Anna Funder
Anna Funder is one of Australia’s most acclaimed and awarded writers.
A former human rights lawyer, Anna’s literary work illuminates with great intimacy the courage and conscience of people trying to hold onto their humanity in the face of tyrannical power structures—whether of the left or the right, or, in her most recent book Wifedom, in patriarchy.
Born in 1966, Anna studied English Literature and German, partly at the Freie Universität Berlin. This time spent in Berlin provided a crucial source of inspiration for her literary career. Her nonfiction work Stasiland, translated into French and published by Éditions Héloïse d'Ormesson in 2007, took readers behind the scenes of the East German secret police to massive international acclaim. Stasiland won Britain’s most prestigious prize for non-fiction, the Samuel Johnson (now Baillie Gifford) Prize.
Her debut novel All That I Am, published in France by Éditions Héloïse d'Ormesson in 2013, won the Miles Franklin Literary Award and secured her lasting global recognition. Her most recent book Wifedom, which explores the invisible life of Eileen O'Shaughnessy, George Orwell’s wife, was published by Éditions Héloïse d'Ormesson in 2024 to great critical success. The book was immediately hailed as a bestseller in the UK, named a New York Times Notable Book and won the prestigious Prix du Meilleur Livre Étranger in France, granting her reputation as a masterful storyteller of hidden histories.
In 2025 the Australian public voted all three of her major works as among the top 100 books of the 21st century. Anna has recently been appointed as a Professor of Practice in Creative Writing at the University of Sydney.