Lutz Seiler wins Georg Büchner prize

German writer Lutz Seiler

was awarded the Georg Büchner prize yesterday. It is Germany’s most prestigious literature award.

Lutz Seiler is best known for his novels Kruso and Starr 111. Both novels were influenced by his early life growing up in Gera in the German Democratic Republic.

He originally qualified as a carpenter and began to take an interest in literature while completing his military service with the National People’s Army of the GDR.

After his military service he studied language, literature  and history. 

His first publications were poetry collections, including the debut "Berührt-Geführt" (Touched-Guided), as well as the acclaimed "Pech & Blende" (Pitch and Blend), "Vierzig Kilometer Nacht" (Forty Kilometer Night), and "Schrift für Blinde Riesen" (Writing for Blind Giants).

In 2007, he was the recipient of the Ingeborg Bachmann Prize for the short story collection "Turksib" but it was the novel Kruso that propelled him to wider fame.

The story was inspired by Seiler's own life working as a seasonal employee on the island of Hiddensee, off the northeastern coast of Germany, which became a refuge for free thinkers and disillusioned East Germans wishing to escape across the sea to Denmark.

Kruso (a reference to Robinson Crusoe) documents the community of 'shipwrecked people' on Hiddensee during the final months of the German Democratic Republic.