Olga Ravn

Olga Ravn is a Danish poet and novelist. She is known for her poetry and the novel The Employees (2020).

Olga Ravn was born in Copenhagen. She is the daughter of singer Anne Dorte Michelsen and artist Peter Ravn. Olga attended the Danish Writers' School and graduated in 2010.

Ravn published her first poem in the literary magazine Hvedekorn in 2008. Her poems later appeared in Konvolut 28/6, Trappe Tusind and other Danish publications. In 2012, she published her first volume of poetry, Jeg æder mig selv som lyng. The book explores themes such as youth, love and the body. Critics described it as "a passionate, lyrical collection about breaking free from the role of a young girl". A Swedish translation was published in 2013.

In 2014, Ravn published Mean Girl, a chapbook of poems featuring coloured leaves and shimmering scraps. Each book was unique, and it was limited to 250 copies. In 2015, a Norwegian selection of the book was published.

Ravn edited the 2015 book Jeg ville være enke, og jeg ville være digter, a collection of forgotten texts by Tove Ditlevsen. In the same year, she published her first novel, Celestine. The book is about a boarding school teacher obsessed with a ghost. Critics praised Ravn's language, with one reviewer writing: "She can do so much with words.

Her second novel, The Employees, was published in 2020. Set on a spaceship, it explores work, identity, and human connection. In an interview, Ravn described it as "a novel about trying to stay hard but gradually revealing yourself to be the softest material." The book has been shortlisted for the 2021 International Booker Prize and the 2022 Ursula K. Le Guin Prize.

Ravn has won several awards. In 2019, she won the Beatrice Prize. She has been shortlisted for the Warwick Prize for Women in Translation and the National Book Award for Translated Literature. In 2023, her novel My Work was a finalist for the Cercador Prize for Literature in Translation.

Olga Ravn works as a writing teacher at Testrup Højskole and as an editor at Gyldendal. She also writes literary criticism for Politiken and publishes short texts and videos online.

Photo credit: X @OlgaRavn