Karen Blixen

Blixen in Kenya, 1918

Baroness Karen von Blixen-Finecke (April 17, 1885 – September 7, 1962), née Dinesen, was a Danish author also known by her pen name Isak Dinesen. Blixen wrote works both in Danish and in English; but is best known for Out of Africa, her account of living in Kenya, and for her story, Babette's Feast, both of which were adapted into highly acclaimed motion pictures. Dinesen's short story writing was influenced by the Bible, the stories of the Arabian nights, Aesops Fables, the works of Homer, and the fairy tales of Hans Christian Andersen, her fellow countryman.

Her memoirs of pioneering a coffee farm in Africa, where she had an affinity for all that was natural, brought her worldwide recognition as an authoress. Dinesen felt the native people – the Somali and the Maasai tribes of Eastern Africa – with their rich tradition of oral storytelling, had an ear for her romantic and "old fashioned" style of writing. She loved particularly to tell stories with rhyme because it was something new to their culture. Blixen described them saying about her storytelling, "...'Please, Memsahib, talk like rain,' so then I knew they had liked it, for rain was very precious to us there."

Early Years

Karen Dinesen, called by her friends throughout life, Tania, was the the daughter of army officer Wilhelm Dinesen, and Ingeborg Westenholz, (and sister of Thomas Dinesen.) She was born on Rungsted, on the island of Zealand, in Denmark. Her father, a colorful character himself, was a soldier-of-fotune and adventurer who lived and worked as a fur trapper among the Sokaogan Chippewa in North America. He returned to Denmark but not before fathering a child with a Native American woman among the Chippewa. He wrote of his experiences in America in the book.........? Karen's family, among the aristocratic and upper classes, sent her to school at the Royal Academy of Art in Copenhagen. She also attended schools in Paris, and Rome. As an authoress, she was to write eloquently in both her native tongue, as well as in English.

She began publishing her short stories in various Danish periodicals in 1905 under the pseudonym Osceola, the name of the Seminole Indian leader, probably inspired by her father's time in America. Wilhelm Dinesen killed himself in 1895 after being diagnosed with syphilis when Karen was only ten years old. In many ways, as an adventurer and writer, Karen was her father's daughter; even sharing in the diagnosis of this disease whose frightening spectre would cast a pall over her future.

Life in Africa

In 1914 Karen Dinesen married her Swedish second cousin, Baron Bror von Blixen-Finecke, giving her the title Baroness. The couple moved to Kenya, and celebrated their wedding in Mombasa the day after their arrival. As pioneers to Africa they operated a coffee plantation bought with funds donated to them by their families. Initially life in Africa for the pair was blissful as Karen wrote, "Here at long last one was in a position not to give a damn for all conventions, here was a new kind of freedom which until then one had only found in dreams!" The realities and hardships presented by their new life would severely challenge the romantic ideals and notions that the couple began life in Africa with.

The Blixen's marriage, one of convenience and based on the idea of sharing an adventure together, was not to last. Bror, gregarious and outgoing, was frequently away for long periods on safaris or military campaigns. His nomadic lifestyle was at odds with the demands of a married gentlemen farmer. It was during this first year of marriage that Karen may have contracted syphilis from Bror. Although she never exhibited the extreme late end stages of the disease, such as loss of mental faculties, its diagnosis and subsequent treatments would plague her. In those times, syphilis, greatly dreaded and feared, was treated with arsenic and mercury; two such treatments that most likely contributed to the decline in her health over the years. The couple separated in 1921 and were divorced in 1925 at which time Karen was left to run the coffee plantation, singularly, through misfortune and mishap.

While still in Africa, she met and fell in love with English big game hunter Denys Finch Hatton, with whom she lived from 1926 to 1931. In her memoir, Out of Africa he is simply described as a friend which in many ways he was to her. They never married and most likely due to Karen’s health issues, and despite suffering two miscarriages, she was never able to have children. Their intimate but sometimes intense relationship compounded by Finch Hatton's later death in a plane crash in 1931 and the failure of the coffee plantation (due partly to the Great Depression's world wide effects), took their toll. She was forced to abandon her beloved farm in 1931 and return to Denmark. In saying goodbye to Africa, a place where she experienced both tremendous love and wrenching loss, she reflected:

• If I know a song of Africa, - I thought, of the Giraffe, and the African new moon lying on her back, of the ploughs in the fields, and the sweaty faces of the coffee-pickers, does Africa know a song of me?

