Jenny Erpenbeck

Jenny Erpenbeck is a novelist, playwright, and essayist. She was born in 1967 in Berlin, in the German Democratic Republic. Raised in an artistic and scientific family environment, she initially studied Bookbinding and later pursued Theatre Studies at Humboldt University and Musical Theatre Directing at the Hans Eisner Academy of Music. She made her literary debut with the novella "The Old Child" (Geschichte vom alten Kind, 1999). This was followed by works such as "The Book of Words" (Wörterbuch, 2004) and "Visitation" (Heimsuchung, 2008). Her novel "The End of Days" (Aller Tage Abend, 2012) earned her the prestigious Joseph Breitbach Prize, the Hans Fallada Prize, and the Foreign Fiction Prize from the British Independent. For "Go, Went, Gone" (Gehen, ging, gegangen, 2015), she received, among others, the Thomas Mann Prize and the European Strega Prize. In 2017, she was awarded the Cross of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany.