Auður Ava Ólafsdóttir


Auður Ava Ólafsdóttir is an Icelandic professor of art history, a novelist, playwright and poet. She received the Nordic Council Literature Prize for Hotel Silence in 2018.

Early life and education

Auður Ava Ólafsdóttir was born in 1958, in Reykjavík. She studied the history of art at Sorbonne, Paris.

Career

Auður works as an assistant professor of art history at the University of Iceland. For a time, she was the director of the university's Art Museum.
Her first novel Upphækkuð jörð was published in 1998. It set the stage for her future works in its fine dissection of the smaller things in life.
Her book Rigning í nóvember was lauded as a "moving, layered and optimistic piece of writing". The book won the Tómas Guðmundsson Literary Award.
In 2009, she published Afleggjarinn to mixed reviews. It was described as meticulous and finely crafted, yet lacking a tension both in its language and friction in its emotion. It was also described as a sweetly comic and wry observation of sex, manhood, death and parenthood.

Personal life

Auður has revealed that her temporary residence in Catholic countries and her deep interest in their art and music led her to convert to Roman Catholicism.

Works

Novels