Germany

Patrick Hofmann 

Patrick Hofmann was born in 1971 in Borna. He studied philosophy and German studies in Berlin, Leipzig, and Strasbourg, and wrote a dissertation on Husserl’s theory of description. After having lived…...

Markus Orths 

Markus Orths was born in 1969, lives in Karlsruhe, has written a number of short stories and novels (Catalina, Das Lehrerzimmer, Das Zimmermaedchen) and has received several major literary prizes, among…...

Thomas Brasch 

Thomas Brasch was a German playwright, novelist, poet, translator, and director.  Although born in Yorkshire, England, (Feb. 19, 1945) as the son of Jewish immigrants, his childhood and young adult…...

Burkhard Spinnen 

Burkhard Spinnen was born in Mönchengladbach in 1956 and lives as a writer in Münster. He has received many awards for his work, among them the aspekte Literature Award, the Kranichstein Literature…...

Mario Wirz 

Mario Wirz was born in 1954 in Marburg and has been living in Berlin since 1988. He is an actor, director, and writer. His most recent volumes of lyric poetry are Sieben Leben hat die Woche (2003) and …...

Gunther Geltinger 

Gunther Geltinger was born in 1974 in Erlenbach am Main, Germany. He studied screenwriting and dramaturgy in Vienna and at the Academy of Media Arts in Cologne. He took part in the Prose Authors' Workshop…...

Anant Kumar 

Anant Kumar, a writer in the German language, was born in Bihar (India). He is the author of twelve books of poetry and prose in German, the most recent of which is The Moon and Its Boredom.

Alina Bronsky 

Born in Jekaterinburg, Russia, in 1978, Bronsky now lives in Frankfurt, Germany. Broken Glass Park, nominated for the prestigious Bachmann Prize, is her first novel. Alina Bronsky is a pseudonym. Little…...

Günter Kunert 

Günter Kunert, one of the best and most versatile German-language writers today, has received numerous prizes for his poetry and prose. Born in Berlin in 1929, he was "encouraged" by the East German…...

Stefan Heym 

Stefan Heym (1913–2001) was born in Chemnitz, Germany, and emigrated to America during the Nazi era in the early 1930s. He served in the US forces in Europe with distinction, and subsequently wrote…...

Uwe Kolbe 

Uwe Kolbe was born in East Berlin in 1957. He first published his poetry in Sinn und Form in 1976. In addition to nine collections of poetry, he has also published five other works: Vaterlandkanal, a travel…...

Kathrin Aehnlich 

Kathrin Aehnlich, engineer turned successful author, began her writing career in 1985 at the Deutsches Literatur Institut in Leipzig. Her creative final paper, “When I am grown up—I will fly…...

Thomas Pletzinger 

Thomas Pletzinger was born in 1975 in Münster, Germany, graduated from Hamburg University with an MA in American Studies, and subsequently worked for publishers and a literary scouting agency in New…...

Uwe Mengel 

Uwe Mengel was born in Bergen on the Baltic Island of Ruegen. He studied theology at Friedrich Schiller Universität, Jena, East Germany. He continued his studies after his escape to West Germany at…...

Herta Müller 

Herta Müller, the winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2009, was born in 1953 in itzkydorf, a German-speaking village in Romania. After college she worked as a translator in a factory, and was…...

Siegfried Kracauer 

Siegfried Kracauer (1889–1966) was the author of The Mass Ornament, From Caligari to Hitler, Theory of Film and many other seminal works on modernity. From 1921 to 1933 he worked as cultural editor…...

Harald Weinrich 

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…...

Alfred Döblin 

Alfred Döblin was born in Stettin in 1878. His most successful novel was Berlin Alexanderplatz, published by S. Fischer in 1929. In 1933 Döblin emigrated to France and then to the U.S.; he returned…...

Michael Kleeberg 

The novelist Michael Kleeberg was born in Stuttgart in 1959. He grew up in Böblingen and Hamburg, where he later studied political science and visual communication. After extended stays in Rome, Berlin,…...

Peter Utz 

Peter Utz is a professor of German Literature at the University of Lausanne. His research interests include Modern German Literature from the 18th century, Swiss German Literature, literary translation…...

