Fraktur mon Amour (2006) • Blau steht dir nicht (2008) • Atlas der abgelegenen Inseln. Fünfzig Inseln, auf denen ich nie war und niemals sein werde (2009) • Taschenatlas der abgelegenen Inseln. Fünfzig Inseln, auf denen ich nie war und niemals sein werde (2011) • Der Hals der Giraffe (2011) • Verzeichnis einiger Verluste (2018) • Erfahrung und Erforschung. Literatur und ihre Welten (2020) • MARE INCOGNITUM (2023) • Schwankende Kanarien (2023) •
Judith Schalansky, born in 1980 in Greifswald, then part of East Germany, is a German author, book designer, and editor whose work blends visual artistry with literary depth. Trained in art history and communication design, she has been the general editor of the Naturkunden series at Matthes & Seitz since 2013. Her first book, Fraktur mon Amour (2008), is a typographic love letter to the Gothic script fraktur, showcasing her unique combination of design expertise and narrative skill.
She rose to international prominence with Atlas of Remote Islands (2009), a collection of maps and lyrical essays about fifty far-flung, often uninhabited places, which won “Most Beautiful German Book of the Year.” Her novel The Giraffe’s Neck (2011) further demonstrated her skill in weaving sharp, reflective narratives grounded in landscape and science. In 2018, she published An Inventory of Losses, a genre-defying meditation on lost objects, places, and stories, which won the Wilhelm Raabe Prize and was longlisted for the International Booker Prize. Across all her works, Schalansky’s books are as much meticulously crafted physical objects as they are explorations of memory, geography, and disappearance.
Schalansky handed her manuscript Mare Incognitum to the Future Library in 2023, work which was preceded by Erfahrung und Erforschung. Literatur und ihre Welten (2020), and followed by Schwankende Kanarien in 2023.