Eben Venter

Eben Venter is an Afrikaans-speaking writer who was born in Burgersdorp in South Africa and has lived in Australia, Japan and the Netherlands. He published eleven works of fiction (novels, short story collections and a cookbook). His works have been translated into English, Dutch and German.

Venter was raised on a farm in Eastern Cape. He went to Grey College in Bloemfontein before he was conscripted into the air force and served on the Angolan border. He obtained an MA in philosophy and worked as a journalist in Johannesburg before leaving South Africa in 1986, during the State of Emergency. He went to Australia where he worked as a chef in his sibling's café.

In 2006, he was writer-in-residency at NIAS, the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study, and lectured by invitation at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and Kyoto University, Japan.

The Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University awarded him as an alumni achiever in November 2011. In 2012, he was writer-in-residence at Rhodes University. Currently (as of 2015) he lives in Lismore, New South Wales, Australia, working on the first novel which he creates in English instead of Afrikaans.

• 1986 Witblitz
• 1993 Foxtrot van die vleiseters, translated into German (as Burenfoxtrott) and Dutch (Dans aan het einde van de dag)
• 1996 Ek stamel, ek sterwe, translated into English (My Beautiful Death) and Dutch (Ik stamel ik sterf)
• 1999 My simpatie, Cerise
• 2000 Twaalf
• 2003 Begeerte
• 2006 Horrelpoot, translated as Trencherman
• 2009 Santa Gamka
• 2010 Brouhaha
• 2013 Wolf, Wolf, translated into English by Michiel Heyns

• 1994 Media24 Books Literary Awards (WA Hofmeyr Prize) – Foxtrot van die vleiseters
• 1996 Media24 Books Literary Awards (WA Hofmeyr Prize) – Ek stamel, ek sterwe
• 2004 Media24 Books Literary Awards (WA Hofmeyr Prize) – Begeerte
• 2010 Media24 Books Literary Awards (WA Hofmeyr Prize) – Santa Gamka
• 2010 M-Net Literary Awards – Santa Gamka