Ebner-Eschenbach

Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach (1830-1916)

Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach was born September 1, 1830 as the second daughter of Baron Franz Dubsky and his second wife Marie, née Baroness von Vockel at their estate Zdislawitce in Moravia. Her mother died a few days after giving birth and Marie was raised under the careful attention of two stepmothers to both of whom she was very much attached. The theme of motherhood and suffering would later play a significant role in her writings. Marie’s first two languages were French and Czech, the latter of which she learned from her nannies. The family moved back and forth between their castle and their city mansion in Vienna. Marie showed an early interest in writing and her family sent samples off to the famous Viennese writer and dramatist Franz Grillparzer for comment. He gave a favorable recommendation but the family remained skeptical of Marie’s talents. Later in life, Grillparzer and Marie would become friends and she wrote a memoir about their relationship.

In 1848, Marie married her significantly older cousin, Moritz von Ebner-Eschenbach who, according to her autobiography, encouraged her to write in German. The couple made their home first in the south Moravian town of Louka where Moritz was stationed and then in Vienna. They usually summered in Zdislawitce on the family estate and in some of the fashionable spas of the time.

As she began to focus on her writing, she also completed a very unusual apprenticeship in clockmaking. After early attempts at writing dramas in the style of Friedrich Schiller (Maria Stuart in Schottland [1860], Marie Roland [1867]) and an anonymously published satire on the life of upper class society in one of the established spas, Ebner-Eschenbach focused on prose.

Her break through was Lotti, die Uhrmacherin (1880; Lotti, the clock maker) which was published in instalments by one of the leading German journals at the time, Deutsche Rundschau. That same year, she also published a volume of aphorisms. These are among the most quoted of her texts and get referenced even in contemporary popular culture, for example at the end an episode of the American TV crime series Criminal Minds.

During the final two decades of the 19th century and the early 20th century, Ebner-Eschenbach’s fame continued to grow as she published stories often set either in the realm of the rural village or the country estate, often pitching the contrast between the lives of the people. She also wrote some shorter novels (Das Gemeindekind [1887; Their Pavel, 1996] and Unsühnbar [1890]; Beyond Atonement [2010]).

Ebner-Eschenbach was a founding member of a society working against anti-Semitism and was involved in a number of social causes. After the death of her husband, she travelled a number of times to Rome where she intensified her relationship with other women writers like her friend Malwida von Meysenbug and learned about classical antiquity. There is a strong indication that Ebner-Eschenbach tried to establish a female writers’ network through close association and mutual support with people like Ida Fleischl, Betty Paoli and, later, Enrica Handel-Mazetti, among others. A serendipitous discovery of Ebner’s correspondence with her early mentor and friend Josephine von Knorr, published in German in 2016, has added invaluable contextual information to the emerging new image of Ebner as a person and as a writer.

In her later years, Ebner-Eschenbach gained astounding popularity receiving the highest civilian medal of the Habsburg Empire, the Ehrenzeichen für Wissenschaft und Kunst (Decoration for Science and Art) in 1898. As the first woman ever, she was awarded an honorary degree from the University of Vienna in 1900. That same year, for her seventieth birthday, a salutatory note signed by many thousands of Viennese women was dedicated to her. This popularity and fame also drew derision from some of the modernists like Robert Musil and Karl Kraus who saw her as a representative of the old literary establishment.

Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach who never had any children but often called her literary works her offspring died March 12, 1916; her life spanned the same years as that of Emperor Franz Joseph. She was buried at the family’s burial site on their estate in Zdislawitce.

English Translations of Ebner-Eschenbach’s works

Beyond Atonement, trans. by Mary A. Robinson Whitefish (MT: Kessinger Publishing, 2010)

Seven Stories by Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach, trans. by Helga H. Harriman (Columbia, SC: Camden House, 1986)

Their Pavel, trans. by Lynne Tatlock (Columbia, SC: Camden House, 1996)

German Editions of Ebner-Eschenbach’s works

Autobiographische Schriften I: Meine Kinderjahre; Aus meinen Kinder- und Lehrjahren, kritisch herausgegeben und gedeutet von Christa-Maria Schmidt (Tübingen: Niemeyer, 1989)

Božena, kritisch herausgegeben und gedeutet von Kurt Binneberg (Bonn: Bouvier, 1980)

Briefwechsel mit Theo Schücking. Frauenleben im 19. Jahrhundert, hg. von Edda Polheim. (Tübingen: Niemeyer, 2001)

Erzählungen, Autobiographische Schriften, hg. von Johannes Klein (München: Winkler, 1956)

Das Gemeindekind, kritisch herausgegeben und gedeutet von Rainer Baasner (Bonn: Bouvier, 1983) Translated as Their Pavel by Lynne Tatlock (Columbia, SC: Camden House, 1996)

Die historischen Tragödien. Maria Stuart in Schottland, Marie Roland, Richelieu, Jacobäa, kritisch herausgegeben und kommentiert von Marianne Henn (Tübingen: Niemeyer 2006)

Tagebücher. 6 Bde., kritisch herausgegeben und kommentiert von Karl Konrad Polheim et al. (Tübingen: Niemeyer 1989ff.)

Letzte Chancen: Vier Einakter von Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach, hg. von Susanne Kord. (London: Modern Humanities Research Association, 2005)

Macht des Weibes: Zwei historische Tragödien von Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach, hg. von Susanne Kord (London: Modern Humanities Research Association, 2005)

Leseausgabe in vier Bänden, hg. Von Evelyne Polt-Heinzl, Daniela Strigl und Ulrike Tanzer (St. Pölten, Salzburg, Wien: Residenz, 2014f.)

Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach-Josephine von Knorr. Briefwechsel 1851-1908, 2 Bde., Kritische und kommentierte Ausgabe von Ulrike Tanzer, Irene Fußl, Lina Maria Zangerl und Gabriele Radecke (Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter, 2016)