Judith Kerr
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Judith Kerr (born June 14, 1923 in Berlin, Germany) is a writer. She was born in Germany, but at the age of thirteen she moved with her family, Jewish refugees, to the United Kingdom, where she has lived ever since. She subsequently became a naturalised British citizen. She is best known for her children's books, both self-illustrated picture titles such as the 17-strong Mog series and The Tiger Who Came To Tea, and novels such as When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit, which semi-autobiographically tells the story of the rise of the Nazis in 1930s Germany from a child's perspective.
She left Germany with her parents and her brother, Michael Kerr, in 1933, soon after the Nazis first came to power. They were forced to leave as her father, noted drama critic Alfred Kerr, was wanted by the Nazi authorities. The family travelled first to Switzerland and then onto France, before finally settling in the UK.
During the Second World War, Kerr worked for the Red Cross, before afterwards becoming an artist and later a television scriptwriter. It was in this latter capacity that she met her husband Nigel Kneale, also a scriptwriter, who she married in 1954; they remained married until Kneale's death in 2006. They had two children: their son Matthew Kneale is a distinguished writer himself, winning the Book of the Year prize at the prestigious Whitbread Book Awards in 2000 for the novel English Passengers. Their daughter, Tacy Kneale, works in the special effects industry, and has worked on the popular Harry Potter films.
