Born in 1927, Harald Weinrich is a German essayist, poet, linguist, and literary scholar. He is professor emeritus of Romance Literature at the College de France and has also held chairs and guest professorships at universities in Germany, Italy, and the United States. Read More His work has won many prizes, including the Sigmund Freud Prize, the Goethe Prize and the Joseph-Breitbach Prize. Vom Lesen und Leben der Tiere: Ein Bestiarium, from which his work on WWB is taken, was published by C. H. Beck in 2008.