Knut is dangerous

last updated 8 January 2015

Berlin

Knut, an adorable polar bear cub who has become a national star, has grown too big to play. Knut and the Berlin zookeeper who raised him, Thomas Dörflein, have been delighting audiences since March with their twice-daily performances, usually wrestling or swimming together. In the past few weeks, though, Dörflein had been getting badly bruised in the encounters, so the zoo decided to call off the shows. Dörflein said he was relieved to stop performing with the bear. He said he’d become such a celebrity across Germany that he was getting marriage proposals from total strangers. “But this doesn’t mean that I will never play with Knut again,” he said. “I am always there for him.”