Mirjam Pressler

Mirjam Pressler is a German writer and translator, also known as an author of popular children"s books.

She translated into German more than 300 books on Hebrew, English, and Dutch, writings by Anton Quintana, Uri Orlev, Amos Oz, Zeruya Shalev, Ida Voss, Nira Harel, Patricia Polacco, etc. among them.

Her fundamental work is a new edition of Anne Frank’s diaries with a commentary.

Mirjam Pressler was born on 18 June, 1940, in Darmstadt to a single Hebrew mother, and was brought up in a foster family. She recalls her everlasting wish to become an artist, but, as many young people do, she wrote poems since she was 14-15 years old. She went to Bensheim Gymnasium in Darmstadt, later in High School of Arts (Hochschule für Bildende Künste) in Frankfurt. After graduation, she changed a few jobs, moved to Israel and spent a year in a kibbutz there. She married an Israeli and had three daughters, but their marriage was broken.

In 1970 Pressler returned to Munich where she worked as a translator. In autumn of 1979 she began to write her first novel – “Bitterschokolade” (“Bitter Chocolate”) (1980), which was awarded a children’s literature prize – “Oldenburger Kinder- und Jugendbuchpreis” (Oldenburg Child and Youth Book Prize).

Now the writer is residing in Holledau, close to Munich (Bavaria).

http://lib.rus.ec/a/55759