Ulf Stark, 1944–2017, grew up in a suburb just outside Stockholm. He debuted as a 19-year-old with a collection of poems and published his first children’s book in 1975, but the big breakthrough came in 1984 when he won the Bonniers Junior Publishers Prize competition.

Ulf Stark was one of our great storytellers. He wrote simply and poetically, often about the questions of life. He created his worlds of sorrow and joy, love and longing. And he always did it with humour. The ability to touch readers earned him the audience’s ear and hearing his stories read aloud is an experience never to be forgotten by any child.

Ulf Stark was well awarded. In 1988 he received the Nils Holgersson Plaque, and in 1994 he received the Deutscher Jugendliteraturpreis. In 1996 he received the August Prize together with Anna Höglund.