Johano Strasser

Johano Strasser, born in 1939 in Leeuwarden, the Netherlands, studied philosophy and politics. He received a doctorate in philosophy in 1967 and completed his habilitation in political science at the Free University of Berlin in 1977, where he subsequently taught as a private lecturer. From 1971 to 1975, he was deputy federal chairman of the Young Socialists and, from 1973, a member of the SPD’s Basic Values Commission. From 1980 to 1988, he worked as an editor and co-publisher of the political-literary journal L’80. He became a freelance writer in 1983 and served as president of the German PEN Centre from 2002 to 2013. Strasser published nonfiction, novels, radio plays, stage plays, and poetry. His works include The Finest Time of Life, Society in Fear, and The Drama of Progress. His honors included the Political Book Prize (1983) and the Gerty Spies Literature Prize (2002).