Fanny Lewald

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Fanny Lewald (March 21, 1811–August 5, 1889), German Jewish author, was born at Königsberg in East Prussia.

When seventeen years of age she embraced Christianity. After travelling in the German Confederation, France and Italy, she settled at Berlin in 1845. Here, in 1854, she married the author, Adolf Wilhelm Theodor Stahr (1805-1876). She moved after his death in 1876 to Dresden, where she resided, engaged in literary work, until her death.

Lewald is less remarkable for her writings, which are mostly sober, matter-of-fact works, though displaying considerable talent and culture, than for her championship of women's rights, and for her scathing satire on the sentimentalism of the Gräfin von Hahn-Hahn. This author she ruthlessly attacked in the exquisite parody (Diogena, Roman von Iduna Griffin H...-H... (2nd ed., 1847).

Among the best known of her novels are:

  • Klementine (1842)
  • Prinz Louis Ferdinand (1849; 2nd ed., 1859)
  • Das Mädchen von Hela (1860)
  • Von Geschlecht zu Geschlecht (8 vols, 1863-1865)
  • Benvenuto (1875), and Stella (1883)
  • English by B Marshall, 1884)

Of her writings in defence of the emancipation of women Osterbriefe für die Frauen (1863) and Für und wider die Frauen (1870) are conspicuous. Her autobiography, Meine Lebensgeschichte (6 vols, 1861-1862), is brightly written and affords interesting glimpses of the literary life of her time.

A selection of her works was published under the title Gesammelte Schriften in 12 vols (1870-1874). Cf. K Frenzel, Erinnerungen und Stromungen (1890).

[edit] References