Ingvar Even Ambjørnsen-Haefs (20 May 1956 – 19 July 2025) is considered to be one of the great storytellers of contemporary Norwegian literature. Since his literary debut in 1981, Ambjørnsen has written a great number of novels, collections of short stories as well as essay collections, and several books for children and young readers. Over the span of his career, he has won numerous awards, including the Riverton Prize, the Brage Prize Honorary Prize, the Norwegian Booksellers’ Award and the Aschehoug Prize. Ingvar Ambjørnsen has been published in 30 countries. Several of his novels have successful films and theatre adaptions. The movie Elling, based on Ambjørnsen’s novels The Chicken Dance and Beyond the Great Indoors, was nominated to an Oscar in 2001.
