Olga Tokarczuk was born in 1962 in Sulechów near Zielona Góra, Poland. A recipient of all of Poland's top literary
awards, she is one of the most critically acclaimed authors of her generation. After finishing her psychology degree
at the University of Warsaw, she initially practiced as a therapist and often cites C.G. Jung as an
inspiration for her work, in which mythmaking has become a hallmark.
Since the publication of her first book in 1989, a collection of poems, Tokarczuk has published ten volumes of
stories, novellas, and novels, and one book-length essay(on Boleslaw Prus's novel The Doll. In English her
work has appeared in numerous journals and anthologies, as has her novel House of Day, House of Night. In 1998 Tokarczuk moved to a small
village near the Czech border and now divides her time between there and Wroclaw. For her latest novel, Bieguni [The Runners], she received
Poland's top book award, the Nike Prize, in 2008.
