Walter Kempowski
(born 29.04.1929 in Rostock; died 05.10.2007 in Rotenburg an der Wümme), writer.
Walter Kempowski was sentenced by a Soviet military court in 1948 to 25 years' hard labour for political reasons. After his early release he studied education in Göttingen and worked as a teacher. His first book, Im Block, published in 1969, dealt with his time in prison. In 1971, the first volume of the Deutschen Chronik was published under the title Tadellöser und Wolff, in which Kempowski told the story of his family. After nine volumes, it ended in 1984 with the work Herzlich willkommen. Corresponding to this, the ten-volume compilation Echolot was published from 1993 to 2005, in which Kempowski collaged the voices of unknown and well-known contemporary witnesses to the events of the Second World War. Kempowski received numerous awards for this and his other works, such as the Uwe Johnson Prize in 1995, the Thomas Mann Prize in 2005 and the Federal Cross of Merit with Star in 2006.