Dr. Georg Ruppelt

Dr. Ruppelt was born in Lower Saxony on 3 October 1947. He studied History, German Studies, Pedagogy and Philosophy in Göttingen and later in Braunschweig, where he also received a doctoral degree for his interdisciplinary dissertation “Schiller in National Socialistic Germany” in 1978. After working as a library clerk in Wolfenbüttel and Cologne, he received a position as an administrative assistant and department manager at the State and University Library Hamburg and a part-time university lecturer. In 1987 he was appointed deputy director under Paul Raabe at the Duke August Library in Wolfenbüttel. In 2002 Ruppelt became the director of the Lower Saxony State Library in Hanover, which, at his suggestion, was officially renamed the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Library in 2005.
 
Between 2000 and 2006 Ruppelt was deputy chairman of the German Arts Council, member of the Goethe-Institute advisory board, member of the German Commission for UNESCO, and, since 2001, Second Spokesperson for the German Literature Conference.
 
Ruppelt is especially committed to promoting literacy. From 1996 to 2005 he was member of the board of directors at the Stiftung Lesen [Reading Foundation] where he served as chairman from 2001 to 2005. In 2004 he founded the Academy for the Promotion of Literacy at the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Library which is funded by the Reading Foundation and the state of Lower Saxony.