Durs Grünbein was born in Dresden in 1962. In 1985, he moved to East Berlin and began studying theater studies. He abandoned his studies in 1987 and decided to pursue writing. He studied quantum physics and neurology autodidactically, as well as philosophy, including the works of Ludwig Wittgenstein, the Frankfurt School, and the French structuralists. Grünbein also contributed to various magazines, exhibitions, and publishing projects.

Grünbein's first volume of poetry, "Grauzone morgens" ("Gray Zone in the Morning"), was published by Suhrkamp publisher in 1988. The texts, written between 1985 and 1988, offer a stark and authentic snapshot of life in the urban centers of East Germany. This was followed in 1991 by the highly acclaimed volume "Schädelbasislektion" ("Skull Base Lesson"), whose cycles of poems address the period before, during, and after the fall of the Berlin Wall. In "Falten und Fallen" ("Folds and Fallen") (1994), Grünbein continues his poetic concept of analytical lyric poetry situated between language and the physical.

In the poetry collections of the following years, Grünbein increasingly sought formal and thematic dialogue with great poets of world literature. For example, "Vom Schnee" ("About Snow", 2003) is a portrait of the philosopher René Descartes in the form of an epic poem. Influenced by his stay in Rome as a fellow at the Villa Massimo, "Aroma - Ein römisches Zeichenbuch" ("Aroma - A Roman Book of Drawings", 2009) emerged as a kaleidoscope of poems and prose images. His twelfth poetry collection, "Äquidistanz" ("Equidistance"), was published in 2022. His first novel, "Komet" ("Comet"), was released in 2023.

Grünbein veröffentlichte außerdem mehrere Essaysammlungen, zahlreiche Katalogbeiträge, ein Opernlibretto sowie Neuübersetzungen von Theaterstücken der Antike. Sein Werk wurde in mehrere Sprachen übersetzt. 1995 erhielt Grünbein den "Peter-Huchel-Preis" für Lyrik und, als bis dahin jüngster Autor, den "Georg-Büchner-Preis. 2003 wurde ihm als erstem Nicht-Philosophen der "Friedrich-Nietzsche-Preis" verliehen. 2009 erhielt er das "Große Verdienstkreuz mit Stern" der Bundesrepublik Deutschland. Durs Grünbein ist Mitglied der Akademie der Künste Berlin, der Deutschen Akademie für Sprache und Dichtung, der Freien Akademie der Künste in Hamburg, der Freien Akademie der Künste zu Leipzig und der Sächsischen Akademie der Künste. Seit 2005 ist er Professor für Poetik an der Kunstakademie Düsseldorf und seit 2008 Mitglied des Ordens "Pour le mérite" für Wissenschaft und Künste in Berlin. Grünbein lebt in Rom und Berlin.

Ronya Othmann, born in Munich in 1993, grew up in the Freising district as the daughter of a Kurdish-Yazidi father and a German mother. Othmann's childhood and youth were shaped by travels to visit her paternal family in a Yazidi village in northern Syria, which later ceased to exist. After graduating from high school in 2012, Othmann began training at the International Munich Art Lab and the Swiss Literature Institute of the Biel University of the Arts. From 2014, she studied at the German Literature Institute in Leipzig, where she organized the 2015 Kurdish Film Days.

Othmann primarily writes prose, poetry, and essays. Her literary works explore topics such as migration, homeland, and war. Othmann's style is characterized by an exploration of identity and memory. In August 2020, Ronya Othmann's debut novel, "Die Sommer" ("The Summers"), was published by Hanser Verlag. It uses a family history to reflect on the civil war in Syria and the murder of Yazidis by the Islamic State. In her first volume of poetry, "die verbrechen" ("the crimes", 2021), Othmann refers to a "tired, tired land" identified by reception as Kurdistan. She interweaves the historical and ideological traces of a century with the memories of a lyrical self. Othmann's latest literary work, the novel "Vierundsiebzig" ("Seventy-Four"), was published in 2024.

Othmann has also published journalistic texts, including for Der Spiegel and taz. Since March 2021, she has written the column "Import Export" for the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung. Since May 2021, Othmann has been one of eight authors responsible for the column "Leipziger Stimmen" ("Leipzig Voices") for Leipziger Volkszeitung.

Ronya Othmann has received numerous awards for her work, including the 2015 MDR Literature Prize, the 2020 Mara Cassens Prize for "Die Sommer" ("The Summers"), and the 2024 Düsseldorf Literature Prize for her most recent novel "Vierundsiebzig" ("Seventy-Four").

