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"Ulrich Raulff gibt der Kulturgeschichte die Sporen: Sein großartiges Buch erzählt von den wichtigsten Helfern des Menschen, die einst unsere Gesellschaft prägten." Jürgen Osterhammel, DIE ZEIT
Der Exodus des Pferdes aus der Menschengeschichte ist ein erstaunlich unbeachteter Vorgang. Ganze Bibliotheken zur Geschichte des 19. Und 20. Jahrhunderts schweigen sich aus über das Pferd, das gleichwohl in Europa und Amerika allgegenwärtig war - bis das letzte Jahrhundert der Pferde in der Zeit Napoleons anbricht und mit dem Ersten Weltkrieg ausklingt. Ulrich Raulff zieht in seinem neuen Buch alle Register der Kultur-und Literaturgeschichte und beschreibt mit beeindruckender Erzählkunst eine untergehende Welt.

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THE SUNDAY TIMES HISTORY BOOK OF THE YEAR

´A beautiful and thoughtful exploration of the role of the horse in creating our world´ James Rebanks

´Scintillating, exhilarating ... you have never read a book like it ... a new way of considering history´ Observer

The relationship between horses and humans is an ancient, profound and complex one. For millennia horses provided the strength and speed that humans lacked. How we travelled, farmed and fought was dictated by the needs of this extraordinary animal. And then, suddenly, in the 20th century the links were broken and the millions of horses that shared our existence almost vanished, eking out a marginal existence on race-tracks and pony clubs.

Farewell to the Horse is an engaging, brilliantly written and moving discussion of what horses once meant to us. Cities, farmland, entire industries were once shaped as much by the needs of horses as humans. The intervention of horses was fundamental in countless historical events. They were sculpted, painted, cherished, admired; they were thrashed, abused and exposed to terrible danger. From the Roman Empire to the Napoleonic Empire every world-conqueror needed to be shown on a horse. Tolstoy once reckoned that he had cumulatively spent some nine years of his life on horseback.

Ulrich Raulff´s book, a bestseller in Germany, is a superb monument to the endlessly various creature who has so often shared and shaped our fate.

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A beautiful and thoughtful exploration of the role of the horse in creating our world... lyrical and creative...I very much enjoyed it. Some of the scenes in it will stay with me for a long time to come James Rebanks

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Raulff, Ulrich
Ulrich Raulff is Director of the German Literature Archive in Marbach am Neckar. Previously, he was Literary Editor of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung and Managing Editor of the Süddeutsche Zeitung. He has written books on Marc Bloch and Aby Warburg and won both the the Anna Krüger Prize and the Ernst Robert Curtius Prize for Essay Writing. His book on the influence of the German poet Stefan George was awarded the 2010 Leipzig Book Fair Prize.

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