Elisabeth Borchers was born in 1926 and raised bilingually with French and German. She worked as an editor, first at Luchterhand, then at Suhrkamp from 1960 until her retirement in 1998. She is often cited as playing a critical role in the development of German literature during the second half of the 20th century. She is the author of eight books of poetry, numerous children’s books, radio plays and essays and has translated many books from French into German. She died in 2013 in Frankfurt.