Ingo Schulze, Writer

Ingo Schulze was born in Dresden in 1962, the son of a physicist and a doctor, who separated barely a year later. He stayed with his mother and grew up as an only child. After leaving school, he completed two years of military service with the East German National People’s Army and went on to study classical philology in Jena. His first professional experience was as a dramaturge for the Altenburg state theatre in Thüringen. After Germany’s reunification in 1990, he left the theatre to help start the Altenburger Wochenblatt weekly and went on to found an advertizing paper. An extended stay in Russia inspired him to take up the pen himself. The numerous short stories, novels and essays he has published since have established him among the best known German authors of his generation. Nobel laureate Günther Grass has praised him as a great story-teller. In 2011, he was awarded the literature prize of Mainz (co-sponsored by ZDF and 3Sat). Today he lives in Berlin and has two daughters.