Christoph Hein

Christoph Hein (German: [ˈkʁɪstɔf ˈhaɪn] ; born 8 April 1944) is a German author and translator.

He grew up in the village Bad Düben near Leipzig. Being a clergyman's son and thus not allowed to attend the Erweiterte Oberschule in the GDR, he received secondary education at a gymnasium in the western part of Berlin. After his Abitur he jobbed inter alia as assembler, bookseller and assistant director. From 1967 to 1971 Hein studied philosophy in Leipzig and Berlin. Upon graduation, he became a dramatic adviser at the Volksbühne in Berlin, where he worked as a resident writer from 1974. Since 1979 Hein has worked as a freelance writer.

Hein first became known for his 1982 novella Der fremde Freund (The Distant Lover). From 1998 to 2000 Hein was the first president of the pan-German PEN-Centre.According to Hein, the acclaimed film drama The Lives of Others is loosely based on his life story. In a 2019 article, he claims that after attending the premiere screening, he asked author and director von Donnersmarck to have his name removed from the credits, because he felt that the movie was a "scary tale taking place in a fantasy land, comparable to Tolkien's Middle-earth," that "does not depict the 1980s in the GDR".