James Krüss

James Krüss
Born	James Jacob Hinrich Krüss (1926-05-31)31 May 1926 Heligoland,Germany
Died	2 August 1997(1997-08-02)(aged 71) Gran Canaria, Canary Islands,Spain
Occupation	Writer
Nationality	German
Period	1946–?
Genre	Children's literature
Notable works	Timm Thaler
Notable awards	Hans Christian Andersen Awardfor Writing 1968

James Krüss(31 May 1926 – 2 August 1997) was a German writer ofchildren'sandpicture books,illustrator, poet, dramatist, scriptwriter, translator, and collector of children's poems and folk songs. For his contribution as a children's writer he received theHans Christian Andersen Awardin 1968.

Biography

Krüss was born as the son of the electrician Ludwig Krüss and his wife Margaretha Krüss (born Friedrichs) inHeligoland.In 1941, duringWorld War II,the inhabitants of the island were evacuated toArnstadt,Thuringia,later to Hertigswalde, nearSebnitz,Saxony.After finishing high school in 1943, he studied to become ateacher,first inLundenuntil 1943,Schleswig-Holstein,then inRatzeburguntil 1944, then finally inBrunswick.In 1944, he volunteered to serve in theair forceand was stationed inÚstí nad Labem,now in theCzech Republic,at the end of World War II. From 1945 on he lived with his parents inCuxhaven.

Career

In 1946, he published his first book,Der goldene Fadenand then visited the college of education inLüneburg,Lower Saxony.In 1948, he received his teaching license, but never worked as a teacher. In the same year, he moved toReinbek,nearHamburg,and founded the magazineHelgoland,which was meant for inhabitants of the island, who had been expelled from it; it existed until 1956. In 1949, he moved toLochham,nearMunich,where he got to know the authorErich Kästner,among others.

From 1956, he wroteaudio dramasfor children and children's poems together withPeter Hacks.In 1956, Krüss published the children's bookThe Lighthouse on Lobster Cliffswith the publishing houseFriedrich Oetinger.He also travelled toItalyandYugoslavia.The subsequently well-knownpicture bookHenriette,whoseeponymousprotagonistis ananthropomorphizedsteam locomotive-hauledtrain,and which started a small series of similar, related picture books, was first published in 1958. After a reading ofMy Great Grandfather and I(which won the Deutscher Jugendliteraturpreis in 1960) in theTagesschauin 1960, he suddenly became very famous. In the same year he bought a house with a garden inGilching,Bavaria.In 1962, his arguably most famous bookTimm Thalerwas published. It would later be adapted into aTV miniseriesin 1979 directed bySigi Rothemund,which was also known asThe Boy Who Lost His Laughin theUnited Kingdom.

In 1965, he bought a house inGran Canariaand settled there a year later. At the end of his life, Krüss had heart problems and spent a lot of time in clinics. In 1968 Krüss received theHans Christian Andersen Awardconferred by theInternational Board on Books for Young People,the highest recognition available to a writer or illustrator of children's books.

He died in 1997 inGran Canariaand wasburied at seaon 27 September nearHelgoland.

Legacy

Krüss was first and foremost a storyteller, whose fantastic and whimsical tales are deeply rooted infolktaleand oral storytelling tradition. Many of his books are actually collections of tales held together by a frame story. Such is the case withMy Great Grandfather and I(1959), for which he received theDeutscher Jugendliteraturpreis(German Prize for Children's and Youth Literature), with its sequelMy Great Grandfather, the Heroes, and I(1967), andThe Lighthouse on the Lobster Cliffs(1956).

Krüss was the best known and most prolific children's author in what was for nearly all his writing life theFederal Republic of Germany.Inheriting a post-war literary desert, created by theNazi Party's discouragement of creative writing for children in favour of a hoped-for return to true Germanic folk poetry, Krüss was a hugely important figure in the re-establishment of the freedom of imaginative story-telling. His first children's book,The Lighthouse on Lobster Island(1956), was based on his own experience of growing up in Heligoland, and was followed byMy Great-Grandfather and I(1959), a continuation in the same genre.

TheJames Krüss Award for International Children's and Youth Literaturewas established in his memory. The following people have received awards:

• 2013Joke van Leeuwen
• 2015Frank Cottrell Boyce
• 2017Andreas Steinhöfel
• 2019Frida Nilsson

External links

• James Krüssin theGerman National Librarycatalogue
• Website dedicated to Krüss(in German)
• Freely done anonymous English translation of Krüss's poem,"die Weihnachtsmaus" (The Christmas Mouse)