ABOUT LENA WOLF

Lena Wolf was born in Latvia to ethnically German parents from the Soviet Union and grew up in Kazakhstan.

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Now based in London, Lena describes herself as a German from Kazakhstan - a KazakhGerman. Her debut graphic novel, May The Universe Be Your Home!, is a deeply personal tribute to her ancestors, giving voice to the silenced stories of the Germans from the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union.

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Northwestern Kazakhstan and the city of Aktjubinsk (now Aktobe)—with its vast steppes, spring tulips, and powdery winter snow—were Lena’s first true home. They hold both the warmth of childhood and the shadow of exile: in 1941, her parents and grandmothers were deported there by Stalin from German villages in Ukraine (Zaporizhzhia region) and southern Russia (Don area), where their families had lived for more than 170 years. When the deportation was declared permanent, Kazakhstan became both a place of loss and belonging.

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Almost half a century later, when Lena was a teenager, her family was finally allowed to move to Germany under Gorbachev’s reforms. But in the land of her ancestors, she discovered an unexpected truth—that belonging is not inherited. Surrounded by people whose language she spoke but whose world felt distant, Lena realised she didn’t belong, even where she had hoped to. Over time, she built a new life, and the city of Offenbach am Main gradually became her home.

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Lena completed her Abitur in Offenbach and studied at Goethe University in Frankfurt before moving to New Zealand, where she earned two degrees (BA and MMS) from Victoria University of Wellington. It was there that she began to write about memory, migration, and identity—and for the first time, she felt truly heard.