German children's book author Janosch dead at 95

The German children's book author and illustrator Janosch, whose works delighted generations of children in the country, has died at the age of 95, his literary agent confirmed to AFP on Wednesday.

Horst Eckert, writing under the pen name "Janosch", created a number of iconic characters that remain instantly recognisable to Germans of all ages, including the Tigerente (or "Tiger Duck"), a striped wooden toy duck on wheels pulled along by a string that appeared in numerous books.

His children's book "Oh, wie schoen ist Panama" ("The Trip to Panama") -- which follows the journey of two friends, Little Bear and Little Duck, with Tiger Duck in tow -- was published in 1978 and went on to become a children's classic in Germany.

According to his agency, his works have been translated into more than 30 languages and have received many awards.

His agent and publisher, Bernhard Feil, told AFP that he died on Tuesday, citing the author's wife.

German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier hailed the writer's "unbridled imagination" and said that "our world has become a little poorer" with his passing.

"For countless children, for countless adults who live with children, and for everyone who has not forgotten how to marvel and wonder, Janosch has been -- and remains -- a companion through life like few other authors or illustrators," Steinmeier said.

Eckert was born in 1931 in Upper Silesia, at the time part of Germany, today in Poland.

Like many German-speakers from the region, he and his family moved westward with the defeat of Nazi Germany in 1945; he came of age in West Germany and studied in Munich.

Although his own work was warm and often centred on themes of love and friendship, Janosch in a 2017 interview with news magazine Der Spiegel described his own childhood growing up with a violent alcoholic father and an austere, harshly strict mother as "hell".

Since 1980, Janosch had lived with his wife, Ines, on Tenerife in the Spanish Canary Islands.