Germany

Gertrud Kolmar, born Gertrud Chodziesner in Berlin in December 1894, was a German Jewish poet and writer. Her surviving works include 450 poems, three plays, and two short stories. Kolmar drew inspiration ...

Luftwerk Studio was founded by Chicago-based artists Petra Bachmaier and Sean Gallero. A combination of the German words luft (meaning “air”) and werk (meaning “work” or “artwork”), the name emphasizes both...

German dramatist August Stramm is now considered one of the leading avant-garde writers of his era, though he struggled for literary recognition for most of his career and did not live to see most of his work...

Hellmut (Peter) Huchel studied literature and philosophy in Berlin before changing his first name to Peter in 1930. Frequently writing poems and radio plays, Huchel quickly established himself as a major voice...

Heinrich Heine was born in Düsseldorf, Germany, to assimilated Jewish parents. Heine’s uncle was a powerful banker who supported Heine for much of his life, only to write him out of his will. Heine attended...

Günter Grass is widely considered one of Germany’s most important postwar writers and intellectuals. He was born and raised in Danzig, then known as “the Free City of Danzig”; his parents fled their home in...

Novelist, poet, and playwright Thomas Bernhard is one of the great German-language writers of the latter half of the 20th century. His work is often described as acerbic, misanthropic, and unrelenting. Influenced...

Ernst Meister was born in Hagen, Germany. He enrolled in the University of Marburg as a theology student, but soon began attending the lectures of Karl Löwith and Hans-Georg Gadamer, both of whom had studied...

Born in Bavaria, German poet and prose writer Winfried Georg Sebald was the son of a German soldier who participated in the 1939 invasion of Poland and at the close of World War II was held in a French prisoner...

Poet and translator Carlyle Ferren MacIntyre was born in Iowa and earned his PhD at the University of Marburg in Germany. His collections of poetry include Cafés and Cathedrals (1939), The Black Bull (1942...

Jan Wagner was born in Hamburg, Germany, and lives in Berlin. He studied English and American studies at Hamburg University and at Trinity College Dublin. A literary critic and translator, he is the author...

Gerhard Tersteegen was born in Moers, Prussia, in 1697. His father died when he was young, and after studying the classics, Tersteegen was apprenticed to a merchant, He worked as a merchant before taking up...

Born in Oberholzheim, German poet Christoph Martin Wieland was the son of a Pietist parson. Educated at the University of Tübingen, Wieland’s literary community included Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Friedrich...

Poet, translator, and critic Michael Hamburger was born in Berlin in 1924. His father was a German Jewish professor of pediatrics, and the family fled Nazi Germany for Britain in 1933. Hamburger was educated...

SAID is a native of Iran and has lived in Germany since 1965. He has published eight volumes of poetry, as well as several collections of essays, children’s books, and radio plays. Titles appearing in English...

One of the preeminent figures in German literature, poet, playwright, and novelist Johann Wolfgang von Goethe was born in Frankfurt, Germany, in 1749. The child of an imperial councilor, Goethe had a thoroughly...

Medieval German mystic poet Mechthild of Magdeburg was born into a noble family. She experienced her first religious vision at the age of 12, and apparitions appeared to her daily thereafter. In 1230, she ...

Bertolt Brecht was one of the most influential playwrights of the 20th century. His works include The Threepenny Opera (1928) with composer Kurt Weill, Mother Courage and Her Children (1941), The Good Person...

A poet of reunified Germany, Durs Grünbein was born in Dresden, lives with his family in eastern Berlin, and works in a room he rents in western Berlin. He has published numerous collections of poetry and ...