Franziska Gerstenberg 

Franziska Gerstenberg, born in Dresden in 1979, studied at the Institute for German Literature in Leipzig and lives in Hannover. She was the co-editor of the literary magazine EDIT and has received numerous…...

Elke R. Steiner 

Elke R. Steiner is a comic book artist and illustrator. Born 1971 in Bremen, she studied arts and visual  communication in Münster/ Westfalen. She repeatedly took part in international comic…...

Jenny Erpenbeck 

Jenny Erpenbeck (b. 1967) works as a freelance writer and director in Berlin. Her publications in English include The Old Child (New Directions, 2005)and The Book of Words (New Directions, forthcoming)....

Jakob Arjouni 

Jakob Arjouni was born in Frankfurt in 1964. He has written novels, plays, screenplays, and the mystery series Happy Birthday, Turk!, One Man, One Murder, and Kismet. His other publications include his…...

Günter de Bruyn 

Günter de Bruyn was born in Berlin in 1926. His novels, historical biographies and cultural commentary on post-unification Germany have earned him a reputation as one of Germany's most respected…...

Navid Kermani 

Navid Kermani was born in Siegen in 1967. He studied Islamic Studies, Philosophy and Theatre Studies at universities in Cologne, Cairo and Bonn. He completed his doctorate in Islamic Studies. He has worked…...

Esther Kinsky 

Esther Kinsky was born in 1956 in Engelkirchen, Germany and after living in the UK for a decade, now lives in Hungary. She is considered one of the most distinguished translators from Polish into German…...

Matthias Politycki 

Matthias Politycki was born in 1955 in Karlsruhe. He became a freelance writer in 1990, following an academic career. His first novel, Aus Fälle/Zerlegung des Regenbogens, published in 1987, was followed…...

Inka Parei 

Inka Parei, born in Frankfurt am Main in 1967, lives in Berlin. Her first novel, The Shadowboxer, won the Hans Erich Nossack Award in 2000 and has since been translated into nine languages. For this featured…...

Zafer Senocak 

Zafer Senocak is one of the most innovative German intellectuals and writers (The Encyclopedia of German Literature, 2000). The poem "Woman Babylon" appears in his 1994 book Fernwehanstalten (Babel Verlag).…...

Zehra Çirak 

Zehra Çırak was born in 1960 in Istanbul, Turkey. She moved to Germany with her family in 1962 and has lived in Berlin since 1982. Her awards include the Adelbert von Chamisso Prize (1989 and 2001)and…...

Birgit Biehl 

Birgit Biehl, born in 1944 in the former East Prussia, and currently living in Krefeld, Germany, holds a Ph.D. in Germanic Studies and makes her living as a secondary education teacher. Her poetry has…...

W. G. Sebald 

W. G. Sebald was born in Wertach im Allgäu, Germany, in 1944. He studied German language and literature in Freiburg, Switzerland, and Manchester. He taught at the University of East Anglia in Norwich,…...

Jutta Richter 

Jutta Richter was born in 1955 in Westphalia. She published her first book in her teens and is among the most celebrated of German children's authors. She won the 2001 German Youth Literature Award…...

Elke Schmitter 

Elke Schmitter, born in 1961 in Krefeld, Germany, studied philosophy in Munich. Her novel Mrs. Sartoris has been translated into thirteen languages. In 2002 she published her second novel, Misdemeanors.…...

Juli Zeh 

Juli Zeh was born in 1974 in Bonn. She has worked for the UN in New York, Krakow, and Zagreb, and now lives in Leipzig. Her first novel, Adler und Engel (Schoeffling, 2002), was awarded the Deutschen Bücherpreis…...

Wladimir Kaminer 

Wladimir Kaminer is one of Germany's most popular young writers. His fifth book, Die Reise nach Trulala (The Journey to La-la-land), where the excerpt published here originally appeared, was recently…...

Ingo Schulze 

Ingo Schulze was born in Dresden in 1962. After receiving an arts degree from the University of Jena (Classical Languages) he worked as a dramaturgist at the State Theater Altenburg in Eastern Thuringia…...

Next: Ghana    Previous: Georgia





- top -

Filter Authors by Country

Sections
Filters

Bear with us, please, while we re-tag our content

Keyword Search:

limit your search to:


Subscribe Button
Donate Button
Subscribe to Words Without Borders