Deborah Levy (born 1959 in Johannesburg) is a South African-British novelist, playwright and poet. She broke through internationally with Swimming Home and Hot Milk, both shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize, and cemented her reputation with a three-part 'living autobiography' - Things I Don't Want to Know, The Cost of Living and Real Estate - that examines womanhood, freedom and the writing life with philosophical precision. Her work has been staged by the Royal Shakespeare Company and translated widely; she is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.
Levy opens the Brainwash Festival in Amsterdam on 29 October 2026 as headliner of the opening night at Skatecafé Amsterdam, around the theme 'the shape of us'.
Her new novel My Year in Paris with Gertrude Stein was published in June 2026 and was named by GQ, the Financial Times and BBC Culture as one of the most anticipated books of the year.
The Seamus Heaney Centre at Queen's University Belfast appointed Levy in February 2026 as the first International Visiting Chair for Creative Writing.
The film adaptation of her novel Hot Milk, starring Emma Mackey and Fiona Shaw, was released in cinemas in 2025.
In 2024, Levy gave the New Statesman/Goldsmiths Prize Lecture, titled 'Why the Novel Matters'.
