Charlotta Antonia "Charlotte Antoinette" Seuerling (1782/1784 – 25 September 1828), was a
blind Swedish
Swedish or ' may refer to:
Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically:
* Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland
** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...
concert singer,
harpsichordist
A harpsichordist is a person who plays the harpsichord. Harpsichordists may play as soloists, as accompanists, as chamber musicians, or as members of an orchestra, or some combination of these roles. Solo harpsichordists may play unaccompanied son ...
, composer and poet, known as "The Blind Song-Maiden". She was active in Sweden,
Finland
Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...
and Russia. Her last name is also spelled as ''Seijerling'' and ''Seyerling''. Her first name was Charlotta Antoinetta (or Antonia), but in the French fashion of the time, she was often called Charlotte Antoinette. She was the author of the popular song "".
Early life
Charlotta Seuerling was the daughter of
Carl Gottfried Seuerling and
Margareta Seuerling
Margaret(h)a Seuerling née ''Lindahl'' (1747–1820) was a Swedish actress and Theatre director in a travelling theatre company, perhaps the most known travelling actress of her time in Scandinavia, active in both Sweden and Finland. She was on ...
, actors and directors of a travelling theatre company. She became blind at the age of four due to an incompetent
smallpox
Smallpox was an infectious disease caused by variola virus (often called smallpox virus) which belongs to the genus Orthopoxvirus. The last naturally occurring case was diagnosed in October 1977, and the World Health Organization (WHO) c ...
vaccination. Four years later, at the age of eight, she contracted smallpox, and the scars made people consider her ugly, which made her shy.
As a child, she contributed to the household by singing songs she had composed herself to the music of the
harp
The harp is a stringed musical instrument that has a number of individual strings running at an angle to its soundboard; the strings are plucked with the fingers. Harps can be made and played in various ways, standing or sitting, and in orche ...
in her parents' theatre. She was widely advertised as a wonder: the singing and music-making blind child. She also played the guitar. Her father was very ambitious and upheld a high standard in the plays at his theatre company, often performing famous plays from the continent, such as plays by Shakespeare. Her mother was a good actress who became the first Swedish-speaking Juliet in ''
Romeo and Juliet
''Romeo and Juliet'' is a Shakespearean tragedy, tragedy written by William Shakespeare early in his career about the romance between two Italian youths from feuding families. It was among Shakespeare's most popular plays during his lifetim ...
'' in
Norrköping
Norrköping (; ) is a city in the province of Östergötland in eastern Sweden and the seat of Norrköping Municipality, Östergötland County, about 160 km southwest of the national capital Stockholm, 40 km east of county seat Linköp ...
in 1776. They toured in both Sweden and Finland, and even performed at the Swedish court on at least one occasion. They were popular among the public, but often had financial difficulties and problems with irregular staff – during periods of staff shortage they were forced to use dolls on stage. Charlotta's sister Carolina Fredrika Seuerling was also an actress, but she married a vicar in 1789 and retired.
Career
After the death of her father in 1795, her mother took sole charge of the theatre and moved to
Finland
Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...
, where there was less competition, to tour as the director of her troupe. She sent her daughter to
Stockholm
Stockholm () is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in Sweden by population, largest city of Sweden as well as the List of urban areas in the Nordic countries, largest urban area in Scandinavia. Approximately 980,000 people liv ...
to have an eye operation by the famous doctors Rislachi and af Bjerkèn, that was promised to give her eyesight back. The operation, however, failed, and Seuerling did not have the money to join her mother in Finland. She was thereby forced to stay in a boardinghouse for poor women.
Her musical talent was discovered in 1806 by
Pär Aron Borg
Pär Aron Borg (4 July 1776 – 22 April 1839) was a Swedish educator and a pioneer in the education for the blind and deaf.
Biography
Borg was born in the parish of Avesta in Dalarna, Sweden. After studies at Uppsala University (1796–1798) ...
