M. T. Vasudevan Nair was born in Kudallur, a village in the southern Indian state of Kerala, in 1933. His first short stories, written in his native language, Malayalam, were published in several magazines while he was a youth. The young author’s first volume of narratives came out in 1952.
Ma Yuan was born in the People’s Republic of China in 1953. He studied Chinese at the Liaoning University in northeast China, and between 1982 and 1987 worked as a journalist in Tibet. In 1989 he returned to China, where he moved from city to city trying out jobs in
Louis Jensen was born in Nibe, Denmark, in 1943. An architect and town planner by profession, Jensen has been working as a freelance writer of children’s, youth and adult literature since 1993. He made his debut in children’s and youth literature in 1983 with the short story ‘Insektmanden’ (Engl: The
Les Murray was born on a farm in Nabiac/New South Wales, Australia, in 1938. As an only child he soon acquired autodidactic habits. Following family tradition – a relative in Scotland edited and wrote parts of the enormous Oxford English Dictionary – the young Murray turned out to be highly
Lars Gustafsson was born in Västerås, central Sweden, in 1936. He completed his philosophy studies at the University of Uppsala and Magdalen College, Oxford, with a dissertation in 1978 on »three extremists in the philosophy of language« (incl. Friedrich Nietzsche). From 1960 Gustafsson worked as editor, and from 1965 to
Lazslo Foldenyi was born in 1952. He is an art historian, literary scholar and essayist. He worked as a dramatic advisor and has translated numerous contemporary dramatists. He is co-editor of the Hungarian Kleist edition. His essay ‘Heinrich von Kleist. Im Netz der Wörter’ (1999), was enthusiastically reviewed by the
Klaus Hagerup was born in Oslo, Norway in 1946 and grew up in a family of authors. He decided to become an actor and partly funded his education with his poetry collection, “Silk tenker jeg på dere”, with which he made his debut in 1969. In the following years he
Kazumi Yumoto was born in Tokyo, Japan, in 1959 and got into literature via music. She studied composition at Tokyo College of music and during this time wrote opera libretti and plays for radio and television. Her first novel “Natsu no niwa” (Engl. “The Friends”, 1996) appeared in 1992 to
born 1951 in East Berlin. Expelled from school for »anti-socialist behavior« at age 16, she learned to typeset and was an auxiliary nurse in psychiatric wards. After studying Literature she lived for a year in Mongolia and worked in a carpet factory in Ulan Bator. In 1984, she moved to
Jutta Treiberwas born in Oberpullendorf, Austria, near the Hungarian border, in 1949. After studying German and English at the University of Vienna she worked at a secondary school in her hometown. In addition she ran the local cinema owned by her family for more than twenty years. At the age
K. S. Maniam was born under the name Subramaniam Krishnan into an Indian family in Bedong/Kedah, Malaysia, in 1942. His childhood bore the mark of the everyday life of the Indian minority group in Malaysia. Following his father’s wish that he should have an education that would fit his cultural
Joseph Olshan was born in the USA. He taught Creative Writing at New York University in the 1990s and was the editor-in-chief of Delphinium Books until 2002. In 1985, his debut novel »Clara’s Heart« won him The London Times/Jonathan Cape Young Writers’ Competition. Three years later the book was filmed
