Mariella Mehr

Mariella Mehr (born December 27, 1947 in Zürich) is a Swiss writer.

Mariella Mehr was born a member of the nomadic Yeniche people. She was a victim of the Hilfswerk für die Kinder der Landstrasse (loosely translated, "Relief Organisation for Rural Street Children"), which separated Yeniche children from their parents. Mehr was moved between 16 orphanages and three reformatories as a child. She was committed to a mental institution four times and spent nineteen months in a women's prison.

Mehr published her first work in 1975, and her first novel, Steinzeit, in 1981. She champions the causes of outsiders and oppressed minorities. Her work was recognized in 1998 with an honorary doctorate from the University of Basel.

In 2000, she resigned from the authors' club Gruppe Olten, because the group struck from its mission statement the goal of realising a "democratic socialist society".

Mariella Mehr currently lives in Tuscany.

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