Described by Spanish newspaper ABC as ‘the new sensation in Hispanic literature’, Pola Oloixarac was born in 1977 in Buenos Aires. She claims to have started writing at the age of seven and finished her first novel aged eight.

Born in 1966, Johannes Jansen grew up in Freiburg, Leipzig and East Berlin. In the 1980s he became part of the avant-garde literary movement in East Berlin.

Elena Simonovna Chizhova, born in Leningrad in 1957, has established herself as one of Russia’s leading modern writers. Over the last decade, all her novels have received prestigious awards and recognition, culminating in the Russian Booker Prize 2009 for her latest work, A Time of Women.

Oleg Pavlov was only 24 years old when his first novel, A Military Tale, was published in Novyi mir and received positive attention not only from critics but from the jury for the Russian Booker Prize, which short-listed the novel for the 1995 award.

Aleksey Slapovsky was born in 1957 in the region of Saratov, Russia. He started his literary career in the 80′s as a dramatist; his first significant work is called ‘Sincere Artist, Unwritten Novel’ (1990). He made his name with the novel ‘It’s Not Me’ (Russian title «Я НЕ Я») which was short-listed for the prestigious national Booker Prize.

In our time I can only conceive of realism in an expanded form, absorbing innumerable imaginary elements. Today it is impossible to be a realist without acknowledging the interference of technological fictions in daily life. For the contemporary writer the …

Félix Bruzzone spends most of his time beside the swimming pool. That’s not to say he lives a charmed life but rather that despite being one of Argentina’s most celebrated young novelists, Bruzzone has to earn a living. And Bruzzone …

I love gossip. And who doesn’t? Perhaps you don’t? Well, in that case you’re an exception; the rest of us really love it. Gossip is the stuff(ing) of life. Isn’t it a pleasure, for example, to find out from the …

Sergio Olguín was born in Buenos Aires in 1967 and grew up in the Lanús neighbourhood where many of his novels are set. The first of these he penned aged nine. Entitled Lobo, Mi buen amigo (My good friend Wolf), …

At a time of limitless supply and a surplus of intellectual products I do not seek to be heard (urbi et orbi) by a yogi or dervish, to be understood by a Papuan, Geisha or some illiterate. Here, and not …

Christoph Simon was born in 1972 in Emmental, Switzerland. After travels through the Middle East, Poland, South America, London and New York, he has settled in Berne. Zbinden’s Progress is his fourth and already highly acclaimed book.

Zaionchkovsky is one of those writers with a natural charm, so at ease with themselves and so self-sufficient that they have no need of an energizing topic or a genre as a crutch, no superfluous dramatics – he simply has …

At quite an early age I gave in to the irresistible urge not to forget anything…because everything that we cannot remember may be lost forever. If we know nothing of yesterday, yesterday never was, neither was Bohemia, and neither were …

Poetry was Olga Teixeira Gonçalves’ first love, and she published half-a-dozen collections in the decade from 1973. A Floresta em Bremerhaven (The Forest in Bremerhaven, 1975) was her first novel on emigration, and it went into 4 reprints and won …

One fine day a solar system which is no longer in motion was formed – no longer because its motion is settled. In order for it to go into motion again, there’s a need for something that demolishes. This is …

Mia Couto was born of Portuguese parents in Beira, Mozambique, in 1955. In 1974, he went to Lourenço Marques (now Maputo) to study medicine, but became involved in nationalist politics immediately before and after the coup in Lisbon, which brought …

Maria Velho da Costa is a Portuguese writer, the author of more than a dozen books of fiction, non-fiction and poetry. Born in Lisbon in 1938, she became infamous in 1972 with the publication of Nova cartas portuguesas (New Portuguese …

Rui Cardoso Martins is a Portuguese writer whose works include long and short fiction, screenplays, TV comedy shows (including a popular puppetry series of political satire) and award-winning journalism. Born in Portalegre in 1967, he published his first novel in …

I like words to be incandescent and books to be infernos Linda Lê Relatively unknown to the general public yet critically highly acclaimed, Linda Lê was born to a Vietnamese father and French mother in Dalat in 1963. Her family …

The sacred is in everyday life, in the falling of a handkerchief… It is strange to have to use words to say that they shouldn’t exist. For me sound, sight, smell, these exclude words. There is no need to say …

I intend to die as I lived, a free man. Gabrielle Wittkop On her 81st birthday, Gabrielle Wittkop wrote a farewell letter to Paris publisher Bernard Wallet (Editions Verticales), telling him she had lung cancer and wanted to put an …

Carlos Gamerro is one of the best-known and most highly regarded contemporary Argentine writers. Born in Buenos Aires in 1962, he has published six works of fiction, including the novel The Islands.

Born in Bogotá is 1974, Antonio Ungar has published six books, incl. Tres ataúdes blancos (Three White Coffins), which was awarded the Premio Herralde in 2010. He was also included in the Bogotá 39. Ungar professes to be a nomad with no specific national identity.