Florian Illies, born in 1971 in Schlitz near Fulda. Until December 2002 head of the arts section of the "Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung" and before that the Berlin pages of the "FAZ". Currently a freelance author in Berlin. In 1999 he was awarded the "Ernst-Robert-Curtius Prize for Essay Writing" and in 2014 the "Ludwig Börne Prize".