Anne Ranasinghe (born Anneliese Katz) was born on October 2, 1925, in Essen, Germany and died on December 17, 2016.

She was a Jewish-German born Sri Lankan English language poet.

Anne was considered as one of Sri Lanka’s leading poet in English, having won several international awards.

She was born into a Jewish family.

She was a victim of Nazi Germany’s atrocities against Jews, she witnessed the Kristallnacht (night of broken glass), the burning of the Essen synagogue.

In 1939, Anne Ranasinghe parents sent her to England to an aunt she had never seen before.

After just one a week she was sent a school 140 miles away to live among strangers and to learn English, anew language to her.

And after six months World War II broke out and much later she would learn that her parents had been murdered by the Nazis.

She completed her studies at Parkstone Grammar School and trained to become a nursing sister at Charing Cross Hospital, King’s College, Moorfields, Chelsea and Burden Neurological Institute.

During 1949 Anne Ranasinghe married D. A. Ranasinghe, a post graduate student, who later became a Professor of the Colombo Medical School and moved to Sri Lanka.

She died in her Colombo residence in Rosmead Place.

Anne Ranasinghe passed away at 91 years old.