, who gave piano lessons to the poor women of the boardinghouse piano playing. He was impressed by her ability and accepted her as his private student in musical theory in 1807, giving her a home with his family. Impressed by her ability to learn, he added more subjects, and soon, she excelled in the natural sciences and languages. She also composed her own poems, and created a device by which she could write her poems down. Borg invented a system of blind writing, by which she could learn to read notes, German and French.
She was uninterested in subjects traditionally given to her gender, and Borg published a pamphlet where he argued that women were capable of learning subjects from which they were banned. Borg also taught her medicine; also in this subject, she was so successful that he argued that women would be equally and even better as medical doctors than men.
Inspired by her ability to learn, in 1808 Borg founded the first institute for the blind and the deaf in Sweden,
Manillaskolan. Seuerling was his first student, and she is sometimes regarded as the first blind student of her country.
In 1808, Borg held a demonstration during which Seuerling displayed her ability and talent in reading and writing, playing the harp and clavichord, reading notes, speaking French and German, as well as weaving, sewing and knitting. During this time period in history, blind and deaf people were often thought to be unable to be educated, and the demonstration of Charlotta Seuerling was of great help to the institute. Her ability attracted attention, and much of the support of the newly founded institute is attributed to her.
On 5 July 1809, Borg held a public exam for his pupils in front of five hundred guests, among them the queen,
Hedvig Elisabeth Charlotte of Holstein-Gottorp
Hedwig Elisabeth Charlotte of Holstein-Gottorp ( sv, Hedvig Elisabet Charlotta; 22 March 1759 – 20 June 1818) was Queen of Sweden and Norway as the consort of King Charles XIII and II. She was also a famed diarist, memoirist and wit. She is k ...
. Charlotta Seuerling performed her own song: "I, who do not enjoy the pleasure of seeing the treasured Queen". Upon this, the queen complimented her, and Charlotta, entirely in the taste of the time, dropped her harp and fainted with happiness. She found great success. The scene was described in a poem by Gustaf Snoilsky: ''Upon this the blind songmaiden was moved / and by her gratitute stagger...'', which led to her being known as the "Songmaiden".
After this, the queen became the protector of the institute, and it was also given government support.
Seuerling wrote the song "" (English: Song in a Moment of melancholy) for harp music. The song was very popular in Sweden during the entire 19th century. It teams depression, suicide and betrayal, but also of the happiness of friendship and the hope it gives, interpreted as her own feelings when she was given tuition by Pär Aron Borg and her life changed. It begins: ''No ray of light shine from above, the night was terrifying and darkness surrounded me...'', and ends: "...then as the first ray of dawn a light broke through the mist and friendship came; and with its radiance calm and joy filled my heart."
In 1810, Seuerling joined her mother in Finland, which was now a part of Russia, and performed in her mother's theatre troupe. In 1811, her mother met with financial difficulties. They were then both put under the protection of the Russian empress dowager,
Maria Feodorovna (Sophie Dorothea of Württemberg)
Maria Feodorovna (russian: Мария Фёдоровна; née Duchess Sophie Dorothea of Württemberg; 25 October 1759 – 5 November 1828 S 24 October became Empress consort of Russia as the second wife of Emperor Paul I. She founded the Offi ...
, who had heard of Seuerlings reputation as a harpist, and each received a pension of 600 rubles. Charlotta moved to Russia, where she assisted in the development of
Valentin Haüy
Valentin Haüy (pronounced ; 13 November 1745 – 19 March 1822) was the founder, in 1785, of the first school for the blind, the Institute for Blind Youth in Paris (now Institut National des Jeunes Aveugles, or the ''National Institute for th ...
s Institute for the Blind in
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...
, where she received a position.
Death and legacy
Seuerling returned to Sweden in 1823, and died five years later.
