Juli Zeh (, Julia Barbara Finck, née Zeh; born 30 June 1974) is a German writer and judge. She is known for novels such as '' The Method'' (2009), '' Unterleuten'' (2016) and '' About People'' (2021).

Early life and education

Juli Zeh is the daughter of the lawyer . She studied law in Passau and Leipzig, passing the Zweites Juristisches

Staatsexamen The ("state examination" or "exam by state"; pl.: ''Staatsexamina'') is a German government licensing examination that future physicians, dentists, physical therapists, teachers, research librarians, archivists, pharmacists, food chemists, psyc ...

– comparable equivalent to the U.S.

bar exam A bar examination is an examination administered by the bar association of a jurisdiction that a lawyer must pass in order to be admitted to the bar of that jurisdiction. Australia Administering bar exams is the responsibility of the bar associat ...

– in 2003, and holds a doctorate in international law from

Saarland University Saarland University (, ) is a public research university located in Saarbrücken, the capital of the German state of Saarland. It was founded in 1948 in Homburg in co-operation with France and is organized in six faculties that cover all major ...

. She also has a degree from the German Institute for Literature Leipzig.

Career

Zeh's first published novel was '' Eagles and Angels'', which received the 2002 Deutscher Bücherpreis for best

debut novel A debut novel is the first novel a novelist publishes. Debut novels are often the author's first opportunity to make an impact on the publishing industry, and thus the success or failure of a debut novel can affect the ability of the author to pu ...

. She travelled through Bosnia-Herzegovina in 2001, which became the basis for the book '' Die Stille ist ein Geräusch''. Among her other books are ''Das Land der Menschen'', ''

Dark Matter In astronomy, dark matter is an invisible and hypothetical form of matter that does not interact with light or other electromagnetic radiation. Dark matter is implied by gravity, gravitational effects that cannot be explained by general relat ...

'', ''Kleines Konversationslexikon für Haushunde'', '' Gaming Instinct'', ''Ein Hund läuft durch die Republik'', '' Decompression'' and '' The Method''. Since January 2019, Zeh is an honorary judge at the Constitutional Court of Brandenburg. She was one of the first signers of the Open letter on the German position regarding the Russian invasion of Ukraine in April 2022, who demanded not to support

Ukraine Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the List of European countries by area, second-largest country in Europe after Russia, which Russia–Ukraine border, borders it to the east and northeast. Ukraine also borders Belarus to the nor ...

with arms in order to "prevent a third world war".

Personal life

Zeh is married and has two children. Since 2017, she has been a member of the

Social Democratic Party of Germany The Social Democratic Party of Germany ( , SPD ) is a social democratic political party in Germany. It is one of the major parties of contemporary Germany. Saskia Esken has been the party's leader since the 2019 leadership election together w ...

Selected bibliography

;Novels ;Other

References

External links

An interview about her social commitment, recent translated books and her recent play, ''Corpus Delicti''
''

Trouw ''Trouw'' (; ) is a Dutch daily newspaper appearing in compact size. It was founded in 1943 as an orthodox Protestant underground newspaper during World War II. Since 2009, it has been owned by DPG Media (known as De Persgroep until 2019). '' ...

'', September 2008
Interview about ''Corpus Delicti'', the role of state observation and civil disobedience
April 2011
Article about the translation of ''Corpus Delicti'' as ''The Method''
April 2012

in:

NRW Literatur im Netz NRW Literatur im Netz is a German internet database with short biographies of persons who have lived or worked in North Rhine-Westphalia. The Westphälische Literaturbüro (Westphalian office for literature) in Unna operates the biggest database ...