Ines Geipel, born in Dresden in 1960, is a writer and Professor of Verse arts at Ernst Busch Academy of Dramatic Arts in Berlin. After studying German in Jena, she fled to West Germany in 1989 and studied philosophy and sociology in Darmstadt. Her first book came out in 1996.

The central theme of her literary work is the German history of violence, both National Socialism and the GDR dictatorship. Her novels Das Heft (The Notebook, 1999), Heimspiel (Home Game, 2005), Tochter des Diktators (Daughter of the Dictator, 2017), her personal essays Generation Mauer. Ein Proträt (Generation Wall. A Portrait, 2015), Umkämpfte Zone. Mein Bruder, der Osten und der Hass (Contested Zone. My Brother, the East and Hate, 2019), Schöner Neuer Himmel. Aus dem Militärlabor des Ostens (Brave New Heaven. From the Military Laboratory of the East, 2022) or their literary reports Verlorene Spiele. Journal eines Dopingprozesses (Lost Games. Journal of a doping trial, 2001), Für heute reicht’s. Amok in Erfurt (That's enough for today. Amok in Erfurt, 2004) and Seelenriss (Teared Soul, 2010), which have often stimulated public debate. Since 2005, she has published the Verschwiegene Bibliothek (Secretive Library), a ten-volume edition of authors and texts that were not allowed to be published in the GDR together with Joachim Walther.

Geipel has received several awards for her works, but also for her social commitment, such as the Bundesverdienstkreuz am Bande (German Federal Cross of Merit on Ribbon) in 2011, the Lessing Prize for Criticism in 2020 and the Marieluise Fleißer Prize in 2021.

Born and grown up in Saxony, Ulrike Almut Sandig now lives in Berlin together with her family. The first literary text she published was on posters and post cards giving them to people on the street. Sandig's first poem volumes Zunder (Tinder, 2005) and Streumen (Scatter, 2007) were published at Connewitzer Verlagsbuchhandlung Peter Hinke in Leipzig. Next works published by Sandig were Flamingos (2010) and Buch gegen das Verschwinden (Book against disappearing, 2015), and Dickicht (Thicket, 2011).

For her public music performances, she closely collaborates with composers and filmmakers, most recently with the rapper and poet Grigory Semenchuk (Ukraine) and the Rockband Alif (India). In 2017 Sandig was co-publisher of the Yearbook of Lyric, also poet in residence at the University for Music and Dance in Colonge. In 2020, she published her first Novel Monster wie wir (Monsters like us).

Hans Joachim Schädlich is the Erich Loest Prize laureate 2019.

Hans Joachim Schädlich was born as the son of a merchant in 1935 in Reichenbach in Vogtland, Saxony, where he also attended school. From 1954 to 1959 he studied German language and literature as well as linguistics at Humboldt University in Berlin and Leipzig University, where he completed his doctorate with a thesis on the phonology of the dialect in the Eastern Vogtland area. Schädlich subsequently worked as a research assistant at the Academy of Sciences of the GDR in Berlin, before being relieved of his post due to his protests against the expatriation of Wolf Biermann. In 1977 his application to leave the country was granted and he has lived in West Berlin since 1979.

Schädlich presented his first literary texts in the late 1960s, but was not allowed to publish them in the GDR. In 1986 Schädlich presented his first novel, Tallhover, which helped to establish him in the West German literature scene. The book was followed by numerous novels, collections of stories, essays and articles, and most recently Felix und Felka.

Guntram Vesper is the first winner of the “Erich Loest Prize”, offered by the Sparkasse Leipzig Media Foundation in memory of the writer Erich Loest from Leipzig who died in 2013. The prize is endowed with 10,000 euros. Guntram Vesper was born in 1941 in Frohburg, East Germany, and has lived in western Germany since 1957. In 1967 he read from his works at the last meeting of “Gruppe 47″. His oeuvre is characterised by his early volumes of poems and, later on, especially by a variety of novels, as well as essays and radio plays. Guntram Vesper has received numerous awards for his work, such as the “Peter Huchel Prize” in 1985 and the honorary award of the “Deutsche Schillerstiftung” (German Schiller Foundation) in 2006. He received the “Leipzig Book Fair Prize” in 2016 for his novel Frohburg, which takes a closer look at his Saxon hometown in times of dictatorship.