Seuerling's harp, letters, and poems written by her hand are kept at
Stockholm Music Museum
The Stockholm Music Museum was founded in 1899 (then named ”Musikhistoriska museet”), inspired by an exhibition of theatre and music which was part of the great Stockholm art and industry exhibition of 1897. Via donations and appeals for gift ...
. Among her writings is also a writing test, which is the oldest example of blind text in Sweden, written with a writing device constructed for the blind before
Braille
Braille (Pronounced: ) is a tactile writing system used by people who are visually impaired, including people who are Blindness, blind, Deafblindness, deafblind or who have low vision. It can be read either on Paper embossing, embossed paper ...
, kept at the
National Library of Sweden
The National Library of Sweden ( sv, Kungliga biblioteket, ''KB'', meaning "the Royal Library") is Sweden's national library. It collects and preserves all domestic printed and audio-visual materials in Swedish, as well as content with Swedish ...
.
Her song "" was published anonymously many times after 1828, and under her name in the song book (1852) alongside works by
Johan Olof Wallin
Johan Olof Wallin, (15 October 1779 – 30 June 1839), was a Swedish minister, orator, poet and later Church of Sweden Archbishop of Uppsala, Sweden between 1837–1839. He is most remembered today for his hymns.
Early life
He was born in St ...
,
Fredrika Bremer
Fredrika Bremer (17 August 1801 – 31 December 1865) was a Finnish-born Swedish writer and feminist reformer. Her ''Sketches of Everyday Life'' were wildly popular in Britain and the United States during the 1840s and 1850s and she is re ...
and
Gunnar Wennerberg
Gunnar Wennerberg (2 October 1817 – 24 August 1901) was a Swedish poet, composer and politician.
Biography
Wennerberg was the son of the vicar of the town of Lidköping in Västergötland, went to '' gymnasium'' in the cathedral town of Skara ...
.
See also
*
Maria Theresia von Paradis
Maria Theresia von Paradis (May 15, 1759 – February 1, 1824) was an Austrian musician and composer who lost her sight at an early age, and for whom her close friend Mozart may have written his Piano Concerto No. 18 in B-flat major. She was al ...
*
Pauline Åhman
References
* Carl Christoffer Gjörwell: ''Brefväxling, Volym 5–6''
* Birger Schöldström: ''Mörkt och Ljust 1893''
* Carin Österberg: Svenska kvinnor: Föregångare, nyskapare (Swedish women: Predecessors, pioneers) 1990
* Beatrice Christenssen Sköld (Swedish): ''Valentin Haüy blindpedagogikens fader (Valentin Haüy the father of blind learning)''
* Kjell Dellert: ''Synskadades Museum''
* Birger Schöldström: Mörkt och Ljust 1893 (Darkness and Light)
* Axel Nelson: ''Manillahistoria, Nordisk Tidskrift för Dövundervisningen (NTD) nr 3, 1989.'' (History of Manilla, Nordic script for teaching the deaf) (Swedish)
* Axel Nelson: ''Utblickar kring en sprucken harpa, NTD nr 3, 1988''. (Contemplations from a broken harp) (Swedish)
* Axel Nelson: ''Några Glimtar ur Dövas historia.'' (Peeks in to the history of the Deaf) (Swedish)
* Axel Nelson: ''Nya Glimtar ur dövas historia.'' (New Peeks in to the history of the deaf) (Swedish)
External links
Charlotte Seuerling, den blinda harpospelerskan.(Biography in Swedish, with an image.)
20:e årg. 1901
Per Aron Borg och Manilla
{{DEFAULTSORT:Seuerling, Charlotta
1780s births
1828 deaths
19th-century classical composers
19th-century Swedish actresses
19th-century Swedish musicians
19th-century Swedish women musicians
19th-century Swedish women writers
Blind classical musicians
Blind writers
Finnish stage actresses
Swedish classical composers
Swedish women singers
Swedish stage actresses
Swedish women poets
Swedish women classical composers
19th-century women composers