Malwida von Meysenbug (28 October 1816 — 23 April 1903) was a German writer, her work including ''Memories of an Idealist'', the first volume of which she published anonymously in 1869. As well, she was a friend of

Friedrich Nietzsche Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (; or ; 15 October 1844 – 25 August 1900) was a German philosopher, prose poet, cultural critic, philologist, and composer whose work has exerted a profound influence on contemporary philosophy. He began his ...

and

Richard Wagner Wilhelm Richard Wagner ( ; ; 22 May 181313 February 1883) was a German composer, theatre director, polemicist, and conductor who is chiefly known for his operas (or, as some of his mature works were later known, "music dramas"). Unlike most op ...

, and met the French writer

Romain Rolland Romain Rolland (; 29 January 1866 – 30 December 1944) was a French dramatist, novelist, essayist, art historian and mystic who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1915 "as a tribute to the lofty idealism of his literary production a ...

in Rome in 1890. Von Meysenbug was born at

Kassel Kassel (; in Germany, spelled Cassel until 1926) is a city on the Fulda River in northern Hesse, Germany. It is the administrative seat of the Regierungsbezirk Kassel and the district of the same name and had 201,048 inhabitants in December 2020 ...

, Hesse. Her father Carl Rivalier descended from a family of French

Huguenots The Huguenots ( , also , ) were a religious group of French Protestants who held to the Reformed, or Calvinist, tradition of Protestantism. The term, which may be derived from the name of a Swiss political leader, the Genevan burgomaster B ...

, and received the title of Baron of Meysenbug from William I of Hesse-Kassel. The ninth of ten children, she broke with her family because of her political convictions. Two of her brothers made brilliant careers, one as a

minister of state Minister of State is a title borne by politicians in certain countries governed under a parliamentary system. In some countries a Minister of State is a Junior Minister of government, who is assigned to assist a specific Cabinet Minister. I ...

in Austria, and the other as Minister of the Karlsruhe. von Meysenbug, however, refused to appeal to her family and lived first by joining a free community in Hamburg, and then by immigrating in 1852 to England where she lived by teaching and translating works. There, she met the republicans

Ledru-Rollin Alexandre Auguste Ledru-Rollin (; 2 February 1807 – 31 December 1874) was a French lawyer, politician and one of the leaders of the French Revolution of 1848. Youth The grandson of Nicolas Philippe Ledru, the celebrated quack doctor known ...

Louis Blanc Louis Jean Joseph Charles Blanc (; ; 29 October 1811 – 6 December 1882) was a French politician and historian. A socialist who favored reforms, he called for the creation of cooperatives in order to guarantee employment for the urban poor. Alt ...

, and

Gottfried Kinkel Johann Gottfried Kinkel (11 August 1815 – 13 November 1882) was a German poet also noted for his revolutionary activities and his escape from a Prussian prison in Spandau with the help of his friend Carl Schurz. Early life He was born at Ober ...

, all political refugees; the young

Carl Schurz Carl Schurz (; March 2, 1829 – May 14, 1906) was a German revolutionary and an American statesman, journalist, and reformer. He immigrated to the United States after the German revolutions of 1848–1849 and became a prominent member of the new ...

also became acquainted with her there. In 1862 von Meysenbug went to Italy with Olga Herzen, the daughter of

Alexander Herzen Alexander Ivanovich Herzen (russian: Алекса́ндр Ива́нович Ге́рцен, translit=Alexándr Ivánovich Gértsen; ) was a Russian writer and thinker known as the "father of Russian socialism" and one of the main fathers of agra ...

, known as the "father of Russian socialism" (and whose daughters she taught) and resided there. Olga Herzen married Gabriel Monod in 1873 and established herself in France, but Malwida's poor health obstructed her from joining her. Von Meysenbug introduced Nietzsche to several of his friends, including Helene von Druskowitz. She invited

Paul Rée Paul Ludwig Carl Heinrich Rée (21 November 1849 – 28 October 1901) was a German author, physician, philosopher, and friend of Friedrich Nietzsche. Early life Rée was born in Bartelshagen, Province of Pomerania, Prussia on the noble est ...

and Nietzsche to

Sorrento Sorrento (, ; nap, Surriento ; la, Surrentum) is a town overlooking the Bay of Naples in Southern Italy. A popular tourist destination, Sorrento is located on the Sorrentine Peninsula at the south-eastern terminus of the Circumvesuviana rail ...

, a town which overlooks the bay of

Naples Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adm ...

, in the autumn of 1876. There, Rée wrote ''The Origins of Moral Sensations'', and Nietzsche began '' Human, All Too Human''. In 1890, the late nineteenth century English novelist

George Gissing George Robert Gissing (; 22 November 1857 – 28 December 1903) was an English novelist, who published 23 novels between 1880 and 1903. His best-known works have reappeared in modern editions. They include '' The Nether World'' (1889), ''New Gru ...

wrote in his diary that he was 're-reading Memoiren einer Idealisten'. In 1901 von Meysenbug was the first woman ever to be nominated for the

Nobel Prize in Literature ) , image = Nobel Prize.png , caption = , awarded_for = Outstanding contributions in literature , presenter = Swedish Academy , holder = Annie Ernaux (2022) , location = Stockholm, Sweden , year = 1901 , ...

after having been nominated by the French historian Gabriel Monod. Malwida von Meysenbug died in Rome in 1903 and is buried in the Protestant Cemetery in the city.

References

* *

. New York: McClure Publ. Co. 1907. Schurz discusses his friendship with Malwida von Meysenbug in Chapter 14 of Volume One.

External links

* https://web.archive.org/web/20070610170928/http://sophie.byu.edu/sophiejournal/thesis/Monte_Gardiner_thesis.pdf - translation of ''Memoirs of an Idealist'' trans. Monte Gardiner {{DEFAULTSORT:Meysenbug, Malvida 1816 births 1903 deaths Writers from Kassel German baronesses German expatriates in Italy German religious humanists Burials in the Protestant Cemetery, Rome German women writers 19th-century women writers

See also

References

External links