Vladimir Vertlib was born in 1966 into a Russian-Jewish family in Leningrad (USSR, today St. Petersburg). His parents were members of an illegal Zionist organisation. In 1971, the family emigrated, travelling across Israel, the Netherlands, the USA and Italy until they settled in Austria in 1981. Vertilb studied Economics in
Viktor Yerofeyev was born in Moscow in 1947. His father was an interpreter for Vyacheslav Molotov, among others, and was also the Soviet ambassador in France. Yerofeyev studied philology and linguistics at Lomonsov University in Moscow and received his doctorate on Dostoyevsky and French existentialism. In 1979, he collaborated on
Victoria Tokarjeva was born in Leningrad in 1937. At the age of 18 she was awarded a diploma as a pianist at the Leningrad college of music. After marrying a physicist she moved to Moscow, where she worked as a piano teacher for three years. She had started writing young
The Russian poet Vera Pavlova was born in Moscow in 1963. She studied composition and graduated from the Schnittke College of Music and the Gnessin Academy of Music in the field of music history. She worked as a guide iat the Chaliapin House Museum, wrote essays on musicology, and participated
Vera Polozkova was born in Moscow in 1986. She abandoned her studies of journalism at the Institute of Art, Culture and Literature at the University of Moscow three months before graduation. As a child already she began writing poems, which she published in her Internet blog and, thus, presented to
Tatjana Tolstaja was born in St. Petersburg (Leningrad), Russia, in 1951. She studied Classical Philology in Leningrad. Thereafter she briefly worked as an editor before going to Moscow to work as an author. Her first collection of stories (1987; German “Stelldichein mit einem Vogel,” 1989) was a great literary success
born in 1951 in Moscow. The author studied Biology and Ecology and earned her Ph.D. at Lomonosov Moscow State University. Since 1986, she has worked as a freelance journalist in Berlin. Her 1992 work, »The End of Lies: Russia and Jews in the 20th Century« stirred up considerable controversy. She
Sergei Sergeyevich Lebedev was born in Moscow in 1981. He studied geology and journalism at Moscow State University from 1998 to 2001 and went on to work for a number of independent Russian media. In addition to poems and essays, Lebedev published his first novel »Predel’ zabvenija« [Eng. »Oblivion«, 2016]
Sergej Lukianenko, born in 1968 in Karatau, Kazakhstan, is considered the most popular Russian fantasy and science fiction writer today. After studying medicine he briefly worked as a psychiatrist before he gave up his career in favor of writing. In the beginning of the 1990s he was an active member
Sergey Minaev was born in 1975 in Moscow. He studied history and worked in the mid-90s for a wine import firm. During this time, he delved into the world of expensive clubs and luxury brands and wrote, influenced by Christian Kracht’s »Faserland«, his début novel »Duchless« (2006; tr: Cold Soul).
Raf S. Schakirow was one of the co-founders of the first Russian economic newspaper, ‘Komersant’, where he held several leading positions until 1997, when its publisher was replaced. Shakirov was the founder of the award-winning weekly newspaper for private investors, ‘Dengi’, and directed the large newspaper publishing company ‘Gazeta’. In
was born in 1979 in Kartaly, Russia and studied Journalism in Yekaterinburg, Moscow and Krems. After an internship at Deutsche Welle (DW) she worked in Moscow as a journalist for DW and WDR and TV-Producer for ZDF and arte. Along with Peter Adler she made two sections of the three
