E. Marlitt

E. Marlitt, born Friederieke Henriette Christiane Eugenie John ( born December 5, 1825 Arnstadt in Thuringia, † June 22, 1887 at Arnstadt ) was a German writer.

Life

Eugenie John was born as a daughter of the businessman John Ernst in Arnstadt and left early detect a vocal gift. The Princess Mathilde of Schwarzburg- Sondershausen let them train in Vienna for a singer. After the first stage successes in special Hausen, Linz, Graz and Lviv however Eugenie John had to give up the profession of a royal chamber singer because of deafness 1853. It was instead, 's reader and society lady with the Princess and accompanied her on her many travels. Financial problems forced the princess this later to limit their court and for John to lay off 1863. Since then, she lived with her ​​brother Alfred, who was high-school teacher in Arnstadt the family.

After she had already done the correspondence of the Duchess, the idea to devote himself entirely to writing emerged. She sent first stories to Leipzig to the family magazine The Gazebo. Under the pseudonym E. Marlitt appeared in 1865, a first novel by her in 1866 her first novel Goldelse, which immediately became a great success and Marlitt made ​​her the star author of the gazebo in which they published ten novels. Maybe is the pseudonym for My Arnstädter literature.

E. Marlitt was never married. From the proceeds of her novels who built the villa Marlitt in Arnstadt, in which she moved with her father in 1871. The last years were spent, suffering from arthritis, in a wheelchair. She died in 1887 in Arnstadt and was buried in the old cemetery there in the lower city wall in a grave.

Services

Her novels show that they knew life at court and loved their home Thuringia. Life at court was in a time of increasingly powerful bourgeoisie also for social and intellectual independence of women, which is why she was extremely popular especially in this part of readership.

As ideologically most interesting book Marlitts applies Countess Gisela. It contains everything you would expect from a Trivial Novel - love, crime, and a happy ending - but also criticism of corrupt politics and haughty nobility. The young Countess Gisela gradually learns to remove her snobbery by the love of a mysterious stranger and develops into a compassionate human being. The book was made ​​into a film in 1918.

It is regarded as the first best-selling author in the world and played a major role in ensuring that between 1865 and the mid-1880s, the number of subscribers of the gazebo from 100,000 to about 400,000 increased. Literary criticism has her work always judged ambiguous. On the one hand they 've Friedrich Spielhagen studied in detail, on the other hand it had applied the Cinderella recipe in her novels, is sometimes sensational, then become realistic or female sentimental again.

The writer Wilhelmine Heimburg was regarded as the legitimate successor of E. Marlitt. After her death, Heimburg was asked the last unfinished novel complete The Owl's Nest.

Appreciation

Marlitt honor was named in 1889 in Arnstadt a street after her and inaugurated in 1913 at the old cemetery in Arnstadt is a created by the Berlin sculptor Victor Seifert Marlitt Memorial. After 1945, the Marlitt was initially frowned upon in the Soviet occupation zone as well as in the later GDR ( " preacher of the subjects of the Spirit" ). At the instigation of the SED and the National Education Office in 1951 her monument from the Old Cemetery. In 1992 it was then placed mainly at the instigation Established in 1990, IG Marlitt again.

Works ( selection)

  • The Twelve Apostles. Leipzig 1865
  • Goldelse. Leipzig 1866
  • Bluebeard. Leipzig 1866
  • The secret of the old maid. Leipzig 1867
  • Countess Gisela. Leipzig 1869
  • Thuringian stories. Leipzig 1869
  • The Heideprinzeßchen. Leipzig 1871
  • The second woman. Leipzig 1873
  • In the house Councillor of Commerce. Leipzig 1877
  • In Schillingscourt. Leipzig 1880
  • Bailiff's maid. Leipzig 1881
  • The woman with the rubies. Leipzig 1885
  • The Owl House ( added from the manuscript and published by Wilhelmine Heimburg ), Leipzig 1888
  • Collected novels and short stories. 10 volumes, Keil's Nachf., Leipzig from 1888 to 1890 ( Volume 10 contains a description of life and work Wilhelmine Heimburg ).
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