Life as a writer

After returning to Denmark, Blixen immersed herself in her writing career in earnest. In 1934, her authorial debut , Seven Gothic Tales, was published under the pseudonym of Isak Dinesen, Isak meaning "laughter" and Dinesen, being her maiden name. She decided to publish the book in English since there would be a greater chance of it reaching a wider audience. This first book, whose stories were set in the 18th century are victorian in both style and prose. The plot line contains elements of the exotic and the supernatural, usually within a medieval setting. Gothic Tales was well received and further publication of the book in United Kingdom and Denmark would follow. Her second book, and now the most well known, was her memoir Out of Africa published in 193?. This book firmly established her reputation and gained her world wide recognition as an author. In 1939 she was awarded the Tagea Brandt Rejselegat.

During World War II, when Denmark was occupied by the Nazis, Blixen started to write her only full-length novel, The Angelic Avengers, under another pseudonym 'Pierre Andrezel'. Published in 1944, it has been interepeted as an allegory of Nazism. Its depiction of the horrors experienced by the young heroines, is considered symbolic of the diabolical regime of Nazism.

Her writing during most of the 1940s and 1950s consisted of tales in the storytelling tradition that she began in Africa. The most famous is Babette's Feast, about an old cook, who has not been able to show her true skills, until she has an opportunity at a celebration. An Immortal Story, in which an elderly man tries to buy youth, was adapted onto the screen in 1968, by Orson Welles, a great admirer of her work and life, in 1968.

Blixen was nominated for the Nobel Prize twice, in 1954 and 1957. She was widely respected by her American contemporaries, such as Ernest Hemingway and Truman Capote. During her tour to the United States in 1959, the list of writers who paid visits to her included Arthur Miller, E. E. Cummings and Pearl Buck.

Illness and Death

Extensive tests were unable to reveal evidence of syphillis in her system after 1925, although she did suffer a mild permanent loss of sensation in her legs that could be attributed to chronic use of arsenic in Africa. The source of her abdominal problems remained unknown but such flare ups often coincided with stressful events in Blixen's life. She also documented some trouble with panic attacks in her memoirs. Whatever the final determination, the outcome was that Blixen's health continued to deteriorate in the 1950s.

In 1955 she had a third of her stomach removed due to an ulcer, and writing became impossible although she did do several radio broadcasts. In her letters from Africa and later during her life in Denmark, Karen Blixen speculated as to whether her pain and illness could be psychosomatic in origin. However, publicly she did not nothing to dispel the idea that she was suffering from syphillis - a disease that afflicted heroes and poets, as well as her own father. Whatever the veracity was in regards to her having syphillis, the stigma attached to this disease suited the authoress’ purpose in creating a mysterious persona for herself, Baronesss, writer of esoteric tales. [1]

Unable to eat, Blixen died in 1962 at Rungstedlund, her family's estate, at the age of 77.

Rungstedlund Museum

Karen Blixen lived most of her life at the family estate Rungstedlund, which was acquired by her father in 1879. The property is located in Rungsted, 13 miles NNE of Copenhagen, Denmark. The oldest parts of the estate date back to 1680, and it has been operated both as an inn and as a farm. Most of Blixen's writing took place in Ewald's Room, named after author Johannes Ewald. The property is managed by the Rungstedlund Foundation, founded by Blixen and her siblings. The property opened to the public as a museum in 1991.

Her Legacy and Works

Karen, the suburb of Nairobi where Blixen made her home and operated her coffee plantation, was named after her. There is a Karen Blixen Coffee House and Museum, set near her former home.

• The Hermits (1907, published in a Danish journal under the name Osceola)
• The Ploughman (1907, published in a Danish journal under the name Osceola)
• The de Cats Family (1909, published in Tilskueren)
• The Revenge of Truth (1926, published in Denmark)
• Seven Gothic Tales (1934 in USA, 1935 in Denmark)
• Out of Africa (1937 in Denmark and England, 1938 in USA) ISBN 0140009132)
• Winter's Tales (1942)
• The Angelic Avengers (1947)
• Last Tales (1957)
• Anecdotes of Destiny (1958)
• Shadows on the Grass (1960 in England and Denmark, 1961 in USA)
• Ehrengard (posthumous 1963, USA)
• Carnival: Entertainments and Posthumous Tales (posthumous 1977, USA)
• Daguerreotypes and Other Essays (posthumous 1979, USA)
• On Modern Marriage and Other Observations (posthumous 1986, USA)
• Letters from Africa, 1914 – 1931 (posthumous 1981, USA)
• Karen Blixen i Danmark: Breve 1931 – 1962 (posthumous 1996, Denmark)

Further Reading

Donelson, Linda ( ) Out of Isak Dinesen: Karen Blixen's Untold Story ISBN 0964389398

Trivia

Karen Blixen's grand nephew, Anders Westenholz, is also an accomplished writer, who among other things have written books about her and her literature.

External links

• Karen Blixen – Isak Dinesen website
• Isak Dinesen/Karen Blixen short biography
• Karen Blixen's Kenya
• Karen Blixen Museum, Denmark
• Karen Blixen Museum, Kenya
• The Paris Review Interview

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