the personal biography of Unica Zürn herself, in terms of her relationship with her father, the city of Berlin after WWII, as well as her time spent at the Badewanne cabaret. The novel is set in an imaginary world, a metropolis named Linit, split into three levels: the upper town (Oberstadt), middle town (Mittelstadt) and lower town (Unterstadt), overlooked by a volcano and crossed by the river Emil. Zürn tells the story of fifteen-year-old motherless Katrin, who lives with her father, a writer, and who tries to keep house as best she can. But while her father and his best friend, a hairdresser, are making plans for Katrin’s future (the father wants her to be a secretary, his friend a hairdresser), Katrin also wants to be a writer. This desire for independence characterises Katrin in what could be called a Bildungsroman, where the various situations Katrin has to go through.