Marcel Reich-Ranicki, born in 1920 in Wloclawek an der Weichsel, grew up in Berlin. Shortly after completing his general qualification for university entrance at Fichte-Gymnasium in Berlin-Wilmersdorf, he was arrested in the fall of 1938 and deported to Poland. In 1958 he returned to Germany and lived in Hamburg and Frankfurt. From 1960 through 1973 he was a literary critic for the weekly newspaper Die Zeit and from 1973 to 1988 he headed the editorial department for literature and literary life for the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. During 1968/69 he taught at American universities, from 1971 to 1975 he was a visiting professor for German literature at the universities of Stockholm and Uppsala, since 1974 he has been an adjunct professor at Universität Tübingen, and in 1991/92 he was the Heinrich-Heine-Visiting Professor at Universität Düsseldorf. He became known to a broader public through the television show Das literarische Quartett.

Reich-Ranicki has been the recipient of many awards, among them the Thomas Mann Prize (1987), the Bavarian Television Award (1991), the Ludwig Börne Prize (1995), the Golden Camera (2000), the Hölderlin Prize (2000), and the Goethe Prize (2002) as well as honorary doctorates from the universities of Uppsala (1972), Augsburg (1992), Bamberg (1992), Düsseldorf (1997), Utrecht (2001), and Munich (2002).

His most important publications include the following books:

Deutsche Literatur in West und Ost (1963/1983), Über Ruhestörer. Juden in der deutschen Literatur (1973/1989), Nachprüfung, Aufsätze über deutsche Schriftsteller von gestern (1977/19870/1990), Thomas Mann und die Seinen (1987), Thomas Bernhard (1990), Max Frisch (1991), Ohne Rabatt. Über Literatur aus der DDR (1991), Der doppelte Boden (1992), Die Anwälte der Literatur (1994), Ungeheuer oben. Über Bertold Brecht (1996), Der Fall Heine (1997), Mein Leben (1999), Vom Tag gefordert (2001), Erst leben, dann spielen (2002), Sieben Wegbereiter (2002), Goethe noch einmal (2002), Über Literaturkritik (2002), Kritik als Beruf (2002), Unser Grass (2003), and Über Amerikaner (2004).

Marcel Reich-Ranicki has edited the following books (among others):

Frankfurter Anthologie (so far 28 volumes), Alfred Polgar, Kleine Schriften (6 vols.), Wolfgang Koeppen, Gesammelte Werke (6 vols.), Romane von gestern – heute gelesen (3 vols.), Der Kanon. Die deutsche Literatur (2002-2005), and Meine Gedichte. Walther von der Vogelweide bis heute (2003).