- Feeling foreign was one of writer Peter Härtling's favorite subjects - because he experienced it himself as an orphaned war deportee.
- Härtling has worked as the editor of the magazine Der Monat, and as the president of the Hölderlin society.
- In the winter semester of 1983/84, he hosted the annual Frankfurter Poetik-Vorlesungen, a lecture series, in which a prominent writer discourses on topics pertaining to their work. Härtling used his lectureship to demonstrate the process of using a found object as the inspiration for a literary work. During the series of lectures, he wrote Der spanische Soldat, a short story based on a photograph by Robert Capa.
- He was a member of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany, and he received the Großes Verdienstkreuz for his major contribution to German literature.
- Following the outbreak of World War II, the family moved to the German-occupied town of Olomouc in Moravia. Like many of the town's German residents, Härtling's family fled before the Red Army's advance on the city during the final months of the war; the family briefly settled in Zwettl, Austria.
- For his lasting contribution as a children's writer, Härtling was a finalist in 2010 for the biennial, the international Hans Christian Andersen Award, and the highest recognition available to creators of children's books.
- Härtling has devoted a large proportion of his literary output - both in poetry, and in prose - to the reclamation of history, and his own past. His autobiographical novel, Zwettl (1973), deals with the period he spent living in Lower Austria, after his family fled from the Red Army. Nachgetragene Liebe (1980) recounts Härtling's earliest memories of his deceased father.
- His children's literature has often focused on social problems involving children. In Das war der Hirbel (1973), he wrote about the home of a maladjusted child, and Oma (1975) talks about aging and death, whilst Theo haut ab (1977) deals with being uprooted from home and family.
- Amongst other works, Härtling has written factionalism biographical works on the writers Friedrich Hölderlin, Wilhelm Waiblinger and E. T. A. Hoffmann, and the composers Franz Schubert, and Robert Schumann.
- Another major influence on Härtling's works has been the literature and music of Romanticism.
- He was a writer and a poet.
- There are English translations of several of his children's books, including Granny (Oma), Crutches (Krücke), Ben Loves Anna (Ben liebt Anna), Old John (Alter John), and Herbie's World (Das war der Hirbel).
- In 1969, after writing a eulogy for the Czech children's writer Jan Procházka, Härtling began writing books for children. His first children's book, Und das ist die ganze Familie, was published the following year.
- In 1976, he published a fairy tale called, Fundevogel (English version as "The Foundling"), which is part of the children's book Update on Rumpelstiltskin and other Fairy Tales by 43 Authors, which is compiled by Hans-Joachim Gelberg, illustrated by Willi Glasauer, and published by Beltz & Gelberg.
- Härtling has been the moderator of the Literatur im Kreuzverhörshow, a radio show on the cultural radio station of Hessischer Rundfunk.
- Härtling was born at Chemnitz, and spent the early part of his childhood living in Hartmannsdorf, Mittweida, where his father maintained a law firm.
- Härtling had his first collection of poetry published in 1953.
- He studied under HAP Grieshaber at the Bernsteinschule art school, before starting work as a journalist.
- From 1967 to 1973, Härtling was the managing director of the German publishing house S. Fischer Verlag, located in Frankfurt. Härtling became a full-time writer after leaving S. Fischer Verlag.[.
- Härtling's father was captured by the Russians, and died in June 1945 at the prisoner-of-war camp in Dollersheim. His mother committed suicide in October 1946.
- Orphaned, Härtling was raised by his grandmother and aunts during a time when Germany was eager to press forward, recover from the war, and rebuild its economy. Härtling would spend his whole life working through his own family's circumstances.
- Thousands of children and young readers in Germany grew up with the book "Ben Loves Anna," which was published in 1979.
- Härtling had fled to the city of Nürtingen in southwestern Germany from Bohemia in the present-day Czech Republic when World War II ended in 1945 and ethnic Germans were forced to leave the region. During the family's journey to Germany, Härtling's father was taken captive by the Russians and subsequently died. The following year, his mother committed suicide.
- He had begun writing at a very young age himself. Having interned at the German daily, the "Nürtinger Zeitung," Härtling was just 20 when his first volume of poems was published in 1953.
- Härtling received many awards for his work, including the Deutscher Bücherpreis for his contribution to literature, and the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany. He was awarded the Jacob Grimm Prize in 2010, with the jury naming him one of the most diverse contemporary German-language writers.
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