Meral
Kureishi

Meral Kureyshi, born in 1983 in Prizren, came to Switzerland with her family in 1992 and lives in Bern. She studied literature and German studies and works as a freelance author. Her first novel Elephants in the Garden (Limmat Verlag 2015) was nominated for the Swiss Book Prize, received multiple awards and has been translated into many languages. Her second novel Five Seasons (2020) was awarded the literary prize “The Second Book” by the Marianne and Curt Dienemann Foundation while still in manuscript form. In 2020 she was invited to the Days of German-Language Literature in Klagenfurt for the Bachmann Prize.

Writing in a language that is precise and at the same time poetic, Kureyshi tells of women in transitional states, of loss, origin and new beginnings. Her debut Elephants in the Garden (Limmat Verlag, 2015) follows a young woman after the death of her father, torn between Switzerland and her childhood in Kosovo. Five Seasons (2020) portrays a woman in a state of suspension, undecided between two men, two lives. Her most recent novel We Were Never in the Sea (2025) tells of care, farewell and the many forms in which family can be lived. Kureyshi does without loud pathos and dramatic plots. She lets her stories drift in the flow of the everyday, until they hit you right in the heart.

Meral Kureyshi holds the Samuel Fischer Visiting Professorship at the Peter Szondi Institute of Comparative Literature at Freie Universität Berlin during the 2026–27 